How are you using the Ren from within your DAW?

Any chance you could tell people how to assign the transport controls on the ren to control logic?

Many thanks

IBE wrote:

DJ Miel wrote:So is it possible to use MPC Software as a plugin inside my Daw,and sequencing the whole song inside the MPC Software and just mix the tracks with the Daw (by routing the tracks to the Daw's mixer) without bouncing the tracks?

^^^^^^
And if so, how stable? I know there was a mention of seq drums in the mpc and softsysnths in the DAW, but is anyone getting quite the number of crashes as a plugin sequencing everything vs standalone

Yes, you can sequence everything in the MPC while inside your DAW. Keep in mind, at least in Logic, that the MPC plugin only has 8 virtual outputs to route to your DAW's mixer. Also, you can only run 1 instance of the MPC plugin inside your daw.

Another way you could possibly go about it, is open your soft synth's on their own instrument track in Logic, then route the midi from the MPC plugin to each respective soft synth instrument track via Logic's Environment. This way you would get 8 virtual outputs for your drums/samples, and each soft synth would have it's own channel in Logic for mixdown. Plus Logic is alot more efficient/stable when it comes to handling AU plugin instruments at this point.

I'm not 100% is this is possible so hopefully someone can confirm. If I get a chance, I'll give it a try, although I'm no expect with Logic's Environment. Also, I doubt this would be possible in Pro Tools since it doesn't have some of the midi routing capabilities that Logic has. Can't speak on any other DAW since I'm only familiar with Logic and Pro Tools.

On a side note, My MPC Ren as been suprisingly stable using my method in my earlier post. Keep in mind, my workflow is going to be different from the next person's. After intitially using the Ren, I had to put it away to go back to my MPC 4000. After updating from snow leopard to Mountain Lion and updating Logic to the latest version, I gave the Ren another shot. All the issues I was having before on Snow Leopard went away. Only time I would have an issue is when my Mac would go to sleep, the Ren would lose connection and I would simply have the save the session and restart Logic. No data loss. Now with Ren V1.1, seems to keep connection when my computer sleeps.

Anyway, hope this helps.

goldphinga wrote:Any chance you could tell people how to assign the transport controls on the ren to control logic?

Many thanks

There's a setting in the MPC plugin prefences for the transport, you need to set it to "Daw" I believe. After you have that setup properly the transport shouldn't do anything inside of Logic except for the record button will arm the mpc if you have it set up properly.

After that, you open up Key Commands from inside of Logic. Search for "play" for example, then click the "learn assignment" button, the click "play" on the MPC transport. Repeat the procedure for the other transport buttons (stop, rewind, forward, etc). Now when you press play, stop, rewind, forward, etc, you will actually be controlling Logic, which the MPC is slaved to by design of the plugin. The record button on the other hand only controls the MPC's sequencer.

You may have to change the recording count in setting in Logic. By default, Logic does a 1 bar count in. Problem is that mpc will start playing the from bar 1 instead of the beginning of the last bar, and by the time logic get's to the first bar after the count in, the MPC is already on bar 2. I'm not sure if this has been fixed in softward 1.1. The work around is to turn the recording count in to "off". That way the MPC and Logic stay in sync (correct bar) durring recording. I just hit play on the mpc (logic) and then hit record on the MPC while logic is playing when I'm ready to punch in.

Hope this helps. This is off the top of my head so hopefully it makes sense.

The MPC Ren plugin (VST/RTAS) can output MIDI to plugins not hosted in the Ren. When used as a plugin, your DAW takes over the Ren's MIDI ports. In the Ren's preferences, the MIDI outputs should be set to 'DAW'. Within your DAW, set the MIDI input device for all your instrument tracks to 'MPC' in order to use the Ren's sequencer.

This method allows you to do all the sequencing inside the Ren and all the mixing inside your selected DAW.

