Hooking up TWO BR1600s - ANY INSIGHTS??

[Super 8]

A mate of mine has this idea to hook up TWO BR1600s to make one big (erm? Bear with me while I 'do the math' here: 8 Mono tracks; 4 Stereo tracks per unit (although Tracks 9/10 are for bouncing down a final mix so call that 4 Stereo tracks on the 'slave' and 3 on what would be the 'master' machine) so that's what? The two machines synch'd up would technically make it a 23 track recorder (16 straight Mono tracks and 7 input source recordable Stereo tracks) before having to sub-mix right? I'm still just trying to get my head around this as a concept and whether it would be feasible in a real life recording situation so any thoughts, advice, input would be appreciated! Maybe someone on here has tried this before perhaps? If so would you care to shed some light on such a sonic recording experiments?   

[64Guitars]

Bear with me while I 'do the math' here: 8 Mono tracks; 4 Stereo tracks per unit (although Tracks 9/10 are for bouncing down a final mix so call that 4 Stereo tracks on the 'slave' and 3 on what would be the 'master' machine) so that's what? The two machines synch'd up would technically make it a 23 track recorder (16 straight Mono tracks and 7 input source recordable Stereo tracks) before having to sub-mix right?

Two tracks are two tracks, whether you record a stereo source or two mono sources. So each BR-1600 has 16 tracks. And you don't need to reserve any tracks for bouncing or mastering since you can use any available pair of v-tracks for that purpose. So two MIDI-synched BR-1600s would give you a total of 32 tracks (512 v-tracks).

The BR-1600s must be synched using MIDI. And you can route the output audio of the slave BR into the input of the master BR using either analog or digital audio connections:

Analog:
http://www.boss.info/support/knowledge_base/201973459

Digital:
http://www.boss.info/support/knowledge_base/201975549

[Bluesberry]

sounds exciting......

[Oldrottenhead]

"She cannea take any more, captain.  She's gonna blow!"

[AndyR]

Bear with me while I 'do the math' here: 8 Mono tracks; 4 Stereo tracks per unit (although Tracks 9/10 are for bouncing down a final mix so call that 4 Stereo tracks on the 'slave' and 3 on what would be the 'master' machine) so that's what? The two machines synch'd up would technically make it a 23 track recorder (16 straight Mono tracks and 7 input source recordable Stereo tracks) before having to sub-mix right?

Two tracks are two tracks, whether you record a stereo source or two mono sources. So each BR-1600 has 16 tracks. And you don't need to reserve any tracks for bouncing or mastering since you can use any available pair of v-tracks for that purpose. So two MIDI-synched BR-1600s would give you a total of 32 tracks (512 v-tracks).

I do see what Super 8 means, 64G - the individual tracks in a stereo track have to be recorded and played back as a stereo pair. You could record two monos on an adjacent mono pair (1/2, 3/4, etc) and then move them to a stereo track (eg 9/10) - but you'd have no independent volume (aside from the pan control), compression, EQ, or reverb on play-back (and they'd be panned hard left and right).

In practice, those stereo tracks are single stereo tracks. The monos (1-8), on the other hand, make very good stereo pairs when you end up with too many stereo submixes to handle on 9/10, 11/12, 13/14, and 15/16.

I tend to use the BR1600 as an 8-track with the stereos for creating submixes (I very rarely record stereo source signals, even keyboards).

On the reserving for bouncing - If you wanted to use ALL available tracks before bouncing, then it must be ALL minus one. You must reserve one track for the bounce (one of 9/10 - 15/16 if you want a stereo bounce, one of 1 - 8 if you want a mono bounce). You can't play back one virtual of a track and record on a different virtual of the same track at the same time (that's the only thing I miss from the MBR).

So, yeah, I pretty much agree with Super 8 - in practice, assuming you want a stereo submix, linking two BR1600s would make a 23 track recorder (of which 7 are capable of being dedicated stereo tracks) before any submix is required.

For mastering - you just need your final mix either bounced onto or moved/copied onto one of 9/10's virtuals, and one spare virtual on the same track (for the mastered output).

However, the idea of reserving 9/10 for bounces/mastering only, you really don't need to do that (I don't). You just have to make sure you have enough virtuals free on 9/10 at the end for the mix and master (oh, and none of the final submixes you want to include in the "final mix" bounce must be on 9/10, obviously).

