Cakewalk Hardware Control

how do i get all of this gear to control cakewalk let's find out in this video wait for it [Music] hi folks i'm mike and i hope you will so i've got five devices here which i'm using to control kcork i've got three in my desktop i've got my keyboard here and i'm also using my humble smartphone as well now if you've got a device that you can't see here and you want to use it to control cakewalk do stick around because this video may still be very helpful to you the reason for that is many manufacturers use a common protocol to communicate with doors so protocols are kind of a language a way of communication that protocol is called the mackie mcu protocol and it can do things like control transport things like play stop fast forward that kind of thing so for example with my keyboard here it's got some transport buttons so i can use it to start the playback so like this [Music] and stop fast forward record all that kind of good stuff i can do it here on my mackie mcu controller i can do it over here on my icon pro q controller and also over here on this presonus io station 24 which is actually very similar to the presonus fader port as well so i can play stop fast forward all that good stuff so that's the first kind of group of functions that we're using to control cakewalk the other one is to do with individual channels or multiple channels things like muting soloing that kind of thing and what a lot of us want to do is control the faders so for example on my keyboard again here i can use the fader here push it up and down and you can see the faders going up and down on these other devices and if you're eagle-eyed you'll be able to see it happening on the screen behind as well so of course i can do that with these controllers and with my fader port over here not fader port sorry the i o station 24. i always think it's the fader port with an audio interface added to it anyway so those are the things that we can do there's a whole bunch of other things you can do with some devices you can get plug-in control all that kind of good stuff as well lots of advantages it feels a lot more organic to do it this way you can put your hands on something and use it rather than having to use the mouse and keyboard all the time so i know some of you do have problems getting this up and running so in today's video i'm going to run through how to set it up and then how to fix some of those common issues let's start off with some preparation so what i mean by preparation is making sure that your device is in mackie mcu mode now unfortunately i can't tell you exactly how to do that it varies from one manufacturer to the other and from one device to the other the tips i'll give this if you've got a screen on the device and it's got some settings then often you'll find that you can switch modes in there if you haven't got a screen on your device then commonly there's a special button combination you have to press when you power up the device to get it into machi mcu mode what i suggest you do is go to that products web page look for the manual and that's usually a pdf and do a search in that pdf for mcu and if you can't find it at all that may mean that your device doesn't have mcu mode another thing you can do though is look for any tips on setting it up for cubase i've often found that helpful because cubase uses mcu as well so if there isn't something on cake cork specifically or sonar then look for cubase maybe you'll get the tips in there as to how to put your device in the correct mode once you've got it in mackie mcu mode then we can start setting up in cakewalk so i'm going to start off with the standard process this is the process you'll have to go through regardless of manufacturer or model of device now i'll happen to be using my machi mcu pro control surface the device where the protocol gets its name from but as i say this could apply to something like the behringer x touch or as i say my qcon pro g2 and many other devices keyboards and things from other manufacturers so i'm in cakewalk i'm going to press p on the keyboard to bring up preferences and then i'm going to go down to midi devices because all of these devices are going to use midi to communicate with the computer and then with cakewalk so it's important that we set up inputs and outputs the inputs are so the device can tell cakewalk to do things and the outputs are so that cakewalk can tell the device what the current state is whether it's playing what position it's at what the current state of a fader is all that kind of good stuff so you can see i've already got a device selected here this is just my keyboard my regular keyboard set up for playing notes okay that's not what i'm interested at the moment i'm going to set up my mcu pro so i'll set its input on and i'll set its output on okay now a note on keyboards if i was setting this up at the moment to be using the controls on my keyboard the transport controls and the faders and things usually what happens in fact all of the times i've done this successfully this has happened that keyboard will have two midi outputs and inputs one for its regular use for keyboards and things and then another one for using the mackie mcu protocol it may have more than that so depending on the device it may be using um midi two or three etc so in my case with my arteria keyboard you can see here it's got this device here midi into key lab mark ii that's the arterial device so if i was setting that up that's the one that i would be enabling and it's the one that i would use later on in this process but i'm not doing that now so i'm going to stick to this mcu pro here so i've got that selected i could hit on apply at the moment if i wanted to make sure that's applied and then i need to go down to midi control surfaces i click on that and now i'm ready to set up this as a control surface so i'll go right up to the top right hand corner here this little little icon here and you can see it's to add a new controller surface i'll click on that that brings up this dialog here so i'll start off by selecting under here the mackie control selection there you may have a bunch of other ones there you may have less than this depends on your particular setup but you will all have the mackie control uh i think it's a driver you would call it here so i'll select that as the type of control surface and then i need to select that device that i just enabled for the input and the output so i'm not going to use the key lab that's for my notes i'm using the mcu pro on this occasion so change that to wherever your device is for that particular midi output for that device then i just click on ok and that is all set up