Ableton // CV and Audio IO not fully presented // Main VST3

[NeonBC]

Hej there

the main version (VST3) I want to use in Ableton Live to interact with my little HW Euroack doesn't present all of it's Audio IO as well as the CV IO from it's modules to Ableton and thus, they can't be used to further route those channels either inside Ableton or to the outside world.

I tested it in Bitwig (Studio trial version) and here all of the channels are presente to the DAW and can be used for further routing.

All is the latest version available version to this posting date (Cardinal 22.12 // Ableton 11.2.7). With only my MacOS bein Monterey 12.6.2 (intel only). I tested it with both: the Cardinal intel only build, as well as the universal Mac VST3 version

attached are the screenshots

Bitwig IO:

vs Ableton IO:

thx and have a nice holiday, Neon

[dromer]

I'm actually surprised that bitwig shows the CV ports, since almost no DAW implements this part of the VST3 spec.

If you want Ableton to support CV ports you will have to ask the Ableton developers.

[LKBorg]

Ok, so the Cardinal VST3 not showing the CV ports inside Ableton isn’t Cardinals problem then?

But even if not, this could be remedied by making more audio ports available, as especially via ADAT, the CV signals come in as audio signals. I can use them this way inside Ableton and don’t need the CV module necessarily. But why have it if it’s not usable in the first place?

Cardinal only giving me 6 instead of 8 channels is worsening this problem. So by having all 8 channels + hopefully more in a future update, I could leave ALL the CV handling to Abletons & ADAT in general. Just need plenty of ports to route audio signals out of Cardinal, into the DAW and out into the Eurorack!

So this is my wish for Christmas: plenty of audio ports pretty pls!

cheers 🖖

[falkTX]

you can reuse multiple instances instead of trying to do everything in one. in my opinion 8 audio ports is more than enough.

The CV ports are very handy on the setups in which they work, for example LV2 in a modular host. Those CV ports allow to connect many Cardinal instances between each other and also use other CV-related modular tools. VST3 and CV ports are still quite new, so host support is still lacking, Ableton has not caught up on that yet.

anyway, I do see all of the audio IO on your screenshot, so not sure what this ticket is about... you have the main (1+2) plus the other 6 audio channels as group of stereo ports, which does make the total 8 audio IO visible to the host. the other 10 mono channels are not audio but CV. Ableton doesnt do CV signals so it doesnt show them. everything seems to be correct as far as I can see..

[LKBorg]

Hej

no, Ableton gives me channels 3-8, not 1-8 to be selected and with a complex patch, even 8 channels reach their limit quite fast tbh.

[falkTX]

so what is the thing you pointed at in https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/108364428/209470876-f9627cf1-6766-45f6-833a-b76c6006cdba.png ?

I see Cardinal Main, 3+4, 5+6 and 7+8 They appear grouped as stereo pairs

[LKBorg]

I see Cardinal Main, 3+4, 5+6 and 7+8 They appear grouped as stereo pairs

No Cardinal Main is the track where I run Cardinal VST3 “main” in. The other audio track is where I want to route out the at least 8 channels, but somehow Ableton only gives me the summed Cardinal (all 8 tracks) or the Audio Out 3-8 as stereo pairs. So stereo 1+2 is missing, plus since they’re stereo, they’re useless for CV signals, or mono-out which makes the Audio 8 Module in Cardinal a defacto 4 channel only.

This might have something to do with Ableton only really being Stereo, but this as well as the CV io problem, could be remedied by just allowing for a couple of more Audio IO from within Cardinal! :)

[falkTX]

to be quite honest I dont really understand your explanation.

[NeonBC]

hmm...

ok I try again: unlike Bitwig, the same VST3 in Ableton only gives me 6 outs instead of 8, plus the summed Stereo of the track where Cardinal sits in. What you see in the screenshot is the IO that Cardinal VST3 presents to Ableton

The Stereo pair 1+2 is missing, thus effectively turning the Audio 8 of Cardinal into a Audio 6 — and on top of that, since Ableton is stereo only, the channels 3+4 / 5+6 / 7+8 are turned into 3 channels only, that can be used to route out CV signals via ADAT or mono audio out

[NeonBC]

All I am asking for is:

pls give us a flexible Audio Module, where the folks of us who run 18i20's audiointerface with many channels, can also route and use them with Cardinal :)

as especially with ADAT use into and out of Eurorack, the 8 only module is filled fast and would need at least one more Audio 8

[dromer]

"flexible Audio Module" doesn't make a lot of sense. It is the job of the Host to route audio correctly.

