Mixing in two DAW's / Mastering in one

[Horpe]

Hellay!

Me and my friend have merged our DAW's into a dual DAW solution where DAW 1 acts as a master and DAW 2 slaves to no 1 (via network cable). Both DAW's have their analog output into a small hardware mixer.

Both DAW's have sequenser hosts and plugins. We decided to use DAW 1 mainly for vocals and instruments, while DAW 2 mainly hosts the drums and drumloops.

All is in place and the sync is perfect. However, we wonder about a thing:

Say we have tracked, arranged and even mixed a song in the two DAW's (the instruments and vocals in no 1 while in no 2 the drums and some fx). Insert and Send Plugins for effects and dynamics are inserted and active on both machines. Everything sounds great!

Now we will bounce (with effects and dynamics) everything to one stereo track for a mastering session. This would be no problem with only one DAW! However, now that we have two DAW's we assume that the best way is to bounce to one stereo track in DAW 1, bounce to another stereo track in DAW 2.
Then import the stereo track from DAW 2 into DAW 1 and bounce the two tracks together into a stereo file ready for mastering.

Mastering the stereo file, of course, should be done only in one DAW ...


This way we imagine that we can make use of the power and RAM of two machines as far as possible in a session.

Do you think that this is a good way to work, in a sound quality perspective?
Is there a sonic disadvantage to bounce twice (as desribed above) compared to "the normal way'?

Cheers!

/Horpe

[Benmrx]

Do you not have a way to route the mix from your hardware mixer back into 1 of the DAW's?

I have 2 PTLE systems synced up, each with outputs coming into a Soundcraft Ghost. Then I either send the mix to a Masterlink (selling this weekend cause I don't use it anymore) or send the mix out of the PTLE slave system through a Spdif cable into the PTLE master system and create an Aux track in the master system to recieve the mix from the slave and do a "bounce to disk"

[Horpe]

Hmm...

I do have SPDIF In/Out on both machines.

Do you think it is a better idea to transfer from DAW 2 to DAW 1 and bounce to disk that way. We're both running SX3. You think it can be done in a similar manner as you do it in PTLE? You're right, that could be an option.

Anyway, what did you think about my first suggestion? Isn't that an acceptable option, or have I missed something there? Is it a sonically / tecnically wrong?

[frontierfran]

I find that anything sounds better than bouncing to disk within a DAW. your better off bussing everything to a stereo channel, running that out of the daw and BACK INTO the daw to record another Stereo Track. sounds better...ive heard that from many people actually.

[Horpe]

I'm not shure I get a 100% what you mean, frontier.


Like this?:

I buss the drums on DAW 2 to a stereo channel X on DAW 1 (via spdif). At the same time I buss the instruments and vocals on DAW 1 to that same stereo channel X on DAW 1?

And then out of the DAW and back again...

Can you explain that a little further? I just have a small Phonic MU1002 as a hardware mixer:

http://www.activemusician.com/item--EM.PHN-MU1002

Can this be done anyway or do I need a more "serious" hardware mixer


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I have two DAW's, each one equipped with an ESI Juli@ PCI sound card (2 in / 2 out + SPDIF in/out), a Phonic MU1002 hardware mixer.

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[nathanvacha]

so... you're using the mixer only as a listen-back device and doing your actual mixing entirely in the box, correct?

...and only using two systems for added processing power?

because most of the time i hear of people sync'ing two systems for more analog outputs... to expand a multi-track mix.

so you are simply asking the best way to digitally combine the audio on two different machines?

I would go s/pdif...

I don't know the cubase internal routing, but i would say buss all daw2 tracks to the s/pdif output and set a stereo audio track (or stereo aux track is how I would do it in PT I think) and set that track so it takes it's input from the s/pdif...

and then just make sure that gets mixed with the 2 buss from daw1.

ya'dig?

[Horpe]

Absolutely!

I 'll try at once!

Thank you!