RME announces app control for RME Adi-2 series

[KSTR]

I find that Fabfilter does a great job in this aspect. It can adapt to your operations, whether it's linear movement or rotation.
Take a look at its help documentation. It's a textbook example of human factors design:

Thanks for that. This how it should be done, to allow everbody to use the way they find most intuitive.
Only direct keyboard support is missing which I often find the most convenient way of doing things mainly because it does not require a "user task switch" once you've set the focus on an element. One can control the parameter as directly as possible without looking and with direct haptic feedback, also accessing adjacent elements are selected quickly. I always loved the old versions of the Samplitude DAW for this. Even better would be one character shortcuts to set the focus, like 'V' to access main volume etc.

 

[LesterHiggins]

Exactly. Intuitive or not, this is not rocket science to find out and done equally nearly everywhere for decades.

Yeah, so what it's difficult to use? Everybody else did it that way so there's no reason to reinvent the wheel. What are we, some kind of innovative company or something? Pshhh... Great attitude.

 

[LesterHiggins]

I'm also one of those people who cannot handle the way rotary knobs/dials are often implemented in GUI. The obvious and natural behavior would be: you grab (click) it with the mouse anywhere at/near its circumference and the make the same rotational move that you would do with your fingers.
But is implemented like it were a linear fader, how stupid is that? Would anyone accept it if a linear faded would have to be operated like a rotary knob? For sure, no. So why this botched usage concept for rotary controls?

My bigger grief, however, is that the GUI cannot be handled with the keyboard, let alone blindly. The expected behavior, as used in many other programs, is TAB and SHIFT-TAB to move the focus (which means the item which has the focus must highlight this in some way), then SPACE to switch a toggle or cycle through a list and CURSOR-UP/-DOWN to increment/decrement numerical parameters in reasonable steps (or use SHIFT as a modifier for a "fine" stepping).

It's so inefficient and imprecise. How many times have you struggled to get the number you're trying for with one of these but keeping going over and under? Or going from around 500Hz to 5kHz on the EQ settings takes forever. A slider with a digit-field that takes keyboard input would be so much easier.

 

[danadam]

It's so inefficient and imprecise. How many times have you struggled to get the number you're trying for with one of these but keeping going over and under? Or going from around 500Hz to 5kHz on the EQ settings takes forever. A slider with a digit-field that takes keyboard input would be so much easier.

As I said, I don't really use the app and don't come across knob widgets often but I don't seem to have problems with speed or precision:

 

[MC_RME]

I already said it but some don't seem to get it: the Volume knob is not a simple knob like the EQ ones. The Volume knob can do big damage to your equipment and your ears. Therefore it can NOT be the correct way to grab it with the mouse and directly rotate it from -30 dB to +6 dB in fractions of a second. People who ask for such behaviour don't run a company that can be sued (especially but not only in the US), but would be the first to do so when affected (my bet).

Added: For the above reasons using a 'linear fader' (mouse friendly) is just a recipe for desaster. It can be done this way in many scenarios, but not with the central volume control of your whole HiFi system.

I also wanted to add that some seem to misunderstand the Volume control of the app. It is not intended to be a pot-style control in circle shape. Instead it is IMHO a very good graphical representation of the unit's Volume encoder (!) and its function. Precise digital control, still covering greater change areas, visually attractive, blending a current volume display with the white ring at the unit, and havoc-preventing at the same time.

 

[Sir Sanders Zingmore]

I have a (probably) dumb question about the remote control app…
Is it possible to use it from a laptop that is not directly connected to the ADI-2 DAC and if so how?

I can only get it to work on the computer that the DAC is physically connected to and as such it doesn’t really feel very much like a remote control

 

[OHtaru]

The Volume knob can do big damage to your equipment and your ears.

I once had an interface with a broken encoder, and it was obvious that they really wanted to blow users' ears out. I guess their debounce was done poorly. When the encoder had poor contact, the sound would jump towards 0dB. I applied for a replacement and then sold it. It's completely unusable, and I can't guarantee that this new one won't blow my ears out one day.

 

[MC_RME]

I have a (probably) dumb question about the remote control app…
Is it possible to use it from a laptop that is not directly connected to the ADI-2 DAC and if so how?

I can only get it to work on the computer that the DAC is physically connected to and as such it doesn’t really feel very much like a remote control

We have plans to make it accessible via network, similar to the TotalMix Remote app. That still requires the unit to be connected via USB, and have the remote server app run on the computer providing the USB port. There is no other way as the unit does not have wireless connections. An alternative is writing your own app/script as we published the remote protocol.

 

[MC_RME]

It's so inefficient and imprecise. How many times have you struggled to get the number you're trying for with one of these but keeping going over and under? Or going from around 500Hz to 5kHz on the EQ settings takes forever. A slider with a digit-field that takes keyboard input would be so much easier.

