Avid Pro Tools Product Announcements November 2020
If you want to know everything that was announced for Avid Pro Tools users in November 2020 then read this article. It includes information on Pro Tools 2020.11 and Pro Tools | Carbon.
Pro Tools Carbon - Everything You Need To Know
Pro Tools Carbon is the new interface from Avid who have announced AND released it on the same day. Pro Tools Carbon is a new hardware product, which is potentially their most significant hardware product in years and ironically it's a return to what put Pro Tools into the majority of pro music studios in the first place. We have the details.
Pro Tools Carbon is the first audio interface Avid has designed in house since the Avid HD IO and Avid HD Omni a decade ago. Avid has offered branded hardware since but this has been produced in partnership with other companies such as DAD and Apogee. Whereas, Pro Tools Carbon is an all in-house design and manufacture. When paired with the new 2020.11 release of Pro Tools it offers some very interesting new features which have very quickly become second nature and absolutely indispensable for me. So what is Pro Tools Carbon and who is it for?
What Is Pro Tools Carbon?
It is a 1U hardware interface is a 25/34 interface with 8 mic preamps with some very appealing features under the hood.
Who Is Pro Tools Carbon For?
Pro Tools Carbon is for tracking music. It’s designed for the serious musician or studio owner who wants to be able to track a typical band in stereo using Pro Tools and without having to think about latency.
Pro Tools|Carbon - At A Glance
Pro Tools Carbon - How Does It Compare To The Competition?
We compare the cost of entry of the Avid Pro Tools Carbon audio interface with the Universal Audio Apollo x8p and the Apogee Ensemble, all similar priced audio interfaces with both native and DSP powered plugins.
Pro Tools Carbon is the new kid on the block and the reason for producing this comparison article. Pro Tools Carbon is the first audio interface Avid has designed inhouse since the HD IO and HD Omni some 10 years ago. Avid has offered branded hardware since but this has been produced in partnership with other companies such as DAD and Apogee. Whereas, Pro Tools Carbon is an all in-house design. When paired with the new 2020.11 release of Pro Tools it offers some very interesting new features which promise to become absolutely indispensable.
It is a 1U hardware interface supports 24 inputs plus the talkback mic at 48KHz. This is provided via 8 mic preamps, 2 instrument inputs, 8 line inputs via TRS or D-sub, 16 ADAT inputs and a built-in talkback mic. On the output side, there are a pair of monitor outs on TRS, 8 line outs on D-sub, 16 ADAT outputs and 4 stereo headphone outputs. All of which adds up to 34 outputs and it all works with the Native version of Pro Tools, even though there are 2 more outputs than the 32 I/O limit for Pro Tools Native.
It contains DSP similar to an HDX card, but physically it’s a 1U interface similar in appearance to the MTRX Studio. It is Mac only at present because it connects to the host computer via AVB. The host Mac needs to be running macOS 10.15.6 or later to support Pro Tools Carbon and Avid have worked closely with Apple on the AVB implementation. Pro Tools Carbon is currently macOS only because the Windows OS doesn’t support AVB at present.
Pro Tools Carbon has a hybrid mixer. It runs natively, like the mixer in a host-based system, but mixer channels can be switched to DSP mode on a per-track basis. When switched to DSP mode sub-millisecond levels of latency become available. Just like HDX, tracking through AAX DSP plug-ins is available on DSP enabled tracks but rather than switching between DSP and Native on a per-plugin basis as in HDX, in this hybrid environment the whole track including plugins, sends and output path gets switched and Native plugins get swapped for their DSP equivalent seamlessly. Where a DSP version of a plugin isn’t available the Native plugin is bypassed to preserve the low latency on the path.
Avid Pro Tools 2020.11 Released With Dark Theme, Audio To MIDI And More
In addition to Pro Tools Carbon support in Pro Tools 2020.11, other new features include;
Pro Tools 2020.11 - At A Glance
Pro Tools 2020.11 Bug Fixes
Avid Pro Tools 2020.11 - Bug Fixes
With each release of Pro Tools Avid squashes another raft of bugs in Pro Tools. Here is a list of the areas covered by bug fixes that come with the Pro Tools 2020.11 release.
Control Surfaces
Dolby Atmos Workflows
Editing
Elastic Audio
Export/Bounce
Field Recorder
Import
Installer
Performance
Routing and I/O Setup
User Interface
Video
Workspace