I give up...

I have tried for more than a week, spending well over 36 hours trying to get GR2 and RK2 to work properly.

I'm on a 1.67ghz 17" powerbook with 2gb RAM. It's running on 10.4.3. There's nothing in this computer as I bought it SO THAT I CAN RUN GR2!

Did everything that can be found here on this forum, 512 buffer, 48khz, latest update... The pops and crackles still persist. Although improved from the first day I got it, it's not not useable in the real world.

I've been using it for the past 3 days for rehearsals for a big show/tour and my monitor engineer keeps coming to me and checking my cables asking how come my guitar is so damn noisy with the clicks and pops. The house engineer keeps telling him over the walkie talkie that there's something wrong with my lines. Told him is the software. He then comments that even if I plug my guitar straight to the mixer, it'd still sound better than the irritaing sporadic noises. Sad thing is, he's right.

I'm almost at the point of giving up this setup. As I've spent many hours programming sounds for a 30-song concert, I am reluctant to do so. So, my last resort is to use another soundcard.

The other guitar player in my band also uses GR2 and RK2 but he uses a MOTU 828 mk2 as his audio interface. Although the result is much better than using RK2, there are still pops and clicks once in a while, and it hangs sometimes.

So my question is: can someone recommend a very portable firewire interface (like a FW410) that has been proven to work with GR2 and RK2 (as a controller) without all the noise.

My tour starts in 2 days time and I doubt N.I. is going to come up with a RK2 driver update that will cure all the problems. So in the interim, to save me the hassle of spending many hours reprogramming all my patches on my POD XT, I am willing to SPEND ANOTHER FEW HUNDRED DOLLARS JUST TO GET GR2 TO WORK.

Seriously N.I., non of us should be going through this. As musicians (people who just wanna make music instead of spending the bulk of our time trying to get gear to work), this is the ultimate FRUSTRATION.

GR2 with RK2 works but works badly. Please, on behalf of my fellow musicians, I beg you to fix it. This product has so much potential...

 

I feel with you. It's really pathetic that NI is not capable of delivering a decent driver for the Mac. Why they opted for USB2 instead of FireWire is beyond me.
Anyway, if you say that even your friends Motu 828 MKII is giving him crackles then there's not much hope. You can go and give the RME Hammerfall DSP Multiface with the Cardbus adapter a try - that's a combo that does work for many people - although I can't guarantee anything.

Cheers, Pady

 

Ditto. It's very frustrating to say the least.

There's no way I would trust GR2 for a live rig at this point. It would take several revisions before I felt comfortable using it on the road.

It can't be that hard to write crackle free drivers for the RK2 can it? Many other companies have done so.

 

Start programming the POD XT.

 

My tour starts in February, I too bought GR2 especially for the job. I wont be trusting mine either until the drivers come upto scratch. Wish NI would up their work rate on this one, its really pissing loads of people off.

 

Hi Andydraw.

I read from your previous post that you have used GR2 with a FW410 with some success.

How "successful" are you? Is the crackling totally gone or does it happen much less? Right now I'm even willing to live with once every 20 secs as opposed to once every 5 secs.

Thank you all of you for your insight.

 

Hi Adamlee,

The problem almost disappears when using the FW410, In plug-in mode with Pro tools 7 it is totally gone. If your willing to have the occassional crackle and buzz then this is the way to go for you......you will need another foot controller though if you want to use the program live.
Good luck, I'm waiting for the new drivers as I opted for GR because of RK2 and how easy the whole setup was!!!!

Cheers.

 

Really? I would've thought that the controller still works?

My friend uses GR2 with RK2 as a contoller going through a MOTU 828 as the audio I/O...

 

Yes, the RK2 still works as a controller.

 

I'm on a 1.67ghz 17" powerbook with 1gb RAM. I have had the same problem all Powerbook users have had with The Rig Kontrol 2. I stopped using the Rig Kontrol 2 as the audio device and have been using a MOTU Traveler with no problems. In a pinch you can use the line in on your Powerbook. (with proper adaptors) I have used the audio in/out on my powerbook and it's quite useable. Good luck, and consider packing a backup for your tour like a PODxt, or a Vox Tonelab, or maybe even better, a real tube guitar amp, as you have sound engineers to work with.

Doug

 

Apple just announced the Intel PowerBooks - called Mac Book Pro.
Lord have mercy! Please NI, pretty please, continue to support the PowerPC Macs for at least another 5 years.

 

Hello again,

How does this work? Is the controller purely running through midi? RK2's usb 2 connection usually does the data transmission for controller changes.

Audio I/O from the FW410 and then midi from RK2 to FW410?

please enlighten........

Cheers

 

I do not have the RK2, as I purchased the software-only update to GR, so I can't comment on that (I'm using a Behringer FCB1010). But I can say that with my Presonus Forebox and even (surprisingly, perhaps) an M-Audio Ozonic, I get very playable latency and no crackle or audio glitches on my lowly 867mhz PowerBook. Maybe I'm just lucky.

On the downside, as I've noted elsewhere, external MIDI control causes a different but equally unusable noise problem when I plug GR2 into Ableton Live. As a result GR2 is unusable for me, as Live is the central part of my performance setup.

So I would say that yes, there are Firewire devices that work very well, but unfortunately there are other problems to contend with too. As a result, despite the cool features of GR2 I would not recommend it to anybody at the moment.

 

My understaning is that applications will be (can be? should be?) written in a Universal Binary format that will work with both Intel and PowerPC processors for MacOS X 10.4.4 and later. Does this apply to plug-ins? Who knows?

Personally, I just hope NI can get the RigKontroller working before 5 years.

 

Yes, Universal Binary. But it won't take long until Intel only apps show up.

<Personally, I just hope NI can get the RigKontroller working before 5 years.>

Agreed.

 

The 10.4.4 Update improved things slightly - especially for the standalone version. But still crackles and glitches.

 

Hi Andydraw,

Not quite.

He plugs his guitar into the 828, connects outputs 1 and 2 of the 828 to the monitors/house, connects RK2 to his powerbook, selects GR2's audio device as the 828.

All data transmissions via RK2 work as usual but audio is output from the 828.

 

Thanks for the info pbajzek.

Based on that, I will go to the shop and get a firebox right now.
Hope I won't have to live with it for too long. The whole purpose of GR2 and RK2 is to MOVE FORWARD from GR1 and RK! Now to get it to work, we're back to square one where we need another soundcard...

Will let everyone know how it works out in case someone is in the same miserable shoes as me...

 

I don't have my RK2 yet, so I can't comment on the audio drivers - but,
I can recommend that one thing to check in relation to audio pops and crackles on your PowerBook (or any current Mac) is the Energy Saver settings. Go to System Preferences -> Energy Saver -> Options page
Set the Processor Performance to "Highest". This often eliminates audio transport issues.

 

Thanks Briggity. Yes I do have everthing on highest performance possible.

Just came back from the shop with a brand new Presonus Firebox. We'll see if it solves the crackling...