Steinberg Nuendo 4 Operation Manual

461
Synchronization
Synchronization
Before you proceed, you need to make sure that the clock 
signals on your ASIO cards are synchronized correctly. 
This is essential when cabling any kind of digital audio 
system, not just VST System Link.
The Clock Mode or Sync Mode is set up in the ASIO con-
trol panel of the audio hardware. Proceed as follows:
1.Pull down the Devices menu and open the Device Set-
up dialog.
2.On the VST Audio System page, select your audio in-
terface from the “ASIO Driver” pop-up...

462
Synchronization
Setting up your software
Now it’s time to set up your programs. The procedures 
below describe how to set things up in Nuendo; if you are 
using another program on the other computer, please re-
fer to its documentation.
Setting the sample rate
The projects in both programs must be set to use the 
same sample rate. Select “Project Setup…” from the 
Project menu and make sure the sample rate is the same 
in both systems.
Streaming digital audio between applications
1.Create input and...

463
Synchronization
Activating VST System Link
Before you proceed you need to make sure that VST Sys-
tem Link is set as Timecode Source in the Synchronization 
dialog and that the desired Sync options are activated, 
see “Timecode Preferences” on page 454.
After setting up the inputs and outputs, you now need to 
define which input/output should carry the actual VST 
System Link information.
The System Link networking signal is carried on only one 
bit of one channel. This means that if you have an ADAT...

464
Synchronization
The Offset Samples setting allows you to adjust whether 
one machine will play back slightly ahead or behind the rest.
This is normally not needed, but occasionally with some hardware you 
may find that the lock is a few samples out. In that case you can adjust 
the lock with the Offset value. For now, leave it set to 0 – it will most likely 
be what you want.
The Transfer Bits setting allows you to specify whether 
you want to transfer 24 or 16 bits. This allows you to use 
older...

465
Synchronization
Hearing the network audio
If you are using an external mixing desk, hearing your audio 
really isnt an issue – just plug the outputs of each computer 
into the desired channels on the external mixing desk, press 
Play on one of the computers, and youre good to go.
However, many people prefer to mix internally inside the 
computer and just use a desk for monitoring (or maybe not 
use any external mixer at all). In this case youll need to se-
lect one computer to be your “main mix...

466
Synchronization
Setting up a larger network
This is not much more difficult than a two computer net-
work. The main thing to remember is that VST System Link 
is a daisy chain system. In other words, the output of com-
puter 1 goes to the input of computer 2, the output of 
computer 2 goes to the input of computer 3, and so on 
around the chain. The output of the last computer in the 
chain must always go back into the input of computer 1, to 
complete the ring.
Once youve done this, the transmission...

467
Synchronization
Creating a virtual effect rack
The effect sends for an audio channel in Nuendo can ei-
ther be routed to an FX channel track or to any activated 
Group or output bus. This allows you to use a separate 
computer as a “virtual effect rack”, by setting things up in 
the following way:
1.Go to computer 2 (the machine you will use as effect 
rack) and add a new stereo audio track.
You cannot use an FX channel track in this case, since the track must 
have an audio input.
2.Add the desired...

36
Video 

469
Video
Background
Nuendo plays back video films in a number of formats. 
Under Windows, video playback can be done using the 
playback engines DirectShow, DirectX Video or Quick-
Time. 
Under Mac OS X, QuickTime is always used as playback 
engine.
There are several ways to play back video:
Without any special hardware.
While this will be fine in many situations it does put a limit on the size of 
the internal video window as well as the quality of the image.
Using FireWire (Mac OS X only).
Using a...

470
Video
Selecting the video playback engine 
(Windows only)
When using Nuendo on a Windows system, you can se-
lect the playback engine in the Device Setup dialog (Video 
Player page).
Which playback engine to select depends largely on 
which type of video system you are using, as well as on 
the file format and codec of the video files you want to 
work with.
When you have changed the video playback engine, 
make sure to remove any previously imported video file 
from the Pool, and re-import it.
A...