As I already wrote nothing prevents you from a right click to enter the exact value for any EQ parameter in the ADI-2 app. The problem that you complain about does not exist.

 

[KSTR]

The Volume knob can do big damage to your equipment and your ears. Therefore it can NOT be the correct way to grab it with the mouse and directly rotate it from -30 dB to +6 dB in fractions of a second. People who ask for such behaviour don't run a company that can be sued (especially but not only in the US), but would be the first to do so when affected (my bet).

I don't buy that. If so, all manufacturers of analog preamps etc with manual volume control would be out of business. One can't protect against stupid.

I do agree, however, that some thoughtful protection is certainly a good thing. For example, behavior like "double-click to reset to 0dB" would not be a good idea on a volume knob. Rather, it should mute and another double click should slowly(!) ramp up the volume again. Same goes for direct value entry. Users should have time to react to a volume increase they did not intent. For keyboard users, ESC would be the proper key to abort and revert a setting still in progress. And after any edit/ramp time-out, CRTL-Z to undo.

 

[OHtaru]

The mouse is slippery.

 

[MC_RME]

I don't buy that. If so, all manufacturers of analog preamps etc with manual volume control would be out of business. One can't protect against stupid.

A mechanical pot (aka analog control) is under direct tactical control (and it's not even easy to turn it from 0 to 11 without a regrab in-between. Very easy with the mouse if implemented as requested here). Reaction/operation there is always different to a mouse and considered standard.

Regarding your other points, study the available Settings in the app to prevent volume adjustment overload. We invested some thinking into it, even addressing handicapped persons that struggle with mouse etc..

 

[ObjectiveSubjectivist]

An alternative is writing your own app/script as we published the remote protocol.

Can I ask where I can find it?

 

[danadam]

Can I ask where I can find it?

https://www.rme-audio.de/downloads/adi2remote_midi_protocol.zip

(see ADI-2 Remote Pre-Release: Step 3 – support for the whole ADI-2 series post)

In ADI-2 Remote V 2.0 – we can't stop! post there is:

Note: The extended MIDI protocol will be available soon as download.

but I don't know if that zip was updated to describe the extended protocol or not.

 

[MC_RME]

It was (September 2023).

 

[LesterHiggins]

As I already wrote nothing prevents you from a right click to enter the exact value for any EQ parameter in the ADI-2 app. The problem that you complain about does not exist.

First of all, right-clicking is for opening MENUS of possible actions, not taking specific actions. There is only one possible path, the dialog opens, that should be a regular click and not a context-click. I would have thought it was possible to click on the knobs if there was any feedback from the UI like a hover state and a cursor change, but that is not the case, the UI does not respond to the cursor, so there was no reason to believe the knobs are interactive in that way. Context-clicks are invisible UI paradigms that require discovery or training, and on Macs aren't a common or expected paradigm. I did not even think to attempt a context-click. Invisible UI paradigms are by definition non-intuitive. There is no context-click on the volume knob, by the way, which is what I commented on first. Also the dialog that appears after a right-click (which again, improper use of context-click, should be primary click) could be improved by defaulting focus to the field itself rather than requiring another click (this time a primary click) to bring focus to the field. So it's two clicks, a wrong one and an unnecessary one. You cannot say that is good design.

 

[LesterHiggins]

I already said it but some don't seem to get it: the Volume knob is not a simple knob like the EQ ones. The Volume knob can do big damage to your equipment and your ears. Therefore it can NOT be the correct way to grab it with the mouse and directly rotate it from -30 dB to +6 dB in fractions of a second. People who ask for such behaviour don't run a company that can be sued (especially but not only in the US), but would be the first to do so when affected (my bet).

Added: For the above reasons using a 'linear fader' (mouse friendly) is just a recipe for desaster. It can be done this way in many scenarios, but not with the central volume control of your whole HiFi system.

I also wanted to add that some seem to misunderstand the Volume control of the app. It is not intended to be a pot-style control in circle shape. Instead it is IMHO a very good graphical representation of the unit's Volume encoder (!) and its function. Precise digital control, still covering greater change areas, visually attractive, blending a current volume display with the white ring at the unit, and havoc-preventing at the same time.

Maybe something is getting lost in translation, it is possible I am misinterpreting your tone as condescending when you are just trying to be helpful, but a company should not tell customers that inherently unintuitive UI patterns (context-clicking has no visual affordance and is therefore invisible which is by definition a non-intuitive design that requires discovery or training) make their product usable and the customer just has a problem using their product. Powerful/capable =/= usable/intuitive.

 

[sqrl]

I have a (probably) dumb question about the remote control app…
Is it possible to use it from a laptop that is not directly connected to the ADI-2 DAC and if so how?

I can only get it to work on the computer that the DAC is physically connected to and as such it doesn’t really feel very much like a remote control

I have the ADI-2 connected by USB to a media pc and just run it from another laptop or PC with a remote desktop program, Anyviewer in my case.