LOUD Technologies Inc. (parent company of Mackie) today announced it has signed an agreement with Avid® that licenses the use of Mackie’s new Onyx-i Series Firewire Recording Mixers with Avid Pro Tools M-Powered™ 8 software.

To enable use with Pro Tools M-Powered 8, users will need to purchase the Mackie Universal Driver upgrade ($49.99 USD). Once the driver is downloaded and installed, the Onyx 820i, 1220i, 1620i and 1640i mixers can be used with Avid Pro Tools M-Powered 8 software.

“For years, Mackie customers have wanted to combine the familiar workflow of an analog mixer with the world’s most popular DAW,” remarked John Boudreau, VP of LOUD’s Music Gear group. “Through our newly-signed agreement with Avid, Mackie’s Onyx-i mixers now make this possible.”

Chris Gahagan, Senior Vice President of Products at Avid said, “Avid has made openness a key component of its ongoing strategy, and this agreement with LOUD is a perfect example of how we continue to open up our ecosystem.  As joint developers of the HUI protocol, Avid and LOUD have a history of working productively together, and we’re pleased to be working together on this latest endeavor to provide our customers with more choice and flexibility when it comes to unleashing their creativity.”

Mackie Onyx-i Series FireWire Recording Mixers are now available at Mackie-authorized dealers worldwide. For more information on this series, please visit http://www.mackie.com/onyxiseries.

This beauty is a redesign of Rain‘s previous award winning mobile audio platform. With up to an amazing 8GB of RAM and an Intel Core 2 Duo engine, this is a whole new ball game.

For the first time ever, LiveBook has a beautiful, black aluminum skin designed to aid the intelligent cooling system keeping everything Quiet Cool. But the beauty isn’t just skin deep. A dumptruck full of new features make LiveBook the most powerful, stable and reliable mobile audio workstation ever.

Features like Penryn-series dual core processing on Intel’s new Centrino 2 “Montevina” platform, a new high res display with a picture so sweet it’ll bring a tear to your eye and, for the first time ever, up to 8GB of memory! (yes, in a notebook).
Totally Audiocentric

LiveBook LiveBook was meticulously designed as a platform for audio production. A dizzying array of ports give you the power to interface with all your audio gear. Dual FireWire chipsets ensure maximum compatibility with industry standard audio interfaces plus eSATA for lightning fast data streaming to your external drive. And at the heart of it all, up to 2.8GHz of high power, high efficiency processing courtesy of Intel. That means you pushing endless tracks, plug-ins and synths like it was going out of style (it’s not). Penryn-series dual core processors from Intel. It’s low heat, low noise and all the horsepower you need to make the music you want – starting at just $1999.

At a Glance:

*  CPU:
2.1GHz Intel Core 2 Duo “Penryn” T8100 3MB L2 800MHz FSB
2.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo “Penryn” T9300 6MB L2 800MHz FSB
* Chipset: Intel PM965+ICH-8M
* Video: Discreet NIVIDIA GeForce Go 8600M GS (256MB)
* Sound System: Built-in Intel HD, Built-in Stereo Speakers and Microphone
* Memory: Up to 4GB DDR2 667MHz SODIMM Dual Channel
* Display: 15.4″ WXGA+ (1280×800) Widescreen LCD
* Storage: Up to 200GB SATA-300 7200RPM (16MB Cache)
* Optical: CD-RW / DVD-RW +/- Dual Layer
* Modem: 56k V.90/V.92 Modem RJ-11
* WiFi LAN: Integrated mobile Intel 802.11A (b,g,n) Wireless Wi-Fi LinK
* Wired LAN: 10/100/1000 built-in/Realtek Fast Ethernet Controller
* Input Devices: Touch pad with 2 click buttons, 88 key keyboard
* Battery: Li-Ion 6 cell Smart Li-Ion battery 64W/Hrs, 4 Hrs., Built-in gauge IC
* I/O Ports
o 4 x USB 2.0 ports
o 3 x FireWire ports (1x internal + 2x 6-pin w/ TI Chipset on PCI Express card)
o 1 x VGA port/MiniD-sub 15-pin for external monitor
o 1 x 2.0 MP Webcam
o 1 x Card Reader
o 2 x Audio jack: Audio out / Mic-in
o 1 x RJ11 connector for Modem
o 1 x RJ45 connector for Ethernet
o 1 S-Video Composite (TV-Out)
* Dimensions: 14.2″ x 10.5″ x 1.1″~1.5″ (WxDxH)
* Weight: 5.5 lbs. w/ 6 cell battery