=====
When I started this reply, I was thinking "no way do I want two BR1600s linked". While typing I thought maybe it could be useful for the following:
- Occasionally when doing big backing choirs, 16 independent mono tracks could be useful. But most of the time 8 is enough.
- When I have a really complex track, the ability to hear all the submixes at once could be useful - but that is RARE for me. Really, the only time I feel it is when tracking or submixing extra guitar parts - you sometimes can't hear all of the other instruments while you're doing it (unless you're prepared to make a temporary rough mix of everything else first).

BUT, I'm wondering - is the following possible?
Content on 1-8 of BR 1 and on 1-8 of BR 2, and bounce it to 11/12 of BR 1.
THEN record another 16 monos on the next virtual layer, and I want to bounce them to 11/12 of BR 2 (instead of 1).
Later, I'll want to combine 11/12 of both to another stereo.

Or are we saying all the bouncing happens on the "master" BR? If that's the case, the stereo tracks on the "slave" are almost useless to me! (apologies - I haven't followed the links)

Anyhoo - I'll be interested to hear what happens Super 8... but I really don't plan on ever trying this myself!

[Super 8]

OK, read all that so thanks for the input folks. Off to follow 64G's above links now (again, thanks!) To be honest my heads already beginning to hurt where this sync'ing two BR concept's concerned. Maybe I'be bitten off more than I can chew already (don't tell anyone but I'm really not very technical at all where stuff like this is concerned!) Now not very sure at all as to whether I'll be able to pull this idea off as I'm already over mny head just reading what's been said so far (broke my brain cell in my first post there just trying to work out how many tracks I'd conceivably have were this idea to work for me). Hmm ... we'll see!   

[64Guitars]

I do see what Super 8 means, 64G - the individual tracks in a stereo track have to be recorded and played back as a stereo pair. You could record two monos on an adjacent mono pair (1/2, 3/4, etc) and then move them to a stereo track (eg 9/10) - but you'd have no independent volume (aside from the pan control), compression, EQ, or reverb on play-back (and they'd be panned hard left and right).

In practice, those stereo tracks are single stereo tracks. The monos (1-8), on the other hand, make very good stereo pairs when you end up with too many stereo submixes to handle on 9/10, 11/12, 13/14, and 15/16.

Yes, I know what Super 8 meant and I understand what you're saying. I just get uncomfortable when people talk about a single stereo track. It implies that two channels of information are somehow recorded on a single track, and that's not possible without some sort of multiplex scheme. Without such a scheme, two tracks are always required to record two discrete channels of audio. So we really shouldn't talk about a "stereo track" like it's a single data location. Instead, we should call it a stereo pair so that it's clear that we're referring to two tracks.

I think what sometimes confuses people is that the stereo pairs are each controlled by a single fader, so they think of it as a single track. But it's not a single track. That single fader is simultaneously adjusting the levels of two discrete channels of audio coming from two separate tracks. And when you press the track button below the fader, it simultaneously arms two tracks for recording. It's this last point that prevents you from recording two mono tracks separately on a stereo pair. It would be easy enough to record a mono source to track 9, for example. But when you went to record another mono source on track 10, you'd erase what you'd recorded on track 9 because both tracks would be simultaneously armed for recording. There's no way to make it record only on track 10 while leaving track 9 alone.

So I stand by what I said - two MIDI-synched BR-1600s would give you a total of 32 tracks (512 v-tracks). It's true that if you're recording mono signals exclusively, only 16 of those 32 tracks are of use to you. But so many musical devices have stereo outputs nowadays that I find it hard to believe that those 8 stereo pairs would go unused. And even in the unlikely event that you didn't have any stereo sources, you could always use half of each stereo pair to record a single mono source.

I tend to use the BR1600 as an 8-track with the stereos for creating submixes (I very rarely record stereo source signals, even keyboards).

Many of the BR's effects take a mono input signal and produce a stereo output signal. This is accomplished by phase-shifting and/or time-shifting the input signal to create two different output signals. If you record that stereo output to a single track, it will sound quite different than if you record it to a stereo pair. I think you'll find that those effects usually sound much better when recorded in stereo. Although, admittedly, it's a matter of personal preference. And, of course, there are some effects that have a mono output signal. Obviously, nothing would be gained by recording that mono signal to a stereo pair.

You can easily tell which effects produce a stereo output signal by looking at the effect algorithm.

