Anyone tried Breakaway Broadcast ASIO ?

[JAylmer]

Anyone tried Breakaway Broadcast ASIO for DJ work ?

It seems to have some features that may be useful to dj's
($299)

[milky]

Breakaway DJ was specifically developed for DJs. I use it on my home system and it sounds great.

[JAylmer]

1st issue:
I own a copy of Breakaway DJ. I am always tossing up between the OTS dynamics processor (using Jeff's settings) and Breakaway.
Last dance I used "Rihanna - Pon De Replay" as a Quick Step through the OTS processor and it sounded bad.
The OTS processor was breathing with the heavy bass and losing dance information.
A typical comment from an informed dancer for Rihanna - Pon De Replay would be "What a sh.t piece of music".
However Breakaway doesn't do this with its multi-channel processor.

I use a USB sound card mounted in my mixer console which lives in the shed when not in use at a dance.
Problem is all of my setup is done using the default inbuilt sound card but at a dance I plug in the usb card and have to get Breakaway working again. This sometimes takes too long.
To get around this I am purchasing a second USB Audio Box identical to the first.
I need to use breakaway as I try to run my console unmanned.
2nd issue:
Breakaway DJ will fix the Rihanna issue, however I notice different quality descriptions between Breakaway DJ & Broadcast.
Broadcast: "Where other processors strain and fall apart, Breakaway Broadcast Processor is loud and clear, even with extremely difficult instruments like xylophones".  It does not offer the same quality description for Breakaway DJ.

This is where I notice a difference, my system is straining with sounds like xylophones (Probably only I notice it, no loss of dance information).
I used to use hi-res mp3 and have switched to wave - not noticing any change.
Breakaway DJ gets it out but it could be subtly better - hence my question about Broadcast.
I am hoping that my set of 63 year old ears are not distorting my assessment of the situation.

Unless someone can say they have lined the two products (Breakaway DJ & Broadcast) and possibly noticed an improvement then I won't upgrade to Broadcast ($300).

[Dj Buik]

I've got a license of all 4 flavors of Breakaway.
The normal Breakaway i use only for my Desktop use.

Breakaway Broadcast i use only for (online) broadcasting, because the music is very compressed.
Not very suitable for a gig in a bar or something.

In live gig situations i use Breakaway Live (ASIO). It is specially build for that.
It has also a High Pass Filter which i often use in small bars.

BAL is setup after my mixer main output, so it is processing all my audio.
Breakaway DJ does not has that possibility.

[milky]

Have you tried altering the frequencies via the parametric EQ? Whilst I realise it is not practical to tune your system to every venue, I have one saved for my home theatre room and several other settings I have made for other rooms. The presets are generic and assume an anechoic room - rarely the case in the wild.

[Dj Buik]

If i understand the audio routing correctly, the parametric EQ comes after the Audio processing Core.
So it will not fix Jaylmer sound issue. See forum link below:

http://www.forumclaessonedwards.com/forum/index.php/topic,579.0.html

But i could be wrong. Maybe you could ask this question on the Breakaway forum.
Jesse (Audio Engineer) is still active on the forum.


BTW: Why don't you download the fully functional demo of Breakaway Broadcast and Live?
Breakaway Live with ASIO (standard supported) is only $129.

[JAylmer]

A good idea to download trials, I notice they are good forever.
I need to come up to speed with Breakaway with the help in this forum and the Breakaway forum.
A good user manual with examples and descriptions of the controls would be nice, but nothing in the download and no reference to help forums?
Heaps of people must download this product and never be able to get it going. Let me guess that 70% never get it going.
I'm only just past that stage.

BTW: Why don't you download the fully functional demo of Breakaway Broadcast and Live?
Breakaway Live with ASIO (standard supported) is only $129.

This I don't understand.  Live by itself is $129 and then Broadcast is $199 or $299 (ASIO).

I think you are saying buy the cheaper Broadcast use ASIO and serial it into Live which might fix me but those downloads together are $328 ?

Also Breakaway's ability to be able to save parametric equaliser profiles is a great idea as OTS doesn't have this feature, I find I have huge differences between different venues.

[milky]

Download the Breakaway RTA (Real Time Analyser). You need a great room mic (not necessarily the one they recommend), but you can then modify the environment in a mind boggling way.

[Dj Buik]

Breakaway Broadcast can generate a MPX (Multiplex) FM signal with a 192 KHz soundcard.
The Live version isn't able to do that.
That's why Broadcast is more expensive than Breakaway Live.

Buy only the Broadcast version if you need MPX or you want to sound very loud on a Internet Stream.

In my signature you can find some manuals i made about Breakaway and Ots.

Below you see the IO settings panels.
On my laptop i don't have an ASIO soundcard  that's why it is disabled.

[JAylmer]

OK, I'll focus on Breakaway Live and use the Breakaway RTA.

Even simple things like what does input and output mean in the Breakaway setup are not intuitive.
eg.
In your example you are prompted for Breakaway's audio output and have connected it to the sound card's audio output?
It doesn't define what the ports are with respect to (eg. Breakaway, sound card, computer) in the Breakaway setup.
On the Breakaway setup I would have labelled the Audio Output prompt as Audio Input.

A great product but a User Manual would have help showing tons of examples.

I did see your comments in this forum but the examples did not use ASIO as I recall, but it has still obviously helped a lot.

[Dj Buik]

Normally if you use ASIO mode you use a Soundcard line in as an input, and a line out as an output.

You also can use a Breakaway pipeline as an input or output.
Audio software sees this pipeline as an (virtual) soundcard.
That way you digitally route the audio stream thru your computer.

Breakaway uses VAC internally as an pipeline:
http://software.muzychenko.net/eng/vac.htm

BTW: An Breakaway Core is an instance of Breakaway not an CPU core.

[JAylmer]

If I don't enable ASIO then I can get it working and also recover from hiccups that invariably occur.
I use a grid video pattern during the tune's introduction that syncs to the beat so the dancers all start off together.
Breakaway adds too much latency even with "Audio Real-time Priority" ticked, so the video and audio get out of sync.
If I could add corresponding latency to the video in OTS AVDJ only then that would help but that feature does not exist.
I could play with the buffer size and see if it would improve but I would prefer to use ASIO because of its low latency.

Without Breakaway ASIO works fine with OTS AVDJ.
When  I enable ASIO I cannot get it to work, I have a Breakaway setup problem.
I can find the ASIO DEVICE ok in Breakaway. The rest are guesses?  ASIO setup is different to normal, it seems intuitive but does not work.
Input wants two variables one for left and one for right.  Input L1 is IN1 and Input R1 is input IN2.
Output L1 and R1 are set to OUT1 and OUT2

Then I go to OTS and try select Breakaway from the available OUTPUT DEVICES.
There is nothing there that looks like it might be it and selecting what is there results in no audio.
Of course if I select the ASIO device instead of Breakaway then it works fine but that bypasses Breakaway.
I also tried the inbuilt sound card which also has ASIO but get the same result.

I need a lump of quality time that I won't get for a few weeks yet. It may be back to the OTS Dynamic Processor & Equaliiser before I get it resolved unless someone can see an obvious oversight.

[Dr.J]

Have you checked out Dj Buik's setup guide for Breakaway Live (bottom part of his signature)?

I haven't used it in years, but I recall Live being a little tricky to setup. Check the Breakaway forum too.

[JAylmer]

Tried DJ Buik's which was useful initially but not the full picture for ASIO as his sound card was not ASIO capable.
I need to use ASIO because of latency.