What’s New in Mixbus v6

Mixbus v6 adds the following new features and improvements:

• 5th generation processing engine including extensive latency compensation and cue-monitoring.
• Graphical operation improvements, largely suggested by forum users, that improve Mixbus’s usability on smaller monitors.
• Foldback buses allow the building of multiple custom cue mixes for artists.
• Region List is redesigned and a new Source List that helps you manage recording takes and organize imported files such as loops.
• “Cut” Tool provides a faster and clearer way to split regions with a dedicated tool mode.
• MP3 import/export on Mac, Windows, and Linux.
• Virtual MIDI keyboard window allows you to “play” MIDI notes into a track when you don’t have a physical device available.

5th Generation Mixbus Engine

The v6 release involves several deep improvements in the 5th generation Mixbus engine.

The 5th generation engine incorporates almost 3 years of continuous behind-the-scenes development. Many subtle behaviors, like the ringing-out of reverb and delay tails after transport stop, are greatly improved.

Mixbus v6 launches faster than v5, and the transport (play, stop, locate) is much smoother and more responsive. You should also notice improvements in looped recording, looped playback, and varispeed.

Some of the specific improvements are listed below:

Latency compensation:

• In addition to the Mixbus console (which has always been latency-compensated), it is now possible to add additional buses alongside the tracks, which can be used for additional grouping, effect returns, and other tasks. And these buses are now fully latency-compensated just like the regular mixbuses>master path.
• Plugin Delay Compensation (PDC) can now be disabled. This might be useful when recording live tracks while monitoring prerecorded tracks.
• To disable PDC, you must first click Preferences->Toolbar->“Display Latency Compensation Info” to expose the latency-compensation toolbox.

Monitoring improvements:

• By default, MIDI tracks will now monitor both the “input” and “Disk” when they are in automatic mode. Users can override this on a per-track basis and choose to monitor the input or Disk, only.
• Audio tracks can now monitor both the input and disk simultaneously.
• The SDIO ( separate disk I/O ) will also allow the addition of the “record-wet” feature (reserved for a future release)

Operational Improvements

• Slates now show the track number and use a larger, higher-contrast font.
• Track number turns red if the track is record-armed.
• Renaming a mixbus will automatically display the new name inside the channel strip bus enable buttons.
• Channel VCA and phase buttons are now always visible at the bottom of the channel strip.
• The EQ knobs now show “freq” rather than percent. This is a popular request from users on our forum.

Source List + Region List

• The “Region List” has been redesigned to show only the regions actually in use in the current snapshot. The secondary function of the region list (showing the source files for every region) has been moved into its own dedicated section, the “Source List”

Region List

• The “Region List” shows only the regions that are used in the current snapshot. Selecting a region in the list will select the corresponding region on the editor canvas. This allows you to reverse-interrogate your edits by, for example, sorting regions by their start time and then selecting them.

Source List

• The “Source list” shows the file sources used by the session, whether they are used in the current snapshot or not.
• Sources have a “capture time” ( i.e. Take ) stamp, so the user can find other regions captured at the same time

Tagging Regions and Sources

Regions and Sources may be “tagged” together, which can help in session management. For example, you can tag all the regions that were part of a good overdub; or you can tag regions with the particular artist who recorded them. See Edit->“Tag selected regions” in the main menu.

Separately Pannable Utility (“Aux”) buses

• In addition to the Harrison console signal flow structure, you may add an unlimited number of audio buses (sometimes called “Aux” or “Utility” buses).
• When a track has a “Send” to a utility bus, you can double-click the send to access the Send’s level and pan-control (if any) from the channel’s fader area.
• Click “Show Sends” on the bus, and the mixer window will “spill” the attached tracks into view, and provide the send-level and pan from the channel’s fader area.
• Learn more here: DAW Style Mixing Buses

Foldback buses

• Foldback buses can be used to create headphone mixes for your talent (artists). Foldback buses represent a send to a headphone mix. The mix for a foldback bus can be the combination of any mixer strip, either pre- or post-fader; the foldback bus has its own plugins and fader, allowing you to create a complete custom sound for each artist. Furthermore, it is possible to remotely control foldback mixes from an OSC-enabled tablet or phone application.

Enhanced transport syncing

• Mixbus can now record when an external transport sync source is varispeeding (playing at a speed other than 100%). This improves the ability of Mixbus to transfer tracks from analog tape, among other benefits. It will also allow us to emulate traditional analog recording studio tricks. We plan to expose controls for those new features in the 6.x update series.

A new “Transport Masters” dialog is provided to display all current sync sources, and their speed and location. You can select which external synchronization source to chase on-the-fly. This is a huge advantage for demanding tasks like on-site live broadcasts or providing backing tracks for a live show.

“Cut” tool

• Additional to the built-in region splitting capability, a Cut (scissor) tool is added similar to those used in other DAWs.

Virtual MIDI Keyboard

• An on-screen keyboard is available to enter rhythms and melodies when you don’t have a physical MIDI keyboard available. The virtual keyboard maps your QWERTY keyboard into a note-input device.

• The Virtual MIDI Keyboard can be accessed in the “Window” menu. By default, the Virtual MIDI Keyboard is connected to the input of the currently-selected MIDI track. For more details, see: Virtual MIDI Keyboard

MP3 Import

• In the past, only the MAC version could import mp3’s using the Apple built-in decoder. Now Windows and Linux can also import mp3 directly.
• On import, MP3 files are converted to a .wav file (inside the session folder) for internal use.

Default preferences and behavior changes:

Waveforms now Logarithmic

• Many of our users preferred the “Logarithmic” waveform display option. The default value for waveform displays has been changed to “Logarithmic”. If you were using that option in the past, then you might notice your region waveforms now appear visually larger. ( you will not hear any difference, though )

Auto-Input behavior

• “Tape Machine Mode” has been replaced with “Auto Input does Talkback”, which is defaulted OFF. In the past, if you had Auto-Input engaged, the default behavior was to monitor the inputs when transport was stopped. In a multi-room studio, this can help performers hear each other and rehearse between takes. But this is not so useful in a typical DAW studio when everybody is in the same room, and it might lead to feedback. So we changed the default operation of Auto Input. If you want the old operation, then enable the option “Auto Input does Talkback” in Preferences->Signal Flow.
• Auto-Input is now defaulted “ON” for new users.

Elimination of Separate Sidechain Bussing

• The discrete sidechain bus of earlier versions is eliminated in V6. Sidechain controlled compression is replaced with a plugin-based approach.

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