Problem with 2 USB mics as aggregated device

[DWJ]

Hello. I have two Samson CO1U USB mics and aggregated them. Problem: selected "Aggregate Device" and "Stereo (2-channel) in Audacity prefs, but only one of the mics has input. went to my mac Sound settings and sure enough, only one mic has output when I select Aggregated Device, but both mics have equal output when separately selected. Seems to indicate a Mac issue. Any ideas? Oh yeah, I am on an iBook G4 with 10.5.8

[kozikowski]

First I heard of this Aggregated Device thing.

In all instances, Audacity is still a complete slave to the computer it's running on. Audacity picks up sound from the computer sound services -- always. No computer, no sound.

Koz

[DWJ]

Thanks for the response. OK, I reselected aggregated devices in the Mac Midi/Audio utility, and now both mics are inputting in my Mac Sound pref panel. So far so good. But still the same problem in Audacity. I select "Aggregated Device" and "Stereo 2 Channel" in the audio prefs for Audacity. When I hit Record, a stereo track appears but only one track is registering the input of one mic, the other track is dead. Any ideas?

[kozikowski]

No. Like said. I've never seen this setting before and it may be days before I can get on a machine long enough to mess with it. We'll see if anybody else has any ideas. Intel Mac with Leopard?

Koz

[DWJ]

I am on an iBook G4 PPC with 10.5.8. Leopard. ADDED: I just tried it with SoundStudio 2.2.4 and the mics/inputs work properly, picking up sound as left and right for the separate mics. Maybe some setting problem with Audacity?

[kozikowski]

Maybe I do know this one. Audacity 1.2 wakes up in mono, not stereo. Reset in Preferences, then restart Audacity.

Koz

[DWJ]

Thanks for the suggestion, but my setting is already for stereo, and has stayed that way through restarts. BTW, I downloaded Soundstudio 3 and aggregating the mics works on that app as well, letting one record in stereo with two USB mics plugged into a laptop.

[Gale Andrews]

If anyone wants to know, here's how to aggregate devices in Audio MIDI Setup.

I've definitely heard of others aggregating microphones on OS X for use with Audacity, and I think one case was USB microphones - I know it works with wired mics. Were you using USB mics with SoundStudio, DWJ? I would try the current Audacity Beta 1.3.9 and see if you get stereo input there. 1.2 is very old now.

From reading on the internet it seems that Garage Band apart, even single USB standalone mics are often not seen by audio software such as LE, SoundBooth etc. The trick seems to be that you have to aggregate them with the built-in audio output first.

As far as I know Audacity does not need a single USB standalone mic to be aggregated, but USB mics will usually need to be selected as the Default Input in Audio MIDI Setup (doing so in Sound Preferences is not sufficient). This is known to be the case with Logitech USB microphones.


Gale

PS I am not on a Mac, just passing on what I've heard about.

[kozikowski]

I can get one LogiTech USB microphone running on a Mac just by selecting 44100, 16-bit, Mono in Audacity and then the chipset number in System Preferences (it doesn't always say "Logitech"). Nothing needed in Audio/Midi Setup that I know of.

Aggregated is up for grabs. No idea. Not a clue. I wonder what happens if you arrive with two different USB microphones. Do you get a little mushroom cloud over the Mac. Is it a pretty mushroom cloud?

I may be able to borrow a microphone from work and connect that with my existing LogiTech desktop USB microphone.

Koz

[Gale Andrews]

I can get one LogiTech USB microphone running on a Mac just by selecting 44100, 16-bit, Mono in Audacity and then the chipset number in System Preferences (it doesn't always say "Logitech"). Nothing needed in Audio/Midi Setup that I know of.

Could be that all or most of the reports I've seen about Audacity and Logitech USB mics are for Audacity 1.2.x. People usually don't bother to say what Audacity version they are using if they e-mail or use mailing lists, but many said they tried setting up in system preferences. I've seen dozens of those reports though, and quite often people came back to say Audio MIDI setup had fixed the problem.

Maybe for 2.0 it will suffice to recommend system preferences? I know you like system preferences because it has that meter bar, right Koz?


Gale