Sonoma Wire Works - Support Forums

by **dsindel** » Thu Sep 03, 2009 4:20 pm

Greetings, I experience something a bit strange and wanted to know if anyone else has come across this...

I am using a Line6 UX1 Toneport and Recording Direct into the IK amp heads and no matter what I play the sound fizzles out after about 4 seconds, so in essence it is hard to hold a chord and let it sustain or play a solo and let a note ring out with out this degradation of signal...

Could this some kind of a USB, buffer or driver related issue? I have tried many different settings on my PC (XP PRO/SP3) with no success as of yet.

Thanks

Dan

by **dsindel** » Thu Sep 03, 2009 5:03 pm

quick update...

I just took advantage of the "Free POD Farm Offer" and tested it out briefly and I also experienced the sound "fizzling out" after about 4 seconds. So I must rule out that the problem is within the IK software as it occurs with the L6 software as well...

by **Charvelguy** » Thu Sep 03, 2009 5:06 pm

Of the tone that you get, do you think it is of an appropriate volume, clean or distorted level? Just as a stab, it sounds like something relative to the ASIO & I/O, but,.. sometimes this takes going point for point in the signal chain to figure out what's causing the issue.

by **dsindel** » Thu Sep 03, 2009 5:59 pm

Yes levels are fine, I make sure not to clip and have tested out many different buffer settings in the Audio Setup area. I have also experimented with a few different guitars and cables just to eliminate any point of failure but signal loss still persists.

In case anyone is actually interested in hearing an example of this, join My First Riffcast (HELLO WORLD) and go the very last riff which is called "Ending" and you can hear the rhythm guitars breaking up very quickly.

http://www.riffworld.com/Members/dsindel/riffworkscollaboration.2009-08-30.2202621677/

by **blue4u** » Fri Sep 04, 2009 3:56 am

Sounds to me like the way a "gate" effect behaves when it is really clamping down on the signal. Try removing the gate effect from the signal path (if you're using one) and let us know if that helps...

by **dsindel** » Fri Sep 04, 2009 4:48 am

Hi Blue, wish is was that simple. there is no gate in the signal path. I have tried many different things (software amp heads, guitars, updated all drives etc...) but signal loss still persists.

Some amp patches (i.e. with tons of distortion) elongate the process but not by much, the cleaner sounds die rather quickly most of the time.

by **atalwar** » Fri Sep 04, 2009 5:28 am

is your D.I signal also dying out?
try to record the guitar DI signal in audacity using the line 6 wdm driver. that would tell if it's an asio issue or some fault at other end like impedence mismatch, dirty pot/jack.

also if possible try to upload a clip of your D.I signal somewhere where others can listen to it and nail the issue.

by **dsindel** » Fri Sep 04, 2009 3:54 pm

Hi atalwar, thank you for helping out.
Okay so I did in fact d/l audacity and created a quick "Sound Test", nothing fancy just strumming a G chord but after about 4 seconds you can hear the degradation and not a smooth/clean decay of signal...

Sounds like some modulation and intermittent noise on the tail.

Here is the link to the mp3
http://www.dansindel.us/audio/DI_soundTest.mp3

**Not sure if this is common amongst digital recording but after years of recording with my Digi stuff I have never had a signal issue with the 002 hardware, so who knows perhaps it has something to do with the Toneport/ASIO side of things?

by **cwight** » Fri Sep 04, 2009 8:27 pm

errr...I gotta say that sounds pretty normal to me. About the same as mu guitar amp. What is it that you are missing?

by **atalwar** » Fri Sep 04, 2009 9:45 pm

there is some phutting going on at decay in the lows, and it is also present in the peaks but getting cancelled out a bit.

sounds like the input is being driven a bit harder than the interface would like and it is trying to recover from clipping or simply put has some input distortion.

if you have a pad button/jack on interface try flipping/using it or try lowering volume on the guitar and see if it cleans the sound.

by **Charvelguy** » Fri Sep 04, 2009 9:55 pm

Is this a modeler vs tube thing? I often find myself not liking modelers for the one specific reason of how they decay the note. I agree, in the clip I hear the front end being pushed a bit.. maybe an eq as well would help.

by **dsindel** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 6:09 am

This is the setup..
Currently I am just going straight into a TonePort UX1 (nothing else), it is USB and from there connecting to RW (or Audacity in the case of the sound test).

Some modeled sounds with super heavy distortion tend to not die out as quickly but as you can hear on the direct/clean sounds it is not a smooth decay what so ever.

I have even lowered the volume pot on the gtr to see if I am driving the signal to hard into the sound card but still end up with the same frizzle-fry...

Hmmmmmmmmmm?????? just don't know if it could be something in the signal chain or maybe even hardware related. when I use my DIGI002/Firewire things are just perfectly fine but with the TonePort/USB signal path this is where things go south.

Thanks guys for your help (and now I have my fancy avatar uploaded, which means I ain't going away... lol)
Dan

by **blue4u** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 1:47 pm

The TonePort is likely the culprit. The quality of Line 6's audio interface is actually decent (from what I've read and experienced) but it's not going to give you maximum performance. You may want to step up to a higher quality audio interface and/or tube pre-amp/active D.I. box like Radial makes. Or, just live with things as they are. Doe RiffWorks allow you to use the DIGI002? If so, I would stick with that. Line 6 is giving away the POD Farm plug-in this month if you want to keep using those sounds

by **Charvelguy** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 2:48 pm

Has anyone here noticed or experienced any difference in tonal or signal degradation with different models of L6 hardware? I recall having conversations years back on the Charvel/Jackson forum when I was considering making the leap onto l6. There were a number of guys who discouraged going the route of the Guitarport and GP model packs and strongly endorsed the UX2 citing tonal differences.
As far as I can tell without taking one apart, the toneport hardware units are just basically an interface card in a casing. Obviously, the units have different features.. I'm wondering if different components (chips, etc) varied also.

by **dsindel** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 6:55 pm

Hi blue4u, yes I tried the Digi but their drivers seem a bit proprietary and did not work to well with RW. Upon suggestion from Sonoma tech support I tried the ASIO-4-ALL driver packages which sort of worked better but "no cigar".

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