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.
why au might be overrated...
the more i come back to auria pro, the less i use aum...for some reason when i stick bias amp, neosoulkeys or module, a reverb and maybe something else i hit or go over 100% of system resources (1rst gen ipadpro 12). but these same plugins, plus a shit ton more in auria pro and i baarely hit 50. something about ap’s coding must be tight AF. my last mix (pictured below)has a ton of fabfilters on almost every track,master fx’s,etc....you better believe that 15% of that firepower would be crackle city in aum. so i don’t use au’s to mix..just for preproduction, freezing any fx into the track and just use auria and auria approved fx for mixing and i can bump up my buffer to max and have no issues. 
i use auriapro to host jams too now, record always, no sending tracks around, possibly making other copies. etc
i do use cubasis if i’m jamming with a drum sequencer.
Comments
There's a lot to be said for Apps that are integrated and not assembled from a bunch of Apps to gain stability.
As folks fall in love with discrete App's they adopt AU and IAA methods and introduce some instability to their platforms as they keep adding complexity.
Trade offs
TOP STABLE PLATFORMS:
Agreed plus BeatHawk
Yes that's exactly how I feel. Everything is much easier and less hassle in one environment, be it Auria with the native plugins, or Gadget, or even just GarageBand. AU gets a lot of hype, but there's a way to go yet before it's really mature.
One flaw in iOS AU implementation is the well known memory limit but related to that is the fact this memory doesn’t become available again until you quit the host and reopen it which seems pretty big to me. I’ve seen this mentioned around here a while ago but not lately. As I recall this is a flaw in iOS so it would be nice for a dev to confirm this. Maybe it will be fixed in iOS 12, who knows?
@vpich : That IS a typo in your first sentence there? You mean “AU” not “AUM”? Also is that a 4gig iPad Pro?
Oh - my answer took so long that i didn‘t realize you were probably talking about AUM vs Auria platform usability and stability - i wrote a long answer about the AU versus native plugin questions...
I‘ll leave my text anyway:
——————————
To elaborate on the AU/native problem a little further:
My EQ benchmark comparison clearly shows that it‘s not the AU plugin format itself that costs the performance. Running 77 AU ProQ2 (beta) in Auria Pro produces 26% CPU, while 77 native ProQ2 produce 22 % CPU - so the AU overhead for 77 instances is only 4% CPU.
If one substacts the hosts base-load for the 44 audio-tracks from the results for 77 AU ProQ2s, one gets comparable 24% CPU in Auria Pro and 23-25% in AUM.
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But i must admit that FabFilters ProQ2 (beta) is the only EQ AU of my testfield that managed to load that many instances (and with so little CPU load) in any of the hosts. Hopefully the beta will be released soon. I am convinced that FabFilter will apply the findings of the ProQ2 AU adaption to further AU portings of their products - and will happily buy them all again as AU
I don’t think that „testing tons of instances in various AU hosts“ is a common standard for AU FX developers (resulting in optimizing the per instance memory consumption). Perhaps i am going to do a „AU FX max instance test“ someday to raise the awareness of the AU-total-memory problem. Or better apple removes/raises the limit.
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TL;DR;
Measurements show that AU usage does not in itself cost additional performance, however developers need to optimize their FX plugins for speed and memory.
Personnaly, my hype for AU came from the fact that multiple apps can be used at a same time on one screen (as well as my hype for splitcreen/splitview that died in the eggshell, congrats apple) but even a 12.9inch screen isn’t close from competing with a desk with some cheap hardware on it.
Will we ever see an AU host that expand working surface by putting it in a scrollable screen à la caustic, or subdividing automayically screen into small windows with interchangeable AU om the fly à la Skram?
Sorry but, WHY hosts developpers haven’t all figured what Windows and mac OS have eons ago: USERS NEED A FREAKING TOOL BAR THAT CAN’T BE HIDDEN SO ONE CAN ACCESS OPEN WINDOWS ALL THE TIME WITHOUT HAVING TO F👆👆👆ing CLOSE OR MOVE WINDOWS AROUND.
Thanks Michel for adding it to AB3, though simultaneous AU windows is still MIA.
TOP "One Stop Shop" PLATFORMS LIST?
and comin' in on the outside from huge Android installed base:
"It AEMS to please" the developer participates here to improve the IOS revenue.
