MIDI Clock Sync in the preferences not seeming to have any effect

[manisnotabird]

Trying to sync the sequencer on my new Minibrute 2S with Reason. Got it basically working: press play on the Reason transport bar and the 2S sequencer starts playing at the right tempo. No matter how I adjust the Output Offset under Sync Settings in the preferences, or set the Buffer size in the Audio page of the preferences, and whether I'm using the built-in USB MIDI of the 2S, or the 5-pin MIDI of my audio interface, the sound from the 2S is at least 13ms behind the beat when I record it.

[Benedict]

This could have a lot more to do with IO Latency: It takes time for the computer (and soundcard) to process your audio as it arrives to be recorded.

This is common. Look at the settings under Edit/Preferences/Audio for Latency and Record Offset.

Still, it is not uncommon to have to slide things back a wee bit after recording them if you are mixing Hardware & Software (or even real!!!) instruments.

[selig]

The odd thing is that with a latency of 15 ms (128 buffer in my case) when recording from my 2s into Reason, you cannot set more than -3 ms compensation in the Sync Settings (which oddly gives me 10ms latency). The prefs display an "error message" if you go below -3 ms, which reads that "if you need lower offsets, try increasing the buffer size…", which of course means you NOW have even MORE latency and now need even MORE compensation! In other words, doing as they suggest actually makes it worse...

If I increase the buffer to 256, I get 20ms latency on my recordings, and now have up to 6 ms of compensation before getting the "error message". This gives me a latency of 13ms when recording to an audio track, which is of course worse than 10 ms.
Or if I set the buffer to 64, I only get one 1ms sync offset - so confusing!

In all cases this is not enough compensation to get things in sync, so I had to dig deeper.

Turns out there IS a way to get things to work, and it has nothing to do with clock sync. The key is to use EXTERNAL monitoring (in the Audio tab of the Prefs), AND use "Recording Latency Compensation" to get things to line up nicely (at least to ms accuracy). For a buffer setting of 128 samples I needed -6 ms compensation. I'm so used to monitoring through Reason I didn't initially consider this approach until I read up on the Recording Latency Compensation feature. This works the same whether you use the 2s sequencer or send MIDI notes from Reason, so good to know all around!

[manisnotabird]

The odd thing is that with a latency of 15 ms (128 buffer in my case) when recording from my 2s into Reason, you cannot set more than -3 ms compensation in the Sync Settings (which oddly gives me 10ms latency). The prefs display an "error message" if you go below -3 ms, which reads that "if you need lower offsets, try increasing the buffer size…", which of course means you NOW have even MORE latency and now need even MORE compensation! In other words, doing as they suggest actually makes it worse...

If I increase the buffer to 256, I get 20ms latency on my recordings, and now have up to 6 ms of compensation before getting the "error message". This gives me a latency of 13ms when recording to an audio track, which is of course worse than 10 ms.
Or if I set the buffer to 64, I only get one 1ms sync offset - so confusing!

In all cases this is not enough compensation to get things in sync, so I had to dig deeper.

Turns out there IS a way to get things to work, and it has nothing to do with clock sync. The key is to use EXTERNAL monitoring (in the Audio tab of the Prefs), AND use "Recording Latency Compensation" to get things to line up nicely (at least to ms accuracy). For a buffer setting of 128 samples I needed -6 ms compensation. I'm so used to monitoring through Reason I didn't initially consider this approach until I read up on the Recording Latency Compensation feature. This works the same whether you use the 2s sequencer or send MIDI notes from Reason, so good to know all around!

Exactly the problem I was having, and your solution worked with a little fiddling! Guess I'll have to live without hearing any of Reason's effects processing the sound while recording (it's already plugged into my Zoom MS-70CDR).

[manisnotabird]

The odd thing is that with a latency of 15 ms (128 buffer in my case) when recording from my 2s into Reason, you cannot set more than -3 ms compensation in the Sync Settings (which oddly gives me 10ms latency). The prefs display an "error message" if you go below -3 ms, which reads that "if you need lower offsets, try increasing the buffer size…", which of course means you NOW have even MORE latency and now need even MORE compensation! In other words, doing as they suggest actually makes it worse...

If I increase the buffer to 256, I get 20ms latency on my recordings, and now have up to 6 ms of compensation before getting the "error message". This gives me a latency of 13ms when recording to an audio track, which is of course worse than 10 ms.
Or if I set the buffer to 64, I only get one 1ms sync offset - so confusing!

In all cases this is not enough compensation to get things in sync, so I had to dig deeper.

Turns out there IS a way to get things to work, and it has nothing to do with clock sync. The key is to use EXTERNAL monitoring (in the Audio tab of the Prefs), AND use "Recording Latency Compensation" to get things to line up nicely (at least to ms accuracy). For a buffer setting of 128 samples I needed -6 ms compensation. I'm so used to monitoring through Reason I didn't initially consider this approach until I read up on the Recording Latency Compensation feature. This works the same whether you use the 2s sequencer or send MIDI notes from Reason, so good to know all around!

As long as you are helping me, Minibrute 2s owner to Minibrute 2s owner, any advice on a budget solution to bring up the level of my Microbrute to run into the Ext input on my Minibrute 2s? It works okay, it's just probably not even half as loud as the 2S's built-in oscillators.