Ableton Forum

Hi there, I think, due to it's unbelivable quality, AL5 in joint with GR2 should produce a revolution into pop-rock music, but there are a lot of problems to make a right rig. I'll try to explain it in chapters, I'm from Italy, sorry for my english!

1 MY SET UP
- Toshiba Satellite Centrino1.8, 2gb ram
- M-Audio 410 firewire
- GR2 with Rig Kontrol 2
- midi pedalboard FBC1010
-and SL5...obiouvsly! (with Operator)
- ...Korg Kaoss Pad2 (I wish to get it soon)

2 WHAT I WOULD LIKE TO DO
I would use togheter GR2 and AL5, with a microphone added for the vocal parts...with a total midi controls of AL5 scenes, in sync with the changing of GR2 sounds.
The idea is to play guitar in live situations, plus the integrations of AL5 sounds (AL5 to process voice and produce texture of a song, with the possibility to supply to bass (all the basses send to A return) and drum line (all the drums send to B return) , related to the situation if you play in different contexts, with bassist and/or drummers)

....this thing causes a lot of problems to get it!!!

3 PROBLEMS
a) if I use GR2 as a vst plug in of AL5 (wich works with 410 soundcard), I can't use the Rig Kontrol 2 as a sound card for the guitar input:
I must take the guitar input from 410 (and use the RK2 only to cortrol the parameter of GR2)...yes, but the problem is this:
GR2 with the input signal from RK2 sounds better than the sound of GR2 with the input signal form 410
b) if I decide to use the RK2 as soundcard I can't use the 410, ans so I can't use the mic
c) the only way to use both the RK2 and the 410 as audio input is to use GR2 as stand alone (and AL5 too), but by this way I loose the possibility to join AL5 and GR2

IT SHOULD BE A FANTASTIC THING IF WERE POSSIBLE TO USE THE INPUT OF RK2 ALSO WHEN GR2 IS USED AS A VST PLUG IN INTO LIVE, BY THIS MODE YOU COULD HAVE THE OUTPUT OF THE SOUND CARD OF AL5 FOR THE MONITORS, AND THE STEREO OUTPUT OF GR2 FOR REAL GUITAR AMPS...IN OTHER WORDS GR2 OUTPUT BOTH TO LIVE - WICH COULD WORKS AS A GENERAL MIXER (ALSO FOR THE VOICE) - AND TO TUBE AMPS
(GR2 SOUND FANTASTIC TO REAL TUBE AMPS, THE ONLY THING I'M A BIT DISAPPOINTED ABOUT GR2 IS THE QUALITY OF OVERDRIVE, FOR THIS REASON I USE MY ANALOGICAL OVERDRIVES INTO IT)

could anyone have some suggestions?
what is your set up to run AL5 and GR2 without loose the power of RK2 soundcard featuers?
thanks

I can respond to some of your points, but unfortunately I can't really comment on the RK2, as I have no experience with it (I purchased a software-only upgrade from GUitar Rig 1, so I don't have the new Rig Kontrol).

My setup (for performance) is this:
G4 Powerbook 867mhz, 768 mb RAM
Presonus Firebox
Behringer FCB1010
Roland JP-8000
Guitar Rig as an AU plugin to Live

I run my guitar into Live/GR for processing, use the 3 banks of the FCB1010 to control GR and a few other plugins, and use the rest of the FCB1010 banks to control scenes and clips in Live. I also send MIDI clock sync out through the Firebox to the JP-8000 to sync arpeggios, delays, etc.

So not quite the same requirements as yours, but a similar concept: I want GR to interact with Live, for guitar sounds to change with scenes and for multiple devices to remain in sync. Except for some Live clip-launch behaviors that I have ranted about elsewhere, this setup is working great for me. The Firebox has excellent sound quality and low enough latency for playing in real-time (at least on my system) and the FCB1010 gives me *much* more control than NI's little pedal.

It seems your main complaint is with the sound quality of the FW410, correct? Otherwise You could just use it and forget about the Rig Kontrol (which seems to be a very unpopular device with GR users). I know my brother has a 410 and hates the sound. On a mac there are ways for me to use 2 audio devices simultaneously, but I don't know if that's possible on Windows. Perhaps another Windows user can answer this.

I guess my suggestion would be to get a better guitar signal into the 410, so the preamps will not degrade your tone. Can you use the RK2 as a preamp and run its analog output to the 410? Or maybe get a DI box or small preamp that sounds good to you? I hate to offer gear-based solutions, but I'm not sure how else to fix this. Maybe you could find a way to use the second RK input for your mic, so the 410 is for MIDI only?

Sorry I don't have a better solution. I get along fine without the Rig Kontrol, but that's because I love the sound quality of my Firebox (and I only have one pedalboard under my feet).

Thanks again, Peter, your kindness is big as good is your music

about the Rig Kontrol2:
I was tempted to use only my fcb1010, but without the RK2 is not possible - when I use GR2 as a vst plug in into AL - to control the GR2 looper from the FCB(so I think I'll use the RK2 for the GR2 internal looper and th FCB to control AL)...could you control the internal switches of GR2 as a vsti plugin with the FCB?

thanks also for your other suggestions, but unfortunately they are not praticable in my situation

I'm going to think is not possible to have the possibility to use 2 different soundcards (RK2 and 410) when I use GR" as vst plugin into AL5


if I run gr2 as standalone application I should insert the output of RK2 as input of the 410 to put the signal into AL5, but with this solution I'm not able to use a mic input, or I must loose the stereo signal of GR2 (I've discovered the 410 has only 2 analog mono inputs....the other 2 are for spdif )....moreover eith this solution I'll loose the possibiliy to join the features of GR and AL