For example, here's the graphic for the COSM OD GUITAR AMP algorithm from the BR-1600 manual:



The single lines coming out of the first three effects indicate that the signal is still mono. But the other effects in the chain all have double lines indicating that the output is stereo. The noise suppressor and foot volume merely pass the stereo input through to the output. If the input is mono, then the two output signals will be identical. But the Flanger, Chorus, and Delay are each capable of creating two different outputs from a mono input by splitting the signal and phase/time-shifting one channel relative to the other to produce a noticeable stereo effect. If you record it to a single track, the two channels will be combined into one and the effect won't sound as it was intended.

Here's the ACOUSTIC GUITAR algorithm:



Notice that, although the input signal is mono, all of the outputs are stereo. The stereo effect will be most noticeable from the Acoustic Processor effect and the Delay. The other effects in the chain are merely passing the stereo input through without changing the stereo panorama.

And here's the VOCAL MULTI algorithm:



The signal path is mostly mono, but the Chorus and Delay each have a stereo output. Of course, if you use the VOCAL MULTI algorithm but have the chorus and delay turned off in your patch, then there's no benefit to recording the signal to a stereo pair of tracks. But if the chorus and/or the delay are turned on, then you need to record to a stereo pair to get the intended stereo effect. The same is true of the other algorithms. If all of the stereo effects in the algorithm are turned off in the patch, then you should just use one track. But if any of the stereo effects are turned on, you should record to a stereo pair to get the intended stereo effect.

These aren't the only algorithms that have stereo effects. See the manual for more.

Another good way to check if the selected patch should be recorded to a single track or a stereo pair is to alternately arm two adjacent tracks or a single track and listen for a difference. If there are stereo effects in the patch, you should hear a noticeable difference and (assuming you like the stereo effect) you should record to a stereo pair of tracks. But if you can't hear a difference (or you prefer the mono sound), then you should just use one track.

On the reserving for bouncing - If you wanted to use ALL available tracks before bouncing, then it must be ALL minus one. You must reserve one track for the bounce (one of 9/10 - 15/16 if you want a stereo bounce, one of 1 - 8 if you want a mono bounce). You can't play back one virtual of a track and record on a different virtual of the same track at the same time (that's the only thing I miss from the MBR).

That may be true of the BR-1600. I can't tell from the manual. But in all of the BRs that use flash memory for storage rather than a hard drive, you can record to all of the available tracks before bouncing. There is no need to reserve any tracks. When you select bounce mode, it asks you which track you want to bounce to. It also displays a v-track on the same screen. What some users don't realize is that you can move the cursor to the v-track and change it. This enables you to select any empty track/v-track as the destination of your bounce.

If that isn't possible on the BR-1600, it might be because the hard drive is too slow. It would have to read playback data from the disk while simultaneously writing the destination tracks to another part of the disk. Because a hard drive is mechanical, it might have trouble doing that. Although, with enough RAM for buffering, I would think it should be possible. But maybe the Roland engineers didn't think it was worth the cost and effort. With flash memory as the storage media, it's easy because there are no moving parts so there's no problem reading and writing at the same time (or nearly the same time).

[Hook]

We have had this faders vs tracks discussion so many times, stereo tracks are 2 tracks. You can think of it as one fader one track but it's just not true. As far as slaving the 2 together, it only seems necessary if you need more than 8 inputs. Other than that everything can be accomplished with vtracks, I think. It also kind of counters your keeping it smile declaration.
Good luck & rock on!

[Super 8]

It also kind of counters your keeping it 'simple' declaration.

Absolutely! As I pre-fixed my original post, it's not my idea. A mutual friend who also happens to own a BR1600 has asked if I would be up for the challenge of trying to link machines. After reading between the lines here though it sounds too involved for me at this moment in time (not to mention the ramifications if I were to consent to this! I mean, what if 9 months down the line my machine were to end up having a little BR Baby? What would happen then??!

[Super 8]

PS: Thanks both to Messrs AndyR & 64G for your incredible 'input' here! I'm still processing the above & trying to take it all in. All my input sources this end are MONO eg: electric guitars; mic'd acoustic sources (nose flute; etc.) but that's really fascinating re: being able to convert a Mono source to play back in 'pseudo-stereo' when recording to a Stereo track utilising one of the dedicated 'mono-to-stereo presets'! Why am I only finding this out now? You live'n'learn! (That said I think for my personal recording preferences, were I to redesign this model, I would still opt ti have 16 independent Mono channels then be able to choose which ones (if any) I'd link to use in Stereo (as opposed to having FOUR fixed pairs as it stands - that's just too many stereo tracks for my particular needs).