Focusrite Forte, anyone?

[AudioBabble]

I have a Focusrite Forte interface (not my only one), which I use in my recording 'booth' mainly for voice-over work, but also sometimes for recording guitars.

Admittedly it's pretty old and Focusrite have long abandoned it in terms of driver updates. That said, for basic recording it works fine -- the ASIO driver is OK.

However... I just made a shocking discovery!!

A client wants to do a zoom read-through for an audiobook I'm soon to be recording.

Well... after much fiddling about, I have come to the conclusion that the WDM drivers for the forte are incapable of duplex operation. I have the correct (and only) driver package installed, but basically, I can either get zoom to recognize my audio input from my mic OR to recognize and play back windows sound (i.e. the other party speaking) .... NOT BOTH!


It's not just a zoom thing... I have the same issue with any bowser-based audio/video conferencing 'apps' such as google meet or source-elements Nexus

It's not anything wrong with my system/OS. I've tried it on multiple other systems.. same problem.

I've substituted one of my other interfaces, and that works fine... so pretty sure it's the Forte.

this is a long shot... but if anyone else uses a Focusrite Forte (I know, I know... I think they only sold about 10 of them)... did you notice this issue??

are there any known work-arounds?

The only solution I figured out was to route the mic input back out the windows sound driver using Voicemeeter -- it works, but it's pretty much unusable because of the latency, and I can't NOT have my mic channel being software-monitored otherwise it wouldn't work at all.

I guess I'll be using my other interface for the zoom session, but this really bugs me. I'd like to get into more 'live-directed sessions'... but if so I'd be switching interfaces all the the time... or just get rid of the focusrite, which -- apart from this little bugbear, actually does its job very well.

[John Focusrite-Novation]

Forte does support multi-client ASIO and WDM playback on all of the compatible OS platforms. If you give the Focusrite Support Team a call or open a Live Chat, they'll try to help you find a suitable solution to this.

[AudioBabble]

Forte does support multi-client ASIO and WDM playback on all of the compatible OS platforms. If you give the Focusrite Support Team a call or open a Live Chat, they'll try to help you find a suitable solution to this.

well, that sounds promising. I can tell you this though:
I'm usually on windows, but thought I'd give Linux a go as an alternative...
... the Forte does not work under Linux, not in any meaningful way at least. None of the controls on the interface work until it connects with host software -- and the host software is win/mac only.... and (unsurprisingly), it doesn't work under Wine either.

But, I will see what support have to say.

[EDIT, just noticed you said 'compatible OS platforms'... and Linux isn't one of them]

Anyway, there's clearly something wrong with the WDM drivers under Windows at least. The way I see it, unless support can point me to a set of drivers that work at Windows OS level (not ASIO), then I can't see there being much else anyone can do about it. Whatever drivers windows update provides, they're clearly not good enough, and the drivers in the Focusrite driver package (if any... I'm not sure if it doesn't only provide ASIO) are not doing the job.

[BertKoor]

What web browser is giving issues? Did you try another? Is there a control panel for wdm audio, like can you (un)set exclusive mode?

Last time I had a non-duplex device was 1997, it must be software. I'd personally install the driver that came in the box. Later versions (esp generic developed by Microsoft) may show regressions, like you have.

[AudioBabble]

What web browser is giving issues? Did you try another? Is there a control panel for wdm audio, like can you (un)set exclusive mode?

Last time I had a non-duplex device was 1997, it must be software. I'd personally install the driver that came in the box. Later versions (esp generic developed by Microsoft) