Hello,
Just set up an account and plan to use this to collaborate with someone on the other side of the country. I tried using JamKazam and for a variety of reasons, it looks like it’s not going to fit my setup.
In summary: I don’t have an external amp head for my guitar. All of my tone is via VST, which can be either standalone or in a studio session. I will also be using my mic simultaneously for obvious reasons.
The questions are:
Are standalone VSTs supported natively by JackTrip?
If not, is it easy to route the output of a DAW (Such as Presonus StudioOne) to the inputs of JackTrip?
Is there studio software provided by JackTrip that would work natively instead of using another DAW?
For more context:
I have a Focusrite LiquidSaffire56.
My Mic goes through one of the two preamp channels (1&2, in my case I use 1).
My guitar is plugged directly into input 3.
My amp VST, Amplitube, is set up to use Input 3, and then output to my normal Saffire L&R outs.
Obviously if I were to set Jacktrip to use 1&3, I’ll get the raw mic (fine), and raw guitar (not fine lol).
I specifically need a way to have my dry mic and my Amplitube output signal to go through JackTrip.
I spent all of last night troubleshooting other jam software options and really don’t want to spend all of tonight figuring it out instead of jamming with my friend. So any resources/documents or advice that could be provided in advance would be amazing!
JackTrip doesn’t natively support VST or audio routing.
I’m not familiar with Amplitude, but I think what you need is commonly referred to as “virtual channels.” Some audio interfaces (such as UA Apollo) provide this functionality built-in, as do some DAWs. I would first check to see if Amplitude provides this functionality for the sound produced by its signal chains.
Are you using a Mac or Windows computer? I’m not as familiar with Windows, but on Mac you have several great options. My favorite is Loopback from a company called Rogue Amoeba (you may want to check out Audio Hijack as well). A popular free one is called Black Hole.
Another popular free one that works across platforms is the Jack Audio Connection Kit. This is the framework that JackTrip was originally built for (and includes a special audio engine for it). It works great but most people find it intimidating and the interface hard to use.
I wrote an article a few months ago about using Audacity with JackTrip. It’s not exactly what you are looking for, but I think many of the principals are the same and this may help you figure out how to do something similar with Amplitude. It looks like pretty cool software – I may give it a try myself!
I tried JACK as a virtual interface, but it’s hard to find any from-the-ground-up guides. The interface is definitely not intuitive, so I’ll need something thorough.
It was asking me for servers and I don’t see my ins or outs to link or choose from.
Also now that I’m home, I can’t even start virtual studio. When I select my ASIO from the device screen during setup, it crashes. I use Saffire ASIO. Nothing generic. I do have voicemeter on my computer but it’s not running.
Have you discovered anything new? I am one of the moderators of this Forum and have more than 15 years experience with JackTrip on Windows and Mac. I will take the liberty of throwing out some of my thoughts on your setup, and feel free to ask me about anything.
Mike has a good suggestion with Loopback - lots of people using it on Mac. It is not yet available for Windows.
For Windows, I have a somewhat complicated setup using JACK, OBS and ReaStream, a plugin from Reaper. Eventually I will do a video on it.
I have discovered that Voicemeter has a mind of its own and will arbitrarily designate itself as the primary default audio device. Eventually, I removed all Voicemeter devices.
The device screen during setup that you described could be set differently than the device screen for your computer audio. Check and see if the computer is set differently.
There is a setting in VS that allows you to send a single channel to both sides. Unless you are specifically using a stereo mic, mics are only 1 channel mono, so maybe you can use channel one for the mic and channel two for the guitar?
That’s off the top of my head. If I think of anything else I will add more. Good luck!
Most likely you only need JACK Audio to route whatever channels you want to outputs 1 & 2.
Let me see if I can explain some basics about using JACK Audio. This is advanced stuff.
But first I need to make a significant revision to this post. This is because after JACK has started per my instructions below, you will need to go to the Virtual Studio audio settings and switch the “Audio Backend” to JACK, not your Saffire or whatever interface you are using. See screenshot below.
I have switched out screenshot (2) to show what it looks like after starting JACK, joining the VS, and then seeing the VS connection in the JACK Connect screen.
Ok, back to the original post:
The server info you mentioned is found on the Advanced tab of the JACK audio settings. It is on the “Server Prefix” line and should already be there by default after installing JACK Audio. For Windows, it should say, “jackd -S -X winmme” (screenshot 1)
Note: all the other selections on the advanced tab should be “default”
The JACK settings that opens when you click the icon after installing is actually a program called, “QjackCtl”, that comes with JACK, and is very useful.
Clicking the “Start” button on the QjackCtl interface and having the “Connect” settings for routing is a lot more convenient than running the JACK server and settings on the command line, which is how it started out back in the day.
In the “Parameters” tab screen choose the interface, sample rate, and buffer size (frames/period).
The transport interface will open automatically when you click on the icon that appears after installing the JACK app. (The transport app is called, “qjackctl”.)
Once the Jack server starts, join the VS. Then go to QjackCtl and tap the “Connect” button. This is where the routing is done.
If the Jack server has started after clicking the “Connect” button, it should show the active inputs and outputs for VS, as well as the interface you designated in the JACK Setup screen.
Simply select the output channels on the left that you want to go to the input channels on the right side. If there are already connections active, you can disconnect them all and start from scratch to get the desired routing.
For example, in my screenshot (2), it shows that I switched to JACK. I selected Input channel 1 and 3 and routed it to the VS channels 1/2. You should be able to do this for each Input channel you want to use in Virtual Studio.
If the connect screen is showing a graphic mixer and you prefer a listing of channels, go to the “Misc” tab and uncheck at the bottom left. (screenshot 3)
@Zeta9966 We discovered a bug in 1.10.0 that was causing ASIO crashes on Windows. I believe it is fixed in 1.10.1, so you may want to try again after upgrading.