Cardinal simply exposes audio and cv i/o to the host and it's up to the host to deal with it. If Ableton doesn't correctly display the audio ports then you should send them a bug-report and maybe they can fix it.

[LKBorg]

With flexible I meant: as many audio-io modules I put in Cardinal, thus many ports shall be available

so put one Audio 8 + another = 16 in/outs

and so far Cardinal is the only one who has that io routing problem (not exposing channels 1+2). I’ll definitely also file a bug report with Ableton

[dromer]

Maybe Ableton simply likes to keep the first 2 channels al to itself. Do you have any other multi-i/o plugins that you can try?

[LKBorg]

My Elektron Overbridge Plugins do expose all 20 channels for my Syntakt for example, likewise the Digitakt one. Ableton doesn’t keep the first channels, plus it doesn’t route them into Stereo's either.

Atlas 2 also does expose them iirc (been a while since I used it tho)

Speaking of stereo channels: the Cardinal VST3 opened in Bitwig also shows 1+2 / 3+4 etc. but unlike Bitwig, Ableton does interpret them as stereo pairs

[NeonBC]

An update on the channel routings:

I'm starting to explore Bitwig more due to the Ableton issue and it seems the VST3 version generally sums up the audio-channels of the "Host Audio Device"

So: 1+2 / 3+4 etc. and for each of them you get the Pre/Post option In the VST2 and VST3 FX/Synth version you'll get the normal Pre/Post but for the Individual out, you'll only get a stereo-sum, not pre/post again. So I think this is related to the VST3 format.

cheers, Cat

[dromer]

Hmm, how do you see all of these ports? I have the Cardinal.vst3 installed and Bitwig only sees stereo ports for me ..

[NeonBC]

Hmm, how do you see all of these ports? I have the Cardinal.vst3 installed and Bitwig only sees stereo ports for me ..

you have to click "add missing chains" for a device to present all it's outputs

[NeonBC]

But I stumbled into another problem with the multi-channel Cardinal:

even if I route the hardware CV channels into the plugin, they aren't recognized and the scopes stay silent: no channel, audio, CV or even host parameters shows anything, while I route a simple LFO signal via ADAT into the track

the only way to route any audio, ADAT or not, into Cardinal is via the normal channel track-in, which means: stereo in so how would I be able to even get 8 channels in?

[dromer]

@NeonBC thnx! TIL :)

Too bad this doesn't work for Inputs.

[NeonBC]

btw. is there ANY way to use the 8 audio and 10 CV inputs at all?

I had a friend confirm that they at could at least use 6 inputs in Reaper. Still far away from 18 usable inputs

[falkTX]

the CV ports will for sure be unusable in Ableton, as it does not support CV. in fact I dont know any VST3 host that does implement this properly at the moment.

Reaper is for sure the best choice, in the realm of commercial DAWs. It supports VST3, LV2 and CLAP. So one of those ought to work correctly. Bitwig is the 2nd best choice, as it supports VST3 and CLAP. I had success with FLStudio before using the VST3 version.

on a personal note, I really wish there was a more direct involvement in Cardinal's development, in regards to fixes to stuff like this. there have been very little fixes to core stuff.

[NeonBC]

I so wish for your project to gain a few more dedicated ppl that contribute. I would, but I can't code to save my life, I'm a gfx designer by trade.

Btw: I got it FINALLY working in Ableton to have at least the 8 audio i/o working. The problem was me wanting to route it the normal way into the group, which ofc Ableton does not like (nor does Bitwig or Logic and that's where I exhausted my DAWs). It does present the channels in a weird way: only from 3+4 and then 5+6 and so on. The MAIN "Track in" is always channel 1+2!

[previously mentioned the channels were swapped for outputs, however this seems to be an issue with the ES-3 interface and not Cardinal, sry]

thank you for the hard work Falk & Co