[ardour-users] Using A Behringer BCF 2000 With 2.0.2 Isn't Working

[Kevin Cosgrove]

On 20 June 2007 at 12:41, "Bryan Smith" <thewingsofaneagle at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi... I'm really hoping someone can help me out with a problem
> I'm having. I just purchased two BCF2000 units for use with
> Ardour. The four preset buttons that control the transport
> work, however when I Ctrl-Button2 click on a control in Ardour
> to connect it to a control on the BCF2000 nothing happens. I
> followed the directions in the manual to the letter up until I
> got to the MIDI options which are different now in 2.0.2, so I
> wasn't sure how to set those. But, I have tried all possible
> Midi options as well as played with the different "Remote ID"
> options under the options menu. I honestly am not sure what
> those Remote ID options actually mean, so I tried them all. I
> have searched the internet and tried several possible solutions
> including some found here on ardour.org, but to no avail. Any
> assistance would be greatly appreciated. Does anyone have any
> ideas on what I should be looking at?

I just went through what you're going through.  I found
that ardour 2.0rc1 worked as described in the instructions.
Subsequent versions don't work the same way.  Here's what I did.

The BCF2000 shows up in /proc/asound as a card, in my case
card 3.  This means the 'MIDI-port tag="mcu"' line in
/etc/ardour2/ardour.rc needs to change to:

<MIDI-port tag="mcu" device="/dev/snd/midiC3D0" type="alsa/raw" mode="duplex"/>

An identical line also appears in /etc/ardour2/ardour_system.rc
and I made the change there too.  I'm not sure whether one or
both files need to be change, nor if only one file, then which
file.  Changing both seems to work.  You'll need to find out
which card your system assigns to your BCF2000 and change the
"C3" part of the line to refer to the card number on your system.

I tried to make this change in my own ~/.ardour2/ardour.rc file,
but ardour (versions greater than 2.0rc1) would keep putting them
back in the state that doesn't work.  Someone else on this list
wrote that this part of the issue is a bug, and was actually the
one who suggested changing the system rc file(s).

After making the rc file change, then make sure that your BCF2000
is in Logic Control mode.  The display on it will say "LC" if
this is the case.

Start ardour and go through the Options -> Control Surfaces menu
to check Mackie.  At that point my BCF2000's sliders move to
match the state of the first 7 channels plus the master channel
sliders in ardour.  Pushing the buttons and the knob above the
slider will operate mute, solo, and rec enable for the channel.
Rotating the slider will operate pan for the channel.

If you get an error saying that the mcu is already assigned,
then open the Options window (as opposed to Options menu) and go
to the MIDI tab in that window.  Make sure that the mcu is not
assigned at the time you try to click-check the Mackie control
surface.

Good luck....

P.S.:	Oh, please report how two BCF's work together.  I think
	you'll have to go through some more work to get that
	behaving well.  Have a look through the May 2007 list
	archives for info that should help.  BTW, Mackie stuff
	with the BCF is considered in development and unstable.
	But, it seems to work for me like this.

--
Kevin
"The most amazing achievement of the computer software industry is its
continuing cancellation of the steady and staggering gains made by the
computer hardware industry...", Henry Petroski [can you say "Windows"?]