Yeah no i meant aum, i can see my writing was a little disjointed. I have been using aum as my mixer when using au fx and instruments but i prefer that in auria now because of less system hogging and better recall. Plus i avoid having to bounce my recordings to auria where they will eventually end up anyways.
That first screenshot is the exact reason I never use Auria.
Why? Crowded?
Love my Cubasis app. Garageband is great. I still haven’t been able to tap the potential of Gadget, funny enough it was my first app purchase.
There's a reason why real consoles are large
Though Auria actually shows more detail what's going on in the mix, deciphering the tiny 'grid' is quite some stress.
Most unconvenient issue (for me) is that it doesn't permanently show which inputs are active (only when arming tracks).
I don't really understand this comment. It's a mixing console, that's well laid out. In a mixing app. It's like saying you don't want to see a keyboard in a synth app. Or drum pads in a drumming app.
yeah same here. With AUM you build everything from the ground up. with AURIA you're stuck with a cluttered interface whether you use things or not. I don't need 8 subgroups for what I'm doing, but I can't get rid of them. I wish Auria had a cleaner interface and that you could build the mixer in a modular design as in AUM. then I would actually get some use out of it.
I personally find apps offer desktop-like environments to be very frustrating on iOS. AUM makes great use of touch. The menu system is fluid and caters to the touch. Apps like Auria (and Synthmaster One for that matter) feel very fidgety to me. I've tried the apple pencil for more control, but it just feels clunky compared to AUM or Cubasis.
thing is, on paper Auria pro is a dream app, but in practice I just find the workflow leaves a lot to be desired.
In fact it is - but there's this eye-piercing 'small grid effect' (may vary individually, though).
It's emphasized by superflous labels. No need for 16 Pan, Aux, Insert, Input, etc in a horizontal row. A slightly different tone/color would be enough to guide the eye.
@Telefunky yep, the main problem with the Auria UI is not the fact that lots of functionality is on a single screen, but rather the unnecessary visual noise.
Also, the "decorative borders" around the channel sections could be removed, replaced by subtle background color variations (as you mentioned).
@Telefunky You are right - the repetion of the white labels its superfluous, some color guides and a single same-color label just on the first channelstrip would suffice to optically unclutter the user interface.
And then i made a google image search for large studio hardware mixing consoles and found the same label repetition on every knob or button of the channelstrips... with colored knobs
yes - and it doesn't matter because a console is seen from a distance where no grid effect happens. I once had an old 20 channel Soundtracs desk (not used much), but that was a nice user experience.
From a haptic pov I'd go console anytime, but 'affordable' ones are a hell of work to setup/mod for recording - hardly worth the effort, let alone space and weight.
The UI gives me bad nausea, eye-strain and head-ache just looking at it. It's way too 'contrasty' and crowded with small items. It may work on a 12.9" or something but on a 9.7" it's a no-no and I can't even imagine trying to use it on the iPad Mini's. (Everyone seems to scream for iPhone version of Cubasis. Wonder why there's no one screaming over an iPhone version of Auria Pro LOL).
I have yet to actually finish a project in Auria, but I think its really apples and skateboards and not worth comparing. I moved to iOS to 'play' with music again, not 'work' on it. Auria seems like a great environment to work on multitrack recording, while AumApeMatrixBus is more about just simply but effectively syncing and mixing apps.
Just figuring out how to load an AU synth in Auria took me skimming the manual for a while, its buried in the channel fx, and you have to first load the default sampler then change it out for an AU... That, plus I will likely never use 80 percent of the tools provided there - but I get why it is designed as it is. Its a traditional recording studio in an app, fucking amazing but not what many will be wanting or needing.
Yeah me too. It’s looks like a mixer. Sure, make it easy to hide unused busses, but everything is laid out like stuff i’ve used for years. And you can’t hide unused stuff on a physical mixer.
Don’t get me wrong. I like the way aum looks, it’s just that i hit that cpu capacity right aways and also waste time setting up a master bus channel to record a demo if i want it or record all tracks separately and then find and port them to Auria. Easy, but another few steps. But the main thing is that, i hit cpu limit soon.