Software

* Microsoft Windows XP Professional or Vista Ultimate
* NERO Express CD/DVD Creation Software
* Acronis True Image Recovery Software

The Wave Pro features:

* A unique wave key frame
* A U-shaped constant curve
* A cushioned, contoured palm rest

According to an independent study by Peter W. Johnson, Ph.D., of the University of Washington, the Logitech Wave Keyboard improves comfort. Combining three distinctive elements, the newest Logitech keyboard offers you an innovative wave key frame, a U-shaped constant curve and a cushioned, contoured palm rest. In comparison to ergonomic keyboards, you can use a Wave keyboard immediately – there is no learning curve. The Comfort Wave Design guides your hands and cradles your fingers to create a naturally comfortable typing experience.

The MX1100 mouse features:

* Designed to support the naturally curved shape of your hand
* When sold in the desktop bundle, it allows you to fully recharge your mouse while you’re working – you don’t need to stop what you’re doing.

A 7-hour charge provides up to six weeks of power. Or, for your convenience, plug the USB cable into the included AC adaptor and recharge your mouse using any available wall outlet. (When sold separately, the stand-alone MX1100 offers up to nine months of battery life and uses two AA batteries.)

The mouse’s MicroGear Precision Scroll Wheel has two scrolling modes, including hyper-fast scrolling for flying effortlessly through long documents and Web pages. Eight programmable buttons allow you to get to the information, the Web pages, the files and the applications you want – fast. With software installed, a stealth thumb button makes application switching easy and zoom controls allow you to zoom in and out of documents with the press of a button. The mouse also features adjustable dpi (up to 1,600 dpi), which can come in handy when editing an image at the pixel level or, alternatively, when you need to move the cursor quickly within a document.
Both are available as part of a bundle, combining great design and functionality to provide ultimate user comfort. The MX1100 Mouse will also be sold separately.

Price: £TBC
Availability: September

‘Have you seen the Dexter?.. It’s touch screen’.

The videos dotted around on Youtube and various blogs made us literally dribble with the excitement at the futuristic light show that is the touch-screen DAW of the now. It’s currently available for use with Sonar, Cubase, Nuendo and Logic Pro.

In the beginning…

On connection to your computer, the Dexter prompts the user to sync the unit via IP. Connect that up and your main user interface appears before you, and your trousers start to feel the cream.

The 8 channel strips in front of you consist of a meter/fader display a set of Mute, Solo, and Record buttons, which are toggled by one touch. The color of the channel indicates its current state with regards to the aforementioned touch controls.
Switching through the 64 channels is easy, via the 8X8 fader display above your main interface. From here you can choose which of the 64 channels you’d like to assign to which group (if you so choose), although as I’ll point out again later, you can’t save your stored groups. That sucks. As does this fact.

To control more than 64 channels, you have to access the DAW’s interface.

Touch the EQ symbol above each channel fader for a great parametric Q, which has all you need – Gain, Q and band selection. If you’re into EQ automation, you can freeze certain parameters in order to edit certain others, so in essence create a manual ‘Wah-Wah’ sound, and get it down to disk exactly how you want it. This is a very good inclusion.

The main benefit of the Dexter, as I’m sure you’ve read before, is that it is absolutely amazing for surround sound mixing, and this is where it’s true strengths lie – possible taking away hours of work (and doing a damn fine job).

Truly, this editing function is superb, allowing quick and easy experimentation for placing individual tracks anywhere in a 360 degree field. Similar to the EQ, you can then lock these tracks in place, but keep one paramater open, so move everything closer/further away’ from the central point.

If only that was an automated feature too…

I’m at a bit of a loss as to whether or not I like the Dexter or not. On the one hand, it’s an incredibly clever and impressive piece of kit which essentially brings up all your editable parameters onto its tablet form screen.

