Audiobus: Use your music apps together.
What is Audiobus? — Audiobus is an award-winning music app for iPhone and iPad which lets you use your other music apps together. Chain effects on your favourite synth, run the output of apps or Audio Units into an app like GarageBand or Loopy, or select a different audio interface output for each app. Route MIDI between apps — drive a synth from a MIDI sequencer, or add an arpeggiator to your MIDI keyboard — or sync with your external MIDI gear. And control your entire setup from a MIDI controller.
Download on the App StoreAudiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.
MusicIO audio over usb!
Now available in the app store, just downloaded.
Comments
Is this working for anybody here? When I tried it out yesterday I got an extremely messed up signal coming into the DAW. I tried all sorts of things. It Also seems to pitch the audio down around 17 semitones for some reason. I don't know what the heck is going on here. Maybe something to do with sample rate? I'll have to see if I can get it to work on the other Mac later.
yes, there seems to be an issue with the signal here also. Breaking up and distorted.
This using Logic Pro x. I'm still trying to work out if I'm maybe misunderstanding the signal chain.
I did a quick test with my iPhone 6 (at 256) and the server running at "medium". It worked pretty well, but any app switching (or even screen switching in MusicIO) seemed to produce glitches. I was not running into a DAW just testing through the audio interface hooked up to my iMac (an RME Babyface).
Also the IAA system seems pretty flakey as regards quitting processes. Everytime I changed any apps, I had to fire up a process watcher on the phone, because likely or not apps that I thought I had just quit we actually in the background running.
@Munibeast -- any chance your system is running at 48khz? The audio coming out of the iPad is at 44.1khz, and definitely sounds like a sample rate issue.
We're working on various chunks of the signal flow, and the Mac side will likely get some changes shortly. Some people are having some grief with Soundflower (I've been using it for years and love it), so we'll cook up an alternate plan for that.
So far, most of the cases of glitching at the Mac side seem to come from our keeping total latency down to a minimum. The Mac server is adaptive, but it sounds like it's still to aggressive for some folks, so I'll update that to provide more cushion (but potentially higher latency).
If folks have questions, just drop me a note -- or email [email protected] -- Nic, Dan, and I, are all working hard to make things smooth, and whatever hiccups there are right now, I'm sure we'll get them ironed out.
@SecretBaseDesign are the glitches when changing apps typical on the iOS side of things? When I had nothing else running on the iPhone, the results vere very good except when switching from MusicIO to the app that was running, at which point the gitching was really horrible. Not such a big deal with only one app running, but it would make switching between an FX and a drum machine (for example) nigh on impossible.
@bennorland -- the glitch (as far as we've been able to tell) comes with the data flowing across USB being delayed when the apps are switching. This seems to be an iOS operating system issue. Because there's not a lot of slack time for the audio transfer, any delay causes an audio drop-out.
The "fix" for this is to have more audio buffering -- and more latency. We may add an option to the next Mac release, to allow for a bigger buffer, which can then smooth out glitches. If you monitor audio at the iPad, and then adjust the recording on the DAW (there are automatic compensation methods in pretty much every DAW to handle this), the latency might not be a problem.
The latency compensation is something of a "studio trick," and I'm hesitant to play it, as it falls apart in certain situations. One of the things we're hoping to add in the next release is the ability to use the iPad as a filter/effects box. I'd like to plug my guitar into the Mac, send the audio over USB to the iPad, run things through Flux:FX, and then get the audio back to the Mac. If there's latency on the connection (particularly to the iPad), the audio I can hear from Flux:FX will be delayed compared to what I'm doing on my guitar -- and most guitarists are really sensitive to that. I know many guitarists who refuse to use digital effects boxes -- even things like the Digitech RP floor pedals -- because the latency is just too high, and that kills any organic feeling groove.
@SecretBaseDesign that all makes sense. I guess I will just have to be careful how I use the audio connection. I have to say that the latency was pretty impressive when I was testing.
I worked with this today and am curious as to why some sound generating apps such as garageband, guitarism etc. don't appear in the instrument list.
make sure to download the new Mac app version or it will not work at all
I was surprised to see that an iOS app like Sunrizer, which allows you to turn on "Receive MIDI Clock" actually syncs tempo to Ableton LIVE. So all the arpeggios in Sunrizer match the tempo when changed in LIVE.
I can't get the audio portion to work with Ableton. I've tried as both an aggregated device with my Scarlett 18i8 and also as just Soundflower 2ch.
Soundflower installed
Installed the latest Music IO server for Mac.
Music IO running on both Mac and iPad
Soundflowerbed not running as noted it is not necessary via Music IO website.
Created aggregated device of Scarlett 18i8 + Soundflower 2ch (note this makes I assume Soundflower channel 19/20)
Music IO set to output Soundflower 2ch.