JAH wrote:The MPC Ren plugin (VST/RTAS) can output MIDI to plugins not hosted in the Ren. When used as a plugin, your DAW takes over the Ren's MIDI ports. In the Ren's preferences, the MIDI outputs should be set to 'DAW'. Within your DAW, set the MIDI input device for all your instrument tracks to 'MPC' in order to use the Ren's sequencer.

This method allows you to do all the sequencing inside the Ren and all the mixing inside your selected DAW.

Dope ! Thanks !

Ren RTAS plug runs good in PT 8.0. LOL I was skeptical when the 1.1 came out and thought that I had to upgrade my protools to 9.x or 10.x. I can hang with this implementation for now.

Also a last thing.
So apparently it is possible to sequence the whole song inside the MPC Software as a plugin and to process mixing within the daw.But then will the song-building be reflected in the Daw.For example,on Fruity Loops,there is the song mode.Will all my sequences that I created inside MPC Soft be also mapped to the FL playlist (or song mode of any other daw)?

Basically you are using two different sequencers and since you have your Ren outputs routed to your daws aux channels you aren't recording any audio tracks until you bounce the whole session. If you were recording midi tracks that would be a different thing.

That leaves you will using only song mode within Ren.

Blue Haze wrote:Basically you are using two different sequencers and since you have your Ren outputs routed to your daws aux channels you aren't recording any audio tracks until you bounce the whole session. If you were recording midi tracks that would be a different thing.

That leaves you will using only song mode within Ren.

Are you sure? I think it deals with the MIDI Clock Sync,but I don't know how it works exactly...

Im not using the Ren within my daw because my workflow sucks in plug in mode even more then standalone, ....i have protools

I don't usually make beats with protools anyways, just for recording or tracking sometimes

4. Insert the Ren as a plugin on a track in your DAW. Load 16 additional plugin instruments on your DAW tracks. Use the MPC Ren's sequencer to sequence these 16 plugins. Mix down the completed projected within your DAW.

Anyone got this working successfully in FL Studio and can provide some assistance with setting it up? I spent 2 hrs trying to get it to work the right way. I got one midi track working, but when I try to add a second midi it triggers midi 1 too. I searched the manual but couldn't find anything.

jigdagod wrote:

4. Insert the Ren as a plugin on a track in your DAW. Load 16 additional plugin instruments on your DAW tracks. Use the MPC Ren's sequencer to sequence these 16 plugins. Mix down the completed projected within your DAW.

Anyone got this working successfully in FL Studio and can provide some assistance with setting it up? I spent 2 hrs trying to get it to work the right way. I got one midi track working, but when I try to add a second midi it triggers midi 1 too. I searched the manual but couldn't find anything.

Are you using VST plugins in FL Studio?

JAH wrote:

jigdagod wrote:

4. Insert the Ren as a plugin on a track in your DAW. Load 16 additional plugin instruments on your DAW tracks. Use the MPC Ren's sequencer to sequence these 16 plugins. Mix down the completed projected within your DAW.

Anyone got this working successfully in FL Studio and can provide some assistance with setting it up? I spent 2 hrs trying to get it to work the right way. I got one midi track working, but when I try to add a second midi it triggers midi 1 too. I searched the manual but couldn't find anything.

Are you using VST plugins in FL Studio?

Yes I am using VST

jigdagod wrote:

4. Insert the Ren as a plugin on a track in your DAW. Load 16 additional plugin instruments on your DAW tracks. Use the MPC Ren's sequencer to sequence these 16 plugins. Mix down the completed projected within your DAW.

Anyone got this working successfully in FL Studio and can provide some assistance with setting it up? I spent 2 hrs trying to get it to work the right way. I got one midi track working, but when I try to add a second midi it triggers midi 1 too. I searched the manual but couldn't find anything.

Any help with this? It's driving me crazy that I still haven't figured it out.

Have any Mac users been able to get Ren to operate as plug-in (using Ren as the sequencer) in Pro Tools 10? If so, please describe your set-up.