Pro Tools 9 and the Pro Tools Mbox Family
Eleven Rack
Figure A6.1 Eleven Rack: Pro Tools recording system for guitar players.
Going back a couple of years, Digidesign released a plug-in called Eleven that modeled classic guitar amps and eff ects. Digidesign’s Eleven Rack now lets you run these on its internal DSP to provide higher quality with virtually no latency – and you also avoid loading your computer’s CPU.
Designed with guitarists in mind, Eleven Rack is a 2U rack-mount unit that has just about everything a guitar player could wish for as far as software emulations of stomp-boxes and studio effects, classic guitar amps and cabinets, and typical studio microphones that would be used to record these are concerned.
Just hook up the mono or stereo outputs to your guitar amp or a PA system, plug your guitar in, switch through the presets in ‘Rig’ mode, and you will fi nd instant gratifi cation from the classic guitar amp tones inspired by Fender, Vox, Marshall, Soldano, and Mesa/Boogie, and the sought-after classic stomp-box tones inspired by eff ects from MXR, Electro-Harmonix, Univox, and others. There are 104 preset Rigs and 104 user-memory locations that you can use to store edited versions of these, or your own custom rigs.
The amps and eff ects are emulated using circuit-modeling techniques, while convolution-based techniques are used to deliver tremendous realism from the speaker cabinet emulations and from the classic dynamic, condenser, and ribbon microphone emulations. APPENDIX 6
As most electric guitar players are aware, when you plug a guitar into anything other than a real guitar amp, the dynamic response just doesn’t feel the same. This is because the electrical impedance of a real guitar amplifi er’s inputs, or that of an eff ects unit, has an enormous eff ect on the sound of the guitar. Eleven Rack addresses this problem very eff ectively by replicating the input impedances of classic amps and eff ects – implementing this using its own, proprietary, ‘True-Z’ analogue circuitry. The impedance value of the input will change automatically according to which eff ects pedal or amp model is first in the signal chain, and these settings are stored with each preset. You can manually adjust the impedance value to suit whichever guitar you are playing, and store your own settings with each preset.
Eleven also has a microphone input and A/D-D/A converters that are of similar quality to those in the 003 Rack Plus.
Interfacing with Pro Tools
Eleven Rack can be used as an interface to Pro Tools, connecting via USB, and it is supplied with a copy of Pro Tools 8 LE software. There is an Eleven window in the Windows menu of Pro Tools that lets you edit the parameters inside Eleven Rack from your computer screen. Editing Eleven Rack from within Pro Tools in this way is much quicker and easier than using the front panel controls because you can see more parameters at the same time, and get around these using a mouse more quickly.
However, Eleven Rack cannot be used as an interface to Pro Tools|HD. To use it with Pro Tools|HD hardware, or with another interface, you would still connect Eleven Rack to the computer via USB so that the Control window can be used from within Pro Tools, but you would also need to make audio I/O connections to your Pro Tools|HD or other interface using the digital I/O, for example.
Re-amping
Quite often, producers and remixers will want to change the sound of a recorded guitar track at the mixing stage. When you record audio from Eleven Rack into Pro Tools, the Rig data that you have used are also stored with the audio regions so that you can recall these data at any time and make further tweaks.
Eleven Rack also has excellent features for ‘re-amping’. This technique is where you have previously recorded a guitar track, DI’ed cleanly into Pro Tools, and you want to feed this back out of Pro Tools into an amplifi er and maybe into Pro Tools 9 and the Pro Tools Mbox Family
some eff ects units in your studio, re-recording this through a microphone back onto another track in Pro Tools.
Eleven Rack is set up by default to record a ‘clean’ (unprocessed) guitar track alongside the track that is processed using the software emulations. It is easy to return this unprocessed guitar track back through the Eleven Rack via USB, add further processing inside the Eleven Rack (choosing a diff erent combination of amp, cabinet, eff ects, and microphone) and record this back into another Pro Tools track – ‘re-amping’ using Eleven Rack.
Or you can feed this unprocessed track from Pro Tools out of the Eleven Rack’s guitar amplifier 1/4” jack output into a real amplifier in your studio, put a microphone in front of this, and record this back into Pro Tools via the Eleven Rack’s microphone input. This is what is usually meant by the term ‘re-amping’, that is feeding a previously recorded track back through an amplifier and re-recording the sound of this through a microphone. The Amps
The designers went to great lengths to make the whole experience of playing through Eleven Rack satisfying for guitar players, as Digidesign’s website explains:
Figure A6.2 Eleven Rack amps. APPENDIX 6
We spent years scouting a connoisseur’s collection of vintage and modern amps and cabinets, paying special attention to choosing amps that represented the best of their generation and remained unmodified from their original design. We then painstakingly inspected every component, took detailed measurements, and captured every stage of the signal path — point to point.
We incorporated nuances like power amp sag, ghost notes, and cabinet resonance that other amp modeling developers overlooked, giving our clones the truly multi- dimensional tone and hyper-realistic response previously only achievable by mic’ing a real amp.
We set out to invent an input circuit that re-creates the electronic relationship between your guitar and an actual amp or effect. This can’t be done digitally — so we developed a unique True-Z direct input that automatically adjusts the input impedance to match that of the particular amp/effects rig signal chain. Thanks to the True-Z input, plugging into Eleven Rack sounds and feels just like plugging into a real amp or effect.
Using convolution processing, we captured the exact sound of the cabinets and mics used to create the tone of a mic’d combo — instead of using EQ filters to “fake” this sound the way other amp modeling solutions have done.
We enlisted guitar recording expert John Cuniberti (Platinum and Gold recording engineer/producer and inventor of the Reamp box) to ensure the mic’ing techniques used during development were absolutely top notch.
When you play guitar through Eleven Rack, you will appreciate all this painstaking design work, which has paid off extremely well in my opinion.
Guitar amp emulations are based on:
’59 Fender Bassman
’59 Fender Tweed Deluxe
’64 Fender Black Face Deluxe Reverb Normal Channel
’64 Fender Black Face Deluxe Reverb Vibrato Channel
’67 Fender Black Face Twin Reverb
’66 VOX AC30 Top Boost
’69 Marshall 1959 100 Watt Super Lead Plexiglas Head Pro Tools 9 and the Pro Tools Mbox Family
’82 Marshall JCM800 2203 100-Watt Head
’89 Soldano SLO100 Super Lead Overdrive Head Clean Channel
’89 Soldano SLO100 Super Lead Overdrive Head Crunch Channel
’89 Soldano SLO100 Super Lead Overdrive Head Overdrive Channel
’85 Mesa/Boogie Mark IIc+ Drive Channel
’92 Mesa/Boogie Dual Rectifi er Head Vintage Channel
’92 Mesa/Boogie Dual Rectifi er Head Modern Channel
Avid Custom Vintage Crunch
Avid Custom Modern Overdrive The Effects
Figure A6.3 Pedals, stomp boxes, typical guitar eff ects units recreated in software.
Eleven Rack also emulates an assortment of vintage and classic effects processors – from highly sought-after stomp-box eff ects to high-end studio processors culled from Avid’s Pro Tools|HD TDM plug-in range. APPENDIX 6
Eff ects emulations are based on:
Spring Reverb (based on the Fender Deluxe Reverb)
Green JRC Overdrive (based on the Ibanez TS-808)
Tri-Knob Fuzz (based on the Electro Harmonix Big Muff Pi)
Black Op Distortion (based on the ProCo Rat)
Shine Wah (based on the VOX V-846)
C1 Chorus/Vibrato (based on the Boss CE-1)
Orange Phaser (based on the MXR Phase 90)
EP Tape Echo (based on the Maestro Echoplex EP-3)
BBD Delay (based on the Electro Harmonix Deluxe Memory Man)
Grey Compressor (based on the Ross Compressor)
Vibe Phaser (based on the Univox Uni-Vibe)
Black Wah (based on the Thomas Organ CB-95 Crybaby)
Flanger
Roto Speaker
Volume Pedal
Eleven SR (Stereo Reverb)
Graphic EQ
Tuner The Speaker Cabinets
Eleven Rack has an option to automatically match the selected amp to a speaker. A total of seven-speaker cabinets are provided to match the amplifi ers, ranging from 1 × 12 Fender to 4 × 12 Marshall types.
Speaker cabinet emulations are based on:
’59 Fender Bassman 4 × 10” with Jensen P10Qs Pro Tools 9 and the Pro Tools Mbox Family
’59 Fender Tweed Deluxe 1 × 12” with Jensen P12Q
’64 Fender Black Face Deluxe Reverb 1 × 12” with Jensen P12N
’67 Fender Black Face Twin Reverb 2 × 12” with Jensen C12Ns
’66 VOX AC30 2 × 12” with Celestion Alnico Blues
’68 Marshall 1960A with Celestion G12H ‘Greenbacks’
’06 Marshall 1960AV 4 × 12” with Celestion Vintage 30s The Microphones
Eight microphone emulations are provided, each with two positions: on axis or off axis.
Microphone emulations are based on:
Shure SM7 Dynamic Microphone
Shure SM57 Unidyne III Dynamic Microphone
Sennheiser MD 409 Dynamic Microphone
Sennheiser MD 421 Dynamic Microphone
Neumann U67 Condenser Microphone
Neumann U87 Condenser Microphone
AKG C 414 EB Condenser Microphone
Royer 121 Ribbon Microphone Eleven Rack Front Panel
Figure A6.4 Front panel. APPENDIX 6
The front panel of the rack is coloured orange – perhaps paying homage to the legendary Orange amplifi ers that were designed by my good friend Matt Mathias up in Huddersfi eld in the North of England back in the late 1960s. (It’s a shame that Eleven Rack does not include any emulations of Orange amps and cabinets!)
The build quality of the Eleven Rack is fi rst-rate, with chunky knobs, sturdy buttons, and switches. The buttons even light up in different colours, red, green, or amber depending on function, which is a great help when using Eleven Rack on stage in low lighting conditions.
The display screen is quite small, but is OK to work with, and it is easy enough to scroll through settings using the small Scroll Wheel knob. There is an XLR microphone input with an input gain control plus 48V phantom power and pad switches, along with three 1/4” jacks – one each to provide a headphone output, a mono (left channel) output to an amplifi er, and a guitar input.
The front panel also has a large and easily readable backlit display surrounded by switches and knobs, whose function depends on what the display currently shows. In normal mode, the ‘Scroll’ encoder allows you to browse among the diff erent presets (about 100), and the ‘SW1’ switch allows you to select the different display types, whereas the knobs under the display are assigned to the diff erent amp settings. The knobs are not motorized, but they turn on orange when close to the saved value and red otherwise. Eleven Rack Rear Panel
Figure A6.5 Rear panel.
The rear panel has an AC power socket and a high-speed USB 2.0 connection, a pair of XLRs for AES/EBU and a pair of RCA jacks for S/PDIF digital I/O, with Pro Tools 9 and the Pro Tools Mbox Family
a 1/4” jack socket to allow connection of an Expression pedal or Footswitch. A pair of MIDI In and Out/Thru connectors and a 1/4” jack socket carrying a mono (right channel) output to an amplifier are provided. There are two channels provided for FX Loop send and return via 1/4” jacks and a pair of 1/4” jacks for line-level inputs that can be switched between +4 dBu and −10 dBv operation. A pair of stereo balanced XLRs is provided to carry the main audio output. MIDI
If you are using Eleven Rack as a stand-alone guitar processor, you can connect either a footswitch or a pedal to the jack socket on the back panel so that you can step through the Rig presets or use a pedal as a volume or wah-wah or modulation eff ects pedal.
Of course, the MIDI implementation on the Eleven Rack is very comprehensive – just about every parameter can be controlled via MIDI. So it makes more sense to connect a MIDI pedal board if you have one. This way you can do a lot more than with just one footswitch or continuous controller pedal.
You can also connect any type of MIDI sequencer (Pro Tools, Logic, Cubase, or even a hardware sequencer) to Eleven Rack and use MIDI to trigger patch changes and controller changes automatically. Using Eleven Rack with Pro Tools
An Eleven Rack control window is provided that lets you create and edit Eleven Rack rig settings right from within the Pro Tools software.
Pro Tools LE 8 is provided for recording, editing, and mixing, and Eleven Rack records both dry and processed signals simultaneously, with recallable rig settings embedded into audio fi les.