Ableton settings of Aggregated device as input and output.
iVCS3 loaded up in iPad
Ableton audio input on channel set to 19/20. Audio set to IN.
No sound input in Ableton happens when playing iVCS3. I do however get sound from the iVCS3 coming out of my iPad.
Tried merely using Soundflower 2ch as input and Scarlett 18i8 as output, still nothing. Note everything set to 44.1K.
If you've got a newer OS X version (Mavericks or later), this could be the problem.
They are working on a new version of SoundFlower that should be available in a few weeks.
Works just fine for me on Mavericks
OK I just got it working. Forgot to go to settings in the Music IO app and set it up with my iVCS3. Works both as in an aggregated device and also just Soundflower 2ch. However in Music IO server it must be set to Soundflower 2ch, I can't get anything out if I set it to aggregated device. Also note that if I use my audio interface and Soundflower as an aggregated device recording my iOS synth into my DAW that I get 3-4x the latency than if I merely set my audio input as Soundflower 2ch. You still get some latency with Soundflower 2ch as audio input but it seems to be about the same as if you recorded audio out of iPad to audio interface into DAW. Can be corrected by adjusting Track Delay in Ableton.
Other issues I find is that as far as I know there is no way to monitor audio from iOS synth in my DAW without inducing more latency. I cannot direct monitor via my audio interface as sound is going to audio interface post DAW.
*Update: OK I got monitoring. Simple (doh!) iPad audio out into my audio interface and I set up direct monitoring. So now it's just an issue of the latency with aggregated device. Without aggregating Soundflower and my audio interface I cannot work with iPad synths and my hardware synths without changing up settings.
@Don -- Music IO is using IAA directly, so not all Audiobus-compatible apps show up. I'm a big fan of Audiobus (all of my other apps support it), but it didn't seem like the "right fit" for Music IO.
So far, the biggest headache seems to be routing the audio on the Mac, with a dozen different DAW set-ups that need wrangling. I'll try to put together a good overview in the next week or two.
@bsantoro -- the clocking should be solid. Nic from Audeonic takes his MIDI seriously, and Dan from MIDI Designer is pretty touchy too. There's some built-in clock stabilization, so any jitter that does happen over the USB connection should be smoothed out, and you should get steady, low latency clock (and low latency MIDI too, obviously).
Thats a pretty big issue! The whole basis and usage become rather limiting. Another reason to wait until all the concerns become addressed before purchase. Disapointment!
I have used it extensively on saturday evening, Midi is rock solid. Audio Latency is ok I had hooked it up on a active USB 2 Hub which had all ports maxed out
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What you really have to bear in mind is the differnet Buffre Settings etc that could interfer. I had live on 128 and needed to rund my ipad on 512 so this introduced some glitches from time to time, but given the early stage i can easily oversee the limitations. Just the fact that I am able to do this is awesome enough.
Overall for me it works. I'm still thinking out workflow for best sound and integration into my current set up. I tend to work in higher sample rates than 44.1K in my DAW, as well currently I cannot utilize input via audio interface and sound via Music IO simultaneously. But, as I figured out a way to direct monitor my iOS synth and record the midi notes of such iOS synth into my DAW I may formulate the idea and then eventually record to Audioshare, export out and then import into DAW which is already set at higher sample rate. Which is upconverting and may seem pointless but then I have more sonic room to utilize some very nice effects plugins in my DAW.
@SecretBaseDesign is there a windows version happening?
@Carnbot -- we're looking at Windows. Technically, there are no real barriers, and there are obvious reasons for us to do it (There are lots of people on Windows! Yes, we know!). I don't have a time-frame on something like this, though.
That would be awesome, have been trying to find the most cost effective way of doing this
Just a note that the devs are looking at a AU/VST plugin solution over current Soundflower. Which would make set up a little easier and I believe allow your DAW session to exist at a higher sample rate/bit depth than the iOS synth, etc. is at. With wired connection hopefully very little lag and max audio quality. So, if I'm correct, I can record an iOS synth, record from my hardware synth, add vocals, all without having to switch inputs in my DAW, have my session at 88.2K 32 bit if I wanted and all is good.
Yeah, I'd rather not mess again with Soundflower. A source of lots of confusion and gremlins. YMMV.
Hi, anybody using it? Couldn't find any real video reviews.
Updated!
We need a windows version.
VST/Au support in the update, but nothing on the MusicIO site yet. That's going to be niiiiice.
Here's a video that shows the new stuff. The VSTs and AUs are included in the Mac DMG (grab that at http://musicioapp.com/mac).
Sweet, thanks! I'm going to test it out after the little guy goes to bed tonight.
man, I have so much to learn about Logic and how to set it up. Sound is coming through nicely but since I deleted Soundflower I'm just not getting this "route to a bus, and then listen to the bus as an input" thing in the FAQ. Google to the rescue!