On the other hand, I somehow expected more to happen. Maybe I expected some built in effects, so that the unit had a character of its own, some reverbs, some compressors and gates to rival the big boys. A medium between your VST plugins and something by Focusrite, whilst offering the versatility of being, effectively, a touch screen monitor.

The bad news is, it isn’t. You can’t assign your variables from the unit, which means you’ll still be switching back to mouse and keyboard quite a bit.

Built in wireless mode would have been nice too, guys, especially for the price.

I’m told by Jazzmutant that there is a software upgrade being worked on right now to sort out the assignable parameters problem, which would go some way to making this unit a lot more popular, I’m sure.

Now, I should make it clear that apart from the aforementioned issues, there is not much that isn’t possible with this unit. But of course, it’s possible to do it without the unit as well

For instance, (told you I’d come back to this) – you can group your faders for more control on your overall sound, which is a nice little feature. Unfortunately, this isn’t storable (although, again, Jazzmutant is working on it with the software upgrade).

Now, another issue with this little baby is that Digidesign hasn’t allowed Jazzmutant access to it’s SDK, meaning that the controller isn’t supported by Pro-Tools. I can well understand that Digidesign consider the Dexter a threat to its own Pro-Tools supported hardware, and that’s just something everyone will have to live with, although I do feel that if Jazzmutant could focus on developing touch screen technology, it would open up the market an incredible amount.

In summary, the Dexter is a great piece of kit, despite my issues with it, and if the price was dramatically reduced, I would
certainly buy one.
Which brings me to this

I can’t help feeling the Dexter would be of more use in a live environment. Either way, though, I’m pleased to report that you can also install the Jazzmutant Lemur software onto the tablet (as well as!!). This is free, by the way, which does go an incredibly long way to making this unit worth the money.

If that wasn’t the case, I can’t forsee a great end to the review, as it’s the price as opposed to the yet-to-be-fully-developed
product which, for a while, made this unit a mystery to me.

But now you can throw the Lemur into the equation as well, so if you do some sums, the Dexter costs around $400.

Think about that, and you’ve got an amazing bargain on your hands (as long as both are of use to you). See, now I cannot find a single reason not to get one.

Damn you, Jazzmutant.

Since then, I don’t think I’ve seen him NOT be online more than a couple of times, he’s been working almost 24/7 to bring his readers the latest news.

So I think it’s only fair that I just link over to some of his headlines and let the NAMM Vet himself tell you about the latest industry news.

Cheers Stiff!

____

Universal Audio partners with SPL, Empirical Labs and Valley People

UA reveals LA-610 Signature Edition – prestige tube recording channel

EastWest introduces Forbidden Planet

M-Audio introduces ProFire 2626

New Studiophile monitors from M-Audio

Spectrasonics previews flagship V.I. “Omnisphere” at NAMM 08

Complete Pro Tools “studios”

Digidesign D-Show 2.7 software upgrade

URS Classic Console Strip Pro v1.1 for Mac OSX PPC/ Intel

Overloud debuts TH1 Guitar Amp

Music soundware and software distributor ILIO has announced a cooperative program with hard drive maker Glyph Technologies to offer hard disk drives pre-installed with virtual instrument software. ILIO’s G-TIP (Glyph–Turnkey Installation Program) packages will include virtual instrument software from Vienna Symphonic Library and Synthogy pre-installed on Glyph hard drives. Purchasers of these packages may register their software with the manufacturer without having to manually install the multiple Gigabytes of data many of these products contain.

For more in depth details of several pre-configured packages offered, please go along to the ProToolerBlog website.

“The ILIO G-TIP packages are a direct result of customer demand,” says Mark Hiskey of ILIO. “Many of our users simply want the convenience of ‘plug-and-play’ without having to sacrifice the great sound and musicality large virtual instruments provide. Working with Glyph was an easy decision because they have the best reputation in our industry for high performance hard disk storage. And they back that reputation with excellent service and warrantee coverage.”

Phil French, president of Glyph Technologies, comments, “We’re thrilled that ILIO came to us with this idea, and are pleased to be working with a company who shares our commitment to excellence and customer service.”