Anyone controlling logic with a Mackie D8B?

If you want to do this primarily to control Logic, I wouldn't recommend it.

You can search the archives here as others have done this before, but it's no Mackie Control. As far as I recall, the control surface layer is not very capable, and is I believe limited to a fixed eight channels.

I'd recommend a Mackie Control system over a d8b any day.

I can give you some advice on your first 2 questions, but I'd need to know what interface you're using.

You should pay the Mackie d8b forums a visit:
http://forums.mackie.com/scripts/forum/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=forum;f=1

Make sure you have the latest d8b software as it includes a HUI emulation layer which is what you'll be using if you go this route.

Hi sdeb,

Great, thanks for that info.

I've had three D8B's in my time. I L-O-V-E-D them. They sound amazing, the EQ's are extremely musical. And as I'm writing this I'm reminded of how much I miss having one. It's a great piece of gear, and it'll greatly enhance your recording experience. You can select between two sets of speakers with independent volume, have hardware faders and pan which is always fantastic, automation, extremely low latency (better than a lot of more recent gear), realtime plugins including EQ, reverb, and so on. And yes, tons of meters! So you won't regret owning one until...

...well, let's consider what it is: it's an 11-year old piece of gear for which Mackie is fast running out of spare parts. And what parts they do have left in their inventory can be very expensive. What I'm getting at is this: unless you're lucky enough to get a really good one, they do have a tendency to fail. That's the reason I've had three of them over the years. And being that you said you're a newbie, it might not be the right thing to start off with.

Let's look at the Apogee for a second...

!http://www.apogeedigital.com/images/duet rearpanel419.jpg!

You have a total of two inputs and two outputs from the Duet (which is your interface). (I'm excluding the Duet's mic inputs for now for reasons which I won't get into atm). Anyway, unless you were tracking bands, or had lots of outboard gear, the D8B is kind of overkill. Now, that's OK, but you won't be getting the most out of it with your current level of gear.

Now, on the positive side, you can use the D8B as a normal mixing board and run its outputs into the Duet. This way you can track yourself live and apply effects in realtime (as opposed to Logic, which can introduce latency) while you're recording. Playback of Logic would be by way of the Duet playing into a set of returns on the Mackie. So that's all fine. But at the end of the day you're going to have this huge piece of gear sitting there running up your electricity bill to act as a 2-in, 2-out mixer.

And as BJ said, as a control surface it's less than ideal. It's fairly incompatible with Logic too. Basically, it's pretty useless in that regard. Trust me, I've tried.

So I hope I've been able to successfully talk you out of this, much as I hate to do it because, as I said, I love that thing.

Message was edited by: iSchwartz

If looks is your thing, then buy one, turn it on and enjoy the lightshow. :shrugs:

However, if you actually want to do stuff, a bank of MCU's is much better. The d8b as a control surface for Logic is a world of pain and I think you'd probably regret buying one, if this is what you mainly want to use it for.

iS has more experience here, and I can't really offer any more solid info without going to research it myself - but that is my general impression based on past form.

Sadly, I felt I had to annoy you. 🙂

Considering what you said, here's my feeling: go for it! Seriously, I mean it. If it's going to make you feel good then you should do what makes you feel good. Not all decisions have to be practical. And you WILL get a great feeling by seeing that thing in your studio. I know I did.

If you can, get one that has at least one OPT-8 card (the optical card) and --- if you can --- the Apogee Clock card. The reason for this is so that you can expand your setup at some point in the future (e.g., go beyond the limitations of the Duet and be able to interface with other, er, interfaces very easily).

I'll tell you another passion story...

Two years ago I dabbled in learning the bassoon. Well, "dabbled" might be an understatement. I rented a bassoon and practiced intensely for 3 months. I even took some lessons (attempting to be self-taught on the bassoon is, I discovered, a recipe for disaster, especially with respect to my neighbors). Anyway, when my 3-month rental period was up I returned it to the store and missed it dearly ever since. So just a few months ago I found one on eBay for $350 and snagged it. Did I need it? No. But did I w-a-n-t it? Heck yeah.

So the moral of the story: go with your passion. I've shared with you the potential downside. And if you get lucky you won't have one for many years to come.

Do yourself two favors:

a) join the D8B forum linked to above
b) if, in your area you're prone to power outages or blackouts, get yourself (at the very least) a high quality surge strip, or better yet, an uninterruptible power supply (with line filtering) to keep your power supply healthy in the event of power company glitches.

Having OS 5.1 is good!

The standard cards are probably 2 MFX cards and the internal clock card. You'll be 100% fine if that's all it comes with. But for the future you will likely want to get a DIO-8 (optical card) and an Apogee clock card.

See if the seller is has the software (on 3.5" floppy disks) and manuals too.

sdeb wrote:
I'm now, seriously considering getting a proper HDR for it as well.

\[robot voice] Redundant. Redundant. Error! Error! Cannot compute. Redundant.

This could be completely wrong, but this is what I'm hoping I'll be able to do :

1) Use the D8B for analogue in, with mic pre amps, etc.

Yes!

2) Use the D8B's HUI layer to control logic using only the first 8 channels

GAH, no! Please, don't do it. No... No... Don't do it... NOOOOO!!! \[sound of screams heard fading into the distance as our protagonist slips off the cliff's edge and falls helplessly into the abyss]

3) Use logic primarily for it's midi sequencer and instrument library, etc.

OK, and...

4) Record all audio onto the HDR using the remaining tracks (after using up the first 8 strips for logic) completely bypassing logic.

Working with an HDR will offer no advantage over working with Logic. The recording and editing capabilities of Logic far surpass anything you can do with an HDR in just about every respect.

If the above is correct, my question are :

1) Will i be able to route the audio destined-for/coming-from the HDR through logic's effects, such as using logics guitar rig channel strips?

Yes, but not without a lot of latency.

2) Will each of logic's channels output through a single channel strip on the D8B, or will I only get the entire stereo signal out of logic and back into the desk?

Being that you have the Duet, the greatest number of channels you'd be able to output from Logic is "2". So the answer is "no".

The only way you'd be able to do that is if you got an interface that offered you (say) 24 outputs. Something like a MOTU 2408 which (if memory serves) has 3 optical outputs (8 channels each). Then you'd need three DIO-8 or OPT-8 cards -- one per optical out of the MOTU -- and then you could have those 24 channels come up on discreet inputs on the D8B.

Everyone who has replied with some useful information however their answers may be coloured by bad experiences.

I have a D8B acquired in last year running with an Alesis HD24, Logic 9.1 and I can do quite a bit with Logic. Heres the lowdown on getting it working:

1. Ensure your D8B has 5.1
2. You need a MIDI interface as the In/Outs of D8B. Mac and any HD recorder have to be connected in a circuit
3. You need to engage HUI mode in the D8B
4. You have to set up a HUI controller in Logic

There are many more settings to refine but trust me if you take your time and use the Mackie forum you could have a great setup. Mine controls Logic channels including Volume, Pan, Solo, Mute, Inserts, Auxes and Transport controls. Yes its 8 channels at a time in a separate layer but you can bank or use the arrow key in Logic to step up a track at a time.

For super setups running audio from Logic you could (providing you have the ADAT cards) run audio back from Logic using a Presonus Firestudio or RME RAyDat as an ADAT interface from the Mac. However do not be totally put off the HD recorder. Firstly there are tools to get the audio into the Mac to edit and back again and secondly by using it for audio playback you cut down on CPU load.