[WesParticipant]

Wheels:
I use an SQ-5 as the front end for my DAW. My experience with latency is that you have to look at the entire system. There is no silver bullet that kills the monster! Latency is manageable with a good computer (multi-core processor, lots of RAM, fast hard drives etc.), a DAW that supports resource allocation (ie 4 cores for recording, 4 cores for plugins) and an operator willing to take responsibility for learning the process for tweaking the system. I have toyed with the idea of adding either a Waves Soundgrid or Danta card but found that by optimizing my system they were not required. Will I buy one? Probably…I live for gear. The SQ is an absolute beast! The longer I use it the more I’ve come to respect it’s flexibility. Turns out the limiting factor in this equation was me! Good luck!

[WesParticipant]

I can’t quote the actual spec but I drive my Beyerdynamic DT880’s (250 ohm) at about the mid-point on the headphone output and they are plenty loud.

[WesParticipant]

Hey Guys:
I’ve been meaning to reply on this thread but haven’t been out to the forum in a while. I have an SQ-5 that I use as an interface to my DAW (Reaper and/or Sonar Pro). I did initially have quite a few problems with some “bit crusher” type artifacts and drop outs but the latest firmware has fixed all that. My buffer is set at 16 samples and is rock solid. My typical latency is 6 msec. I wasn’t particularly scientific about my measurement…recording a single track into the DAW with the output coming back to the SQ and patching to another input recording a second track.The delay between to two recorded tracks was roughly 6 msec. As a disclaimer let me say that my DAW machine is a monster (8 core CPU with 32g RAM and an SSD). I’m doing a lot of drum tracking and latency just hasn’t been an issue. Your results may vary!

[WesParticipant]

Frank:
In my system I’m able to play back directly from the DAW through the USB channel on the SQ. Windows media is the only thing that plays out of the secondary sound card. So, when I’m playing a Youtube video my system uses the on-board sound card from my motherboard. When I’m tracking with my DAW (and therefore using the ASIO drivers) I monitor on the USB fader on the SQ. In Windows 10 Playback Devices I actually have all the SQ options disabled. This seems counter-intuitive but after looking into the way ASIO drivers work I realized they are only active when my DAW is open. I hope this clears things up!

[WesParticipant]

After months of trial and error I think I found a work around for my particular issue with USB digital noise. In my case (SQ-5 on a Windows 10 computer) I found that there was a conflict between the ASIO drivers and Windows media. The SQ-5 would stream audio from Windows applications fine until I used my DAW (and thus started the ASIO driver). From that point forward things would get sort of hit and miss and the digital aliasing would increase dramatically. My work around was to disable the SQ entirely in the Windows mixer. My DAW (Reaper) still uses the ASIO drivers. In the Windows mixer I use the audio output of my motherboard’s on-board sound card. I then bring this audio in (using an audio cable) as a stereo input to the SQ. In this way when I’m using the DAW I’m using ASIO only. When I play back audio from Windows (Media Player, Youtube etc.) I’m using a separate audio device. With the system configured this way I can run the ASIO driver at 16 samples with no audio issues (latency is roughly 6 msec). It may not be the answer for everyone but it worked for me!

[WesParticipant]

I am having the same issue with SQ5 on a Windows 10 PC. My audio sounds exactly like the file sent by Josh. I have had this experience with both an Intel based DAW and a AMD based DAW. I’ve tried all the solutions recommended in the Glitch Free publication, which was suggested reading from tech support. When running LatencyMon I get nothing but green lights while the issue is happening (as I would expect running a DAW with an 8 core 3.0GHz processor and 32g of RAM). I’ve tried running the unit through both USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 ports. I’ve disabled wifi and ran directly to my ISP using ethernet. I’m sure I’m forgetting at least a dozen other things I have tried. This has been going on for 8 months so my memory may be a little suspect. It’s a shame because the desk really sounds fantastic when it’s not glitching. Unfortunately I purchased this as a head end for my DAW and it has not been reliable enough to use for that purpose. Extremely disappointed!

[Author]

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