Hey, I have a gig coming up soon and recently switched over to archetype rabea for all my live sounds from using an amp and pedalboard. it’s working perfectly for me other than the fact that there’s a very noticeable gap, maybe a second or so, when i change presets with a midi PC input. Has anyone figured out any kind of workaround for this or do i just need to suck it up and deal with a second of silence when switching presets?
1 Like
Hi. You have a few options. You can use MIDI to interact with pedals/FX without delay, so if the difference between patch 1 and 2 is enabling OD, a midi command to enable OD will workaround that.
If you do need to switch between patches, then you need to use something like MainStage or a DAW. This preloads all the plugins, then you use midi commands to flick between them without delay. I personally use MainStage
hi @mrshultz what exactly the last part mean? How can I set up my midi controller to change plugins in Reaper for instance? Also, turning ON pedal effects work without delay but turning them off actually triggers the “loading time/delay”. Thanks!
as far as I know switching between presets will have a gap, even running inside your DAW (I run on Logic Pro X and it’s the same as standalone for me). A workaround would be running more than one instance of the plugin and having only the reverb (and maybe delay) running on the second instance, so the trail would “mask” the preset change. This is not optimal nor versatile, but could work in some cases. For me, I simply got used to the gap and better with the timing for switching presets live.
to set your midi controller to interact with the plugin’s midi mapping, your DAW must be receiving the midi messages from the controller and the type of the track you are using must be ‘midi compatible’ (as in the track must allow midi messages to affect the behavior of the inserts and virtual instruments).
With Logic Pro X, it’s necessary to create a software instrument track and then sidechain it with the input from the interface. Loading the plugin on the insert of an audio track won’t work as the midi messages aren’t read by that type track. It might vary from DAW to DAW though, so search for your particular situation on the forum or on YT, reddit, etc.
edit: the standalone will receive midi messages from a device selected on the settings window, under the “midi devices” section.
1 Like
thanks @vinidooart. I use my midi controller to change between presets or change pedals. I was actually curious about the “preload all the plugins” and change between them. I actually found that running standalone the gap is a little bit small. I guess I’ll just get use to it to play live. Also, on this topic. How is your setup to play live?
1 Like
Most of the time very simple and straightforward:
Guitar (PRS Custom 24) -> Audio Interface (Scarlett 2i2) -> Computer (Macbook) + (m-vave chocolate, a cheap wireless midi controller)
I send one (or both if sending stereo is a possibility) outs to FOH and use the bluetooth midi footswitch controller to change presets.
If mono, I disable the other output on settings to avoid sending just one side of the stereo (which would be a problem if any plugin has a stereo delay or other wide effects).
Usually I prepare all the presets I am going to use beforehand and ‘save as’ a new MIDI mapping, and just run a single instance in standalone.
When I decide to use more than one plugin (like Nolly + Rabea) I open an empty session on Logic Pro X, load the plugins in separate software instrument tracks and match the volume of the presets and channels, often with a limiter on the master channel, just as a safety measure (to avoid sending higher levels than what was set during soundcheck, in case I happen to load a louder preset at any moment). Then, for the MIDI mapping, I usually go for something like this:
( CC#00 up to CC#03 ) -> first 4 presets of the gig on Nolly and "null" on Rabea
( CC#04 up to CC#07 ) -> next 4 presets of the gig on Rabea and "null" on Nolly
CC#08 up to 'how many' I end up having as alternative options of tones -> hybrid configuration, where one plugin will be "null" and the other loads a preset.
Hope I’m not being confusing or unclear haha. Does your setup look much different than this?
Hi. Sorry for the late reply, but in a DAW you would do something like this: (15) How to use Neural DSP plugins LIVE | Part 1 - MIDI Mapping in Pro Tools - YouTube and (15) How to use Neural DSP plugins LIVE | Part 2 - Automate Your Plugins to Play With a Backing Track - YouTube
If you have a Mac, using something like mainstage is a better option IMO or on Windows something like: Gig Performer | Cross platform VST/VST3/AU Audio Plugin Host
Additional stump for Gig Performer, as it handles this type of situation really well. If your sounds are in different GP rackspaces, when you switch between them it’ll keep the previous rack running for a second or two after the switch, which eliminates any gaps (and lets reverb or delay trails fade out naturally). It does cause a brief CPU spike during the overlap, but nothing serious.