It sounds to me like you haven't really spent any time in the app at all, because you can load an AU synth directly from the main screen.
Create a new MIDI channel, and tap on the Instrument:
Then browse the list:
And load your synth:
I don't think that counts as being difficult. It's all too easy to dismiss an app if your knowledge of it is very shallow. Spend more time with it before passing judgement. FWIW in Cubasis the process is a little slower because you have to navigate out of the default instruments into the AU list.
oups...wrong post...
Actually I did some tests right now, looking at the CPU usage of Auria vs AUM in Xcode Instruments, running the same plugins/apps (SECTOR and Dubstation 2 in this case) and couldn't see any real difference. Are you sure you're testing with the exact same plugins and settings? What about buffer size and sample rate? Also note that the CPU meter in AUM displays peak value, not average.
You could be one of those few users that get bad audio performance in some apps (not only AUM), coupled with UI activity such as scrolling. This is an iOS bug that affects only some devices, and Apple is still working to find and fix it according to my last contact with them. Maybe something in AUM triggers that bug while Auria does not? Perhaps it depends on which graphics APIs are used, etc. Hopefully we'll know in the future
The measurements stated in my last message ( see above ) confirm that the CPU percentage for 77 ProQ2 AU instances is about the same in AUM as in Auria Pro - just the base load for the 44 AUM FilePlayers is higher than for the 44 Auria Pro audio tracks.
i feel bad, singling you out, as this really started as me quickly getting out my new workflow that works better for me and seeing tons of posts about "au or broke" or wanting to use fabfilters outside of auria p
ro (even if it means BUYING AGAIN,...
i use audio share every time i turn on the computer, and aum looks great (probably my favorite guy) and works for small sessions, just expressing my current evolving workflow. aum is still going to be a big part of my workflow, because i can use it on my phone where i will routinely work on drums anywhere i have time to spare, run through fx, ,basically go to town on evolving the drum loops and grab that 8 minute file or whatever and send to auria to chop up. never had a freeze or other issue. to be fair, auria pro is pretty solid but it has crashed from time to time.
but in the case of something more intensive,...like neosoulkeys studio on track one, running through one or two fx (johnny and a delay), mic through harmony vocal and roughrider compressor on another track, and then your aufx reverb on a bus i get close to overloading, (guitar through bias amp was crackle city). same session in auria pro, now with compressors and eq's, and fabfilter delay, saturn, master fx,...old timer, etc..more stuff...and pretty far from that limit. and bias amp is also open in auria pro...
the issue might be my iPad, so i'm only sharing my current setup that works for me, and that changes all the time so there is that....
anyways, my original point that i probably muddled was that i only use au's as production tools, bouncing down any instruments and fx to audio. any real mixing for me needs to be in auria, where i need to bump up the buffer as high as possible and then i can use every mixing trick i know and not have pops. anything above 512 makes au not work, so i can't mix with them. so maybe someone looking to start working in iOS and wants to use fabfilters should be aware of this and know that they are going to have way more mixing power inside of auria and not discard it in lieu of au instances of fabfilters.
For me, as a non Auria user, the contrast between Cubasis and Auria tells the tale. When I was app shopping for a DAW I kept hearing how I must get Auria. I just couldn't get over the whole "desktop on a iPad vibe" which I think Auria says to me visually. Cubasis is in no way perfect but I think there is a better balance between design for the iPad and just cramming way too much on a screen for the ultimate in functionality.
Looking at a mixer with your eyes and hands is way different to looking at the same on a screen. To my eyes, Auria is a visual nightmare wrapped in a deep fried twinkie. And it kept me from purchasing.
yeah, i get that. it's just that i grew up using mixers like auria, hardware and even protools/logic, etc. i look at it and it's laid out like what i know, so i don't have to hunt anything down, it's just naturally where it should be. i like cubasis too, but while the design is cleaner, to me it looks more toyish. and missing some key things i need, like bus grouping.
@vpich No question that there are a large number of high quality, high-end, native plugins in Auria Pro with deep feature set allowing for lots of finesse in the mixing stage
But for us ‚dabblers‘ the freedom of AUs host choice (AUM, ApeMatrix, BM3 and others) is a big plus - in the mixing stage i prefer Auria Pro or Cubase with more DAW like features.