Hi there,

today I set up my microphone on my daw to record the sound of my finger hammering onto the piano and the sound-output from my speakers (fed with the midi signal from the piano via audio interface, playing a vst). When checking the recorded sound the difference in onset was 56ms (about one and a half 16th beaths at 100 bpm).

Now to cross-check that I did the same with my drumpad controller that directly feeds into usb and came to 37ms.

Does it make sense to assume that my audio-interface accounts for the difference of 19 ms? I have buffer settings in my interface at 64 samples with sample rate 44100 (should be 1.4 ms buffering).

Or should I consider the midi-module in my piano too? Can those be so slow?

Basically what I am asking is wheter any of my measurements can show me how much of my latency is coming from what part of my hardware.

Thanks a lot

 

MIDI over DIN & USB have slightly different times. But not enough to matter. I would assume the latency is from you audio interface.

 

Okay I thought so too. So the 19 ms difference is from the audio-interface, but where do the 37 ms come from? I mean if the buffer settings in my DAW imply 1.5 ms where is the rest?

The signal running through cables can't take that much time and I was recording like a quarter of a meter away from the instrument and speakers...

Is it that the signal comes from my drumpad controller into the pc into the daw then into the interface and out and the interface is slowing it down there too?

So the signal path for the piano would be piano-interface-daw-interface-speakers and the interface slows everything down twice?

 

Your interface has an input and an output latency and the latter is mostly larger. Plus the VSTi's latency.
And yes, if you pass the interface twice, you get the latency twice, ofc.

But if you add all these, the result should be correct, imho.