Audacity Forum

I downloaded and built the latest SVN code with the ASIO SDK, under the impression this would allow multiple inputs to be recorded simultaneously. I have used ASIO (via ASIO for all) to record two different stereo inputs in Kristal successfully, so there is no reason why it should not work with Audacity.
The build went fine, and audacity runs perfectly well, and I can select ASIO as the device, but when I do I can still only choose 1 or 2 channels to record from (and 2 channels is just the stereo from one microphone), which doesn't help.
Any ideas how I can get more to record more than one input? I don't mind a bit of programming.

JezzaP wrote:I downloaded and built the latest SVN code with the ASIO SDK, under the impression this would allow multiple inputs to be recorded simultaneously. I have used ASIO (via ASIO for all) to record two different stereo inputs in Kristal successfully, so there is no reason why it should not work with Audacity.
The build went fine, and audacity runs perfectly well, and I can select ASIO as the device, but when I do I can still only choose 1 or 2 channels to record from (and 2 channels is just the stereo from one microphone), which doesn't help.
Any ideas how I can get more to record more than one input? I don't mind a bit of programming.

What version of Windows are you on? Are you selecting the Windows DirectSound host in the Devices preferences? In the same Devices preferences, click the drop down arrow for "Recording Device". What recording devices are listed?



Gale

What version of Windows are you on?

Windows 7.

Are you selecting the Windows DirectSound host in the Devices preferences?

No, I was selecting "ASIO".

In the same Devices preferences, click the drop down arrow for "Recording Device". What recording devices are listed?

When I choose DirectSound, then this displays:
-"Primary Sound Capture Driver"
-"Microphone (Realtek High Definition Audio)"
-"Amplifier (Realtek High Definition Audio)"
-"Keyboard (Realtek High Definition Audio)"
-"StereoMix (Realtek High Definition Audio)"
I renamed the inputs for what they are. Really, the amp is in line in and keyboard is the rear mic.

When I choose ASIO, then it displays only "ASIO4ALL v2" in the Recording Device drop-down.

EDIT: ok, suddenly I can now choose 4 channels when I'm using ASIO. That certainly wasn't the case before. I suspect it had something to do with me changing the ASIO preferences, and then closing Audacity, so that only now after I reopen have the changes taken place. Thanks for the reply anyway.

Glad it's working. We don't have many people testing ASIO so any problem reports are welcome. Was it the fact of clicking OK in Preferences that did the trick of revealing the extra channels, or the restart of Audacity?

I don't have an ASIO build at the moment, but if you wanted to you could initialise preferences by exiting Audacity then removing all content from the audacity.cfg settings file except "NewPrefsInitialized=1" at the top. That's the standard trick if Audacity settings get messed up. That should initialise the Devices Preferences to the MME host. If selecting ASIO host again only gives you two channels for the ASIO4ALL device then I guess there is an Audacity problem.

I know of another Audacity-with-ASIO problem as regards sample rates. With some devices Audacity will set the device to play back or record first time at the maximum sample rate it supports (probably 192000 Hz) even if you have made the Audacity project rate (bottom left) and the rate on the device match to some other rate. Despite that the Audacity project rate remains at what you set it to. As soon as you stop and play or record again, Audacity will reset the device to the project rate and will then not reset it again.



Gale

I reset the preferences as you said, and ASIO4ALL allows 4 channels. I think the problem was how ASIO4ALL had it set by default for each program. Other programs I have it working in I had to change these, but I can only assume the driver remembers it on a per-application basis.
One thing that is slightly annoying with audacity is there is no way to open the ASIO driver preferences, so I have to do it manually through the system tray whilst recording, but there is little use for this feature if it cannot be distributed.