4eyez

I am trying to setup up something that I think should be simple but am hitting a brick wall.

I want to build patches in Max/MSP that process my guitar whose input comes in via my Mbox. No problem there. I then want to record the sounds I'm making in Max/MSP into a DAW of some description. I know I can't run ProTools at the same time as anything else, so I opted to use Ableton Live Lite 8 that came with the Mbox.

Audio input from the Mbox into Max/MSP > Audio from Max/MSP into Live > Monitor the audio in Live either through the Mbox or the built-in audio output from my computer.

Sounds easy, huh! I can get individual portions of that to work, but not all together. I've tried every combination of Rewire, Soundflower, and Jack that I can think of and no go.

I want to build patches in Max/MSP that process my guitar whose input comes in via my Mbox. No problem there. I then want to record the sounds I'm making in Max/MSP into a DAW of some description. I know I can't run ProTools at the same time as anything else, so I opted to use Ableton Live Lite 8 that came with the Mbox. 

Audio input from the Mbox into Max/MSP > Audio from Max/MSP into Live > Monitor the audio in Live either through the Mbox or the built-in audio output from my computer. 

Sounds easy, huh! I can get individual portions of that to work, but not all together. I've tried every combination of Rewire, Soundflower, and Jack that I can think of and no go. 

maxmsp-live-mbox-hell

this is very simple, i am afraid to say, using "Rewire, Soundflower, and Jack", as you say. from memory, something like: set mbox to system in/out driver, set up soundflower to intercept. choose output from max to sf, input in live from sf. having said that, not sure you can do any of that with "live lite" - it is crippled in quite a few ways - best checks docs. furthermore piece of advice that is useless and infuriating / bad of me: sell you pro tools LE and mbox - worst piece of software and worst piece of hardware on the planet. worst mistake i ever made. garageband has a better spec and you won't have this irritating 'pro tools only' operation through your hardware. just 2 cents. good luck!

> this is very simple, i am afraid to say, using "Rewire, Soundflower, and Jack", as you say.

I thought it would be too!! Read below...

> set mbox to system in/out driver, set up soundflower to intercept.

> choose output from max to sf, input in live from sf.

Close! The 'soundflower to intercept' tip was a good one, I didn't realise soundflower had an app called soundflowerbed that lets you route the audio, thought it was like ReWire and just showed up as a device in the various applications.

However, still no dice. First off, I didn't see any option to route the input from the Mbox to soundflower. Soundflowerbed only has (as far as a I can tell) the ability to route the audio output. Even then, Mbox doesn't show up as an option, only 'Built-in'. I figured that having the Mbox selected as the Output option in System Preferences would solve that, but the audio is coming out the internal speakers and not the Mbox.

> having said that, not sure you can do any of that with "live lite" - it is crippled in quite

I'm pretty sure I can still do this in Lite; I can select different input/output options in Live's preferences no problem. I've been able to get sound running back and forth between the two of them no problem, just not in this specific sequence mbox > max > live > mbox (though I could live with built-in for the output).

>furthermore piece of advice that is useless and infuriating / bad of me: sell you

> pro tools LE and mbox - worst piece of software and worst piece of hardware on

> the planet. worst mistake i ever made. garageband has a better spec and you won't

> have this irritating 'pro tools only' operation through your hardware. just 2 cents. good luck!

I hear what you're saying. I originally bought it because I was doing lot's of work in larger studios all of which run ProTools system. This gave me the ability to do editing in ProTools at home. It's treated me just fine until this point. I really don't to spend X hundreds of dollars on a new soundcard to do something this simple. Bah!!

> this is very simple, i am afraid to say, using "Rewire, Soundflower, and Jack", as you say. 

> set mbox to system in/out driver, set up soundflower to intercept.
> choose output from max to sf, input in live from sf. 

Close! The 'soundflower to intercept' tip was a good one, I didn't realise soundflower had an app called soundflowerbed that lets you route the audio, thought it was like ReWire and just showed up as a device in the various applications. 

However, still no dice. First off, I didn't see any option to route the input from the Mbox to soundflower. Soundflowerbed only has (as far as a I can tell) the ability to route the audio output. Even then, Mbox doesn't show up as an option, only 'Built-in'. I figured that having the Mbox selected as the Output option in System Preferences would solve that, but the audio is coming out the internal speakers and not the Mbox. 

> having said that, not sure you can do any of that with "live lite" - it is crippled in quite
> a few ways - best checks docs. 

>furthermore piece of advice that is useless and infuriating / bad of me: sell you
> pro tools LE and mbox - worst piece of software and worst piece of hardware on
> the planet. worst mistake i ever made. garageband has a better spec and you won't
> have this irritating 'pro tools only' operation through your hardware. just 2 cents. good luck!

I hear what you're saying. I originally bought it because I was doing lot's of work in larger studios all of which run ProTools system. This gave me the ability to do editing in ProTools at home. It's treated me just fine until this point. I really don't to spend X hundreds of dollars on a new soundcard to do something this simple. Bah!!


Have you tried setting the audio driver to "Live" in Max?

> Have you tried setting the audio driver to "Live" in Max?

Live doesn't show up as an option for the driver in the DSP preferences in Max.

Why not run it into a record~ object? You could move the resulting .wav or .aiff files over to any DAW of your choice after that.

Why not run it into a record~ object?  You could move the resulting .wav or .aiff files over to any DAW of your choice after that.


>I know I can't run ProTools at the same time as anything else, so I opted to use Ableton Live Lite 8 that came with the Mbox.

I am having no problem routing audio from Max 5 to Pro Tools LE 8.0.3 / Mbox 2 as suggested elsewhere in this forum. You have to switch the Max 5 audio driver to "ad_rewire" (possibly close Max 5, don't remember) and then open up the MaxMSP plugin (category instrument or Digidesign) as an insert in Pro Tools.

Never had any issues running PT and Max 5 side by side, other applications like Live (Lite) and Logic should play nice, too.

I am having no problem routing audio from Max 5 to Pro Tools LE 8.0.3 / Mbox 2 as suggested elsewhere in this forum. You have to switch the Max 5 audio driver to "ad_rewire" (possibly close Max 5, don't remember) and then open up the MaxMSP plugin (category instrument or Digidesign) as an insert in Pro Tools. 

Never had any issues running PT and Max 5 side by side, other applications like Live (Lite) and Logic should play nice, too.


Max/MSP + Live + Mbox = HELL!!