Help with Mbox recording

[williammarshall]

I am trying to set up the mbox on a windows XP laptop to use with audacity. Windows can't find the drivers and I read that I needed to use WDM drivers. I am not sure what that it is, how to find them, or how to install them. Can someone please help.

Also, is there anything else I need to know about using mbox with Audacity?

Thanks,

wm

[williammarshall]

I posted a question a few days ago about using Audacity with an Mbox. I did not recieve any replies. Am I on the wrong forum? If so, could someone point me in the right direction? Thanks,

wm

[kozikowski]

MBox may be one of the machines that don't get along too well with Audacity. Search the forum(s) for mbox.

Koz

[steve]

Assuming that you are using Audacity 1.2.x this is the right place to ask - whether anyone who knows the answer sees or replies to your post is another question. You should also check out the manufacturers web site/forum.

WDM drivers are drivers specifically written for Windows. Some sound cards use other specialist drivers such as ASIO drivers which are not directly supported by Audacity. The WDM drivers may be referred to in your manual as "Windows Drivers". If you have them installed, you should see your sound card listed in the available recording/playback device list in Audacity.

Click on "Edit > Preferences" then look in the "Audio I/O" tab. There are drop down menus for recording and playback devices.

Note that with USB devices, the device MUST be connected to your computer, recognised and made ready to use by Windows, BEFORE you open Audacity. If your sound card still does not appear, it is probably because you have not installed the Windows drivers for your device.

If you are sure that you have the correct Windows drivers installed, but it still does not work with Audacity 1.2.6, have a go with Audacity 1.3.6 (it is much more up to date and supports more hardware).

[williammarshall]

Thanks for your responses. The mbox uses ASIO drivers, so I am assuming that it cannot be used with Audacity (unless I am still not understanding something, which is very possible). Anyway, thanks for your time.

wm

[steve]

Many sound cards are set up to use ASIO drivers, but will also work with Windows drivers. The Windows drivers are usually included on the installation disk, but may not be installed automatically. You may need to install the Windows drivers manually - check in your sound card manual.

Just a bit about ASIO - these drivers offer high performance and low latency. ASIO was invented by Steinberg. Unfortunately, the licensing terms for ASIO prevent ASIO support being included in open source software. For most purposes, WDM (Windows) drivers should work well enough to not cause any problems - it is if you are using a lot of real time effects or software instruments that ASIO really becomes necessary, but Audacity does not use real time effects or virtual instruments, so it is not so relevant.

[williammarshall]

Let me see if I understand: even though I am bypassing the soundcard in my computer by going through the USB port, since the Mbox uses ASIO drivers, then it will not work with Audacity. If that is right, then it does not seem that I can get the mbox to work. Yet, I think I read some other posts where people were using the mbox successfully (of course, I think that was the mbox 2, which could be the difference). Anyway, thanks again for your time. I may need to go in a different direction.

wm

[steve]

The Windows drivers are usually included on the installation disk, but may not be installed automatically. You may need to install the Windows drivers manually - check in your sound card manual.