now if everything goes well and the device is sort of using the standard implementation then that will all be working i'll just click on apply here just to make sure i'll close that and if i hit play on my mackie you can see and here that the music starts to play and i'll click stop and that stops and if i move one of the faders around in actual fact i'll just bring this over so you can see the faders i've got control over you can see i'm moving them up and down so that has all worked well all gone to plan but it doesn't always go to plan so let's look at the first reason why that might not be the case so sometimes you'll follow that procedure and still nothing happens well i've got a quick tip for you here and this may solve it for you let me know in the comments down below if it does and also let me know which model of keyboard you're using so if somebody else comes to me with that model i can let them know this is how you can fix it i'm using my arturia keyboard here i've set it up as i did in the previous section i've made sure i've used the right midi outputs and things i've gone through and set it up as a mackie controller and then i've got to hit the play button on the transport i'll do it now nothing is happening i'm pressing the i'm pushing the faders around on my keyboard none of the faders are moving so here's how i'm going to fix that whenever you've set up a mackie control surface of any kind if you go up to this utilities menu at the top left here click on that you'll see at the bottom it will appear down here it may have a slightly different name if you've just got one installed it will just say mackie control one like that click on that it takes a moment and then it brings up this menu this gives you a few useful options as regards the control surface and sort of customizing it the one thing i've found that really helps with a number of devices is checking this tick box here next to disable handshake this is a process which happens normally between cakewalk and the device when it first starts up it sends some information back and forth but with some devices they're not completely compliant so this doesn't work and won't it won't get going so if this is not happening for you if it's not working try this click on disable handshake then click close that window there now i'm going to press play on my arturia device you can see things happening there it's playing i'll press stop i'll push some of the faders around you can see them moving and capable of there it's fixed that it's not always a complete fix but you'll generally find you get most of the functionality that you would want oh by the way are you finding this video useful if you are go ahead and hit the like button for me do it right away so you don't forget if you don't like this video at all make sure you hit the dislike button twice if you do like this kind of content make sure you subscribe and ring the bell on youtube so that you're notified about other videos now back to this video so sometimes you'll get issues when you've got more than one device set up to try and control cakewalk sometimes the second device just won't work or doesn't work fully so for that i'm going to give you a solution which involves downloading a file i'll put a link for that in the description down below and within that file is a setup you just run that setup and install some alternative drivers which will appear in cape cork you'll have to restart catwalk of course before you can see them now i just want to quickly thank noel borthwick and mark mccloud from bandlab who have given me some little hints before i've proceeded in making this video particularly surrounding this particular subject so i've already got one controller set up that's my icon q con pro g2 and i'm going to set up a second one so again i'll press p on the keyboard preferences i'm already in control surfaces here and you can see i've already got the icon set up just as normal as i've shown you already so now i'm going to add my i o station 24 that's the presonus product and i think that that product works in exactly the same way as their current fader port as well so you can follow this procedure if you're having that issue with that as well so i'm going to go ahead on the icon at the top right there click to add a new controller surface now in this part where i select the controller surface rather than picking control sorry mackie control i'm going to go ahead and this has appeared now this is something that mark mcleod make from bandlab and i've followed that process which i told you about earlier of installing that so i'm going to select this one this mcleod mackie control number one and if i was going to do even more devices then i'd use number two and number three so i'll click on number one there and again i'll just go ahead and i'll select the i o station 24c there again io station 24c there click on ok click on apply uh close this window so i'm going to use my cue con to press play you can see that's happening and my fade is going up and down and i can already see my fader moving on my i o station from presonus over there you can see that moving up and down and the transport controls are working on that as well so that's how you would go ahead setting up a second or third device etc it may even help if you're just having general problems to try these alternative drivers i can't guarantee but there's always a possibility that could help it's worth trying out so if you're still confused please do ask in the comments down below and i'll do my very best to help you out but do bear in mind i don't know about every single device out there and how to get it into mackie mcu mode that's something you're best to look in the manual for or contact that company support about now if you want to download those other drivers i told you about do check the links in the description they may well help you out while you're there check out my link to patreon.com where if as little as one dollar per month you can help me help you by making more videos like this and i'll see you in the next video [Music] um

Channel: Creative Sauce

Views: 29,495

Keywords: Cakewalk Hardware Control, Mackie MCU, Cakewalk by, cakewalk by bandlab, cakewalk by bandlab tutorial, how to setup a surface controller in cakewalk, MACKIE MCU PRO, ICON QCON PRO G2, PRESONUS IOSTATION 24C, ARTURIA KEYLAB 88 MKII, Presonus faderport, how to setup a faderport with cakewalk, cakewalk midi controller setup, how to use keyboard as midi controller cakewalk, cakewalk controller, mackie mcu pro, behringer x touch, behringer x touch cakewalk, creative sauce, midi

Id: K7x30ZmO5V0

Length: 13min 28sec (808 seconds)

Published: Fri May 14 2021