The Pro Tools software includes more than 70 eff ects, including reverb, delay, chorus, distortion, fl anger, phaser, reverse, EQ, and compression.
It also has a collection of virtual instruments that can be used to create backing tracks, including Boom drum machine and sequencer, DB-33 tonewheel organ emulator with rotating speaker simulation, Mini Grand acoustic grand piano, Vacuum monophonic vacuum tube synthesizer, Xpand! 2 multitimbral synth and sample workstation, Structure Free sample player, and FXpansion BFD Lite acoustic drum module. APPENDIX 6
Figure A6.6 Eleven Rack control window for Pro Tools.
Pro Tools 9 and the Pro Tools Mbox Family
In Q1 2011 Avid began shipping the Pro Tools Mbox Family products that were fi rst introduced in 2010 with Pro Tools 9 software.
The Pro Tools Mbox Family products (third-generation Mbox, Mbox Mini, and Mbox Pro) continued to come bundled with Pro Tools LE 8.0.4 software until the end of 2010. In December 2010, the Avid website informed: ‘We will continue to support Pro Tools LE software with customer service (CS) updates, but will no longer be developing any new releases beyond that. We are off ering Pro Tools LE owners the opportunity to “crossgrade” to the new Pro Tools 9 software for $249 (vs. paying $599 regular price for new Pro Tools 9 software)’.
According to AVID, ‘Pro Tools Mbox boasts the same professional-grade soft-clip limiter circuit found in the high-end Pro Tools|HD 192 I/O audio interface, so you can track much hotter signals without overloading the inputs and clipping. Built-in reverb helps you deliver more inspiring vocal Pro Tools 9 and the Pro Tools Mbox Family
and instrumental performances—without taxing your computer processor. The integrated guitar tuner enables you to tune your guitar, bass, and other instruments directly from the interface. And a Pro Tools multi-function button makes it easy to access common software parameters—like tap session tempo, start/stop record, and create a new track—right from the front of the interface.
All-new drivers provide superior performance with Logic, Live, Record, Reason, Fruity Loops, Cubase, Nuendo, Sonar, and more. So go ahead, use your favorite third-party DAW from start to fi nish—or record with the included Pro Tools LE software to ensure your sessions are compatible with pro studios around the world’. Pro Tools Mbox
Pro Tools Mbox packs a wide range of analogue and digital I/O connections into a mobile form factor. It uses a USB 2.0 connection to the computer and takes its power from this, so it is ideal for use with a laptop as part of a portable system. It features a built-in guitar tuner and also has onboard DSP that off ers fl exible cue mixing and reverb eff ects. Compatible with most major audio software (Pro Tools LE, Logic, Live, Cubase, and more), it can handle up to 24-bit, 96 kHz sample rates.
Front Panel At the left-hand side you will fi nd two 1/4” DI instrument-level inputs with associated Gain controls, selector buttons, and Soft-limit buttons.
To the right of these, there is an assignable Pro Tools multi-function button that gives you fast access to software functions and a button to enable the 48-volt phantom power for the microphone inputs.
A 1/4” stereo headphone output with associated volume control is provided within the Monitor control section at the right-hand side of the front panel,
Figure A6.7 Pro Tools Mbox front panel. APPENDIX 6
along with Mono and Dim button switches and a large rotary volume control for the listening level.
Rear Panel Here you will fi nd MIDI input and MIDI output connectors (one of each) and a USB 2.0 connector that allows the Mbox to communicate with your computer and also takes power from the computer for the Mbox.
There are four simultaneous channels of audio input and output in total: two XLR mic/line combo inputs with 48 V phantom power, two balanced 1/4” monitor outputs, and stereo S/PDIF digital input and outputs.
Figure A6.8 Pro Tools Mbox rear panel.
Pro Tools Mbox Mini
Mbox Mini is a compact audio interface that uses a bus-powered USB connection that takes its power from a connected computer, typically a laptop – which is ideal as part of a small portable setup. It can handle up to 24-bit, 48 kHz sample rates and is compatible with most major audio software (Pro Tools LE/9, Logic, Live, Cubase, and more).
Front Panel At the left-hand side, you will fi nd a pair of Gain controls for the analogue inputs with associated LED indicators to show clipping and whether or not the 48-volt phantom power is active.
