Unable to adjust headphone of speaker Volume

Drumster

Volume slider/adjuster in ST3 "Settings" does not adjust either speaker or headphone levels.
Master EQ & Gain setting all work ok.
Playlist - Volume is at max - 6.0db
Additional apps like Garage Band etc volume settings work fully.

Keep checking ST3 settings but I cant see if I've accidentally activated some type of "audio limiter"

Thans in anticipation.

Drumster

Problem solved!!! - "Audio Device Setup" in Settings was set to "Mono Output" and to "Combine USB and Headphone Outputs" Both selections now turned "Off" and full range of volume settings can now be set! Phewwww!

BillProtzmann

My StageTraxx was set that way and partway through a rehearsal I lost all volume control. The only way I could recover was to close and relaunch the app.

peter

The volume slider on top of the settings screen is only shown if the volume of the selected device can be controlled by software. This is always the case with the headphone output for example and it is always disabled when you use a USB audio interface.

Drumster

Thanks Peter. As you saw from my post a few minuets after posting I found and corrected the issues. The intention is to use an audio interface in the future but whilst I'm getting up to speed with ST3 and the ipad we are still using MD.
I have a question relating to Sound cards. Having connected up Samsung Tablets and other playback devices to a mixer in the past i know that volume output is drastically reduced from the mixer and all "gain" settings are maxed out the signal is pretty useless.. I'm hoping that taking the IPAD USB output from the "Camera" lead to the mixer USB input will negate the use of a USB Power Hub - Is this correct? If not I will use our Focusrite Scarlet Solo as a soundcard/interface.

peter

What mixer are you using?

I never had any problems getting good volume out of tablets or phones with any mixer I used in the last 10 years or so. I can't imagine you need to max out gain on your mixer. Maybe your cable is at fault?

Whether you need a powered USB hub to connect an interface or not depends on the interface. There is no general rule for it. For example, I don't need a powered hub connecting to XR18 or X32 but I need a powered hub connecting to a Soundcraft Notepad even though it has its own power supply. It's basically hit or miss and only way to find out before buying is asking on the internet for the specific interface.

Drumster

Thanks Peter.
Mixer = Mackie Pro FX 8 - USB
Using MD for the past 20 years or so and always have loads of headroom without turning any gain / volume level up.
Audio out on the MD is phono to L&R 1/4" mono then into channel 4. (Stereo not used for live performances)
Experimenting with the old apple "Ipod" years ago gave results much poorer than MD quality. 6 years ago took a look at the Samsung Pad route which was barely much better. "Max Gain / Volume" has never been used on the mixer I just note that each fader is up much higher than "U" to get acceptable volume quality/levels when using the IPAD compared to that of the MD. I'm thinking that the MD has a small pre-amp in it to helps with the audio level output to the mixer.
As yet I haven't purchased the apple camera lead (USB) to aid the connection with our mixer as I have yet to try a couple of other methods. Using -
Have attempted various methods of Stereo/Mono/XLR/1/4"Stero and mono jack etc between the mixer and the IPad but non equals the levels from an MD.
Youtube suggestion are to go down the Sound Card option using Powered Hub etc.

many thanks for your reply. Rgds. John

Damir

Drumster Hi Drumster, i use a yamaha version of your Mackie and have no gain issues, if your leads are OK you should be able to turn up your input gain knob to bring up the ipad level to drive your output of mackie comfourtably, as you have 50 db gain on the input trim.
The reason your MD doasnt need much gain on this trim is because it sounds like its output is actually a +4 db line level output which a lot of older analog playback devices use to have, because the new gear signal to noise is so good its line level out now is around -10 as Peter said.This helps with battery life because it needs less power to work and still sounds great.
If for some reason you still cant get enough gain then as peter said check your connection lead is ok and perhaps try input 3 in case your input 4 has a fault with it.
But i found no gain problems with an ipad plugged straight in to a similar mixer you are using , i dont like using unnecessary interfaces as they dont really give you much better noticeable audio quality through a PA, the only thing you get is more chance of something going wrong a messier stage and more time to setup.
Good guality audio leads that are not unnecessaraly long are also a good idea with high quality connectors.
Hope this helps in some way
Cheers Damir

peter

The Pro FX 8 has a gain knob in each channel. Why not boost the signal there? As long as the audio signal has a good signal to noise ratio (which all iPads have) you can apply as much gain as you need. A weak signal with good signal to noise is much better than a strong signal with bad signal to noise.

My approach to gain staging: signal levels are not that important (gain knob takes care of it). What is important is that the volume faders on your mixing board have the highest sensitivity in the area around Unity (the travel distance between 0 and -5 for example is the same as for -10 to -20). I want to be able to make small adjustments and therefore the Gain level needs to be set so that all my faders operate near unity (+- 10dB usually). That's all that counts. I don't care if I have to boost the signal gain a bit more or less as long as it does not lead to a high noise floor.

Of course a good audio interface will have better audio quality but you will not be able to hear the difference on a typical PA system. The downside is more cables and more complexity. If you connect your mixer directly via USB, you have of course no additional complexity. It's just a USB cable instead of an audio cable.

Drumster

Hi Peter. Thanks for your advice and info - As I said before we have operated on MD for some 20 years without any volume/quality issue at all with past and current mixer but this IPad volume issue is very frustrating. Will let you know when its sorted and how it was accomplished. Rgds John.

Note: In certain configuration the "Gain" control becomes inoperative on the 1/4" L&R Channel inputs but always operates OK when a Mic is connected to XLR CH input!

MasterAnt

Drumster I'm mixing on a Mackie ProFX8v2 USB and have my iPad Air 2 connected to Ch.1 in mono by just using either the left or right mono jack plug from the stereo cable. But my tracks are mixed in mono, so this is safe. Obviously (or not), make sure you're not connecting up a stereo cable from the iPad to a mono channel. First thing I noticed when switching to ST3 was a 7dB volume drop due to the default headroom in the app for the volume sliders, which I read you know about already. On the mixer, channel gain is on Unity and the fader is on about +5 at the moment, but I believe I could go back to around 0 using the +6 boost on ST3's master EQ. I really haven't tried USB with the only control being one knob because there's no way to route that to my monitors as far as I know. The manual just says USB routes to Main. I no longer have a USB Camera Connection Kit to test (I bought one for my iPad 1, but then Apple discontinued and disabled it for a while so I threw it out), but I could try USB on my iPad Pro which has a USB-C port. That might be comparing apples to pineapples.

Anyway, not sure if any of that helps except for the comment that the mixer (v2) works fine for me with ST3 and iPad via 3.5mm output.

MasterAnt

Drumster I had an 💡

Could it be that your previous player had auto-normalize on your tracks?
Check your source files in an audio editor, and make sure they aren't really soft.
Alternatively, compare audio played from ST3 against iTunes on the same iDevice.

peter

Then the usb option might indeed be worth trying. According to Youtube it should work just with the camera connection kit. No need for a USB hub.