To the right of these you will find a Mix control that lets you blend the input signal with the playback from Pro Tools so you have no latency when overdubbing to existing recordings that you play back because you hear the input signal directly without routing this through the computer. Pro Tools 9 and the Pro Tools Mbox Family
Underneath the Mix control there is a 1/4” stereo headphone output and to the right of this a dedicated monitor volume knob is provided.
Figure A6.9 Pro Tools Mbox Mini front panel.
Rear Panel Here you will fi nd a USB 1.1 connector, a pair of balanced 1/4” monitor outputs, a XLR mic/line combo input with 48 V phantom power, and two 1/4” instrument inputs (1 DI, 1 line level/DI).
The way this works is that you can use the mic/line combo input switched to line level together with the Line/DI in/out switched to line level when you want to connect a two-channel line-level source, such as a CD-player, an external mixer, or whatever.
Or you can connect one microphone and one instrument such as a guitar. Or you can connect two instrument-level signals, such as the stereo outputs from a synthesizer or keyboard.
So although there are a limited number of inputs, they are versatile enough to let you record most things that you are likely to want to hook up in a small setup.
Figure A6.10 Pro Tools Mbox Mini rear panel. APPENDIX 6
Pro Tools Mbox Pro
Mbox Pro is a much more professional recording interface with professional- grade circuitry and converters that off ers high-defi nition (up to) 24-bit, 192 kHz audio quality.
NOTE Only sample rates up to 96 kHz are supported with Pro Tools LE software.
Mbox Pro off ers a wide range of analogue and digital I/O connections with up to 8 × 8 simultaneous channels of I/O – so you can record up to eight input channels at once and playback up to eight output channels. So, for example, you could connect up to three pairs of monitors, or set up for 5.1 surround mixing.
NOTE Mixing 5.1 surround sound in Pro Tools LE requires the Complete Production Toolkit.
It also features a built-in guitar tuner and onboard DSP to provide fl exible cue mixing and reverb eff ects. The Soft-clip limiter provided for each of the four input channels lets you track hot signals without clipping – providing a classic overdriven tape saturation sound.
Mbox Pro can be used with most major audio software including Pro Tools LE or 9, Logic, Live, Cubase, and most similar applications running on either Mac or Windows systems.
Front Panel The two leftmost sections of the front panel each contain an XLR/DI combination socket with an associated rotary Gain control and Soft-clip limiter
Figure A6.11 Pro Tools Mbox Pro front panel. Pro Tools 9 and the Pro Tools Mbox Family
button switch for input channels 1 and 2. The microphone and line inputs for channels 3 and 4 are located on the rear panel, so the front panel sections for these channels each contain a rotary Gain control, a Soft-clip limiter button switch and a button to switch the channel input from mic to line.
To the right of these input channel controls there are four vertical columns of green, yellow, and red LEDs that provide level metering for each input channel. Next along, there is an assignable Pro Tools multi-function button that gives you fast access to software functions, with a button underneath this to let you enable or disable the 48-volt phantom power for the microphone inputs.
The rightmost section provides monitoring facilities. First there is a pair of 1/4” stereo headphone outputs with separate volume controls, followed by the Monitor controls section which has Mono, Mute, Dim, Alt Source, and Speaker A/B/C switching controls, and with a dedicated monitor volume knob at the far right.
Rear Panel The rear panel is packed with input and output sockets including a 15-pin D-sub connector to provide Word Clock, MIDI, and stereo S/P DIF digital I/O; six 1/4” TRS balanced line outputs; four 1/4” TRS line inputs; four TRS jacks to act as Inserts; and two XLR mic inputs with 48 V phantom power and high pass fi lters.
To let you hook up a stereo analogue device such as the analogue audio outputs from a CD player or from a small audio mixer, a pair of RCA phono jacks is provided. If you want to plug-in an MP3 player or a similar device, a mini 1/8” jack socket is also provided. These two unbalanced Alt line input channels add a lot of fl exibility to this unit.
There is also a power on/off switch, a 9-volt DC 4-amp power socket, and a pair of FireWire connections.
Figure A6.12 Pro Tools Mbox Pro rear panel.
© 2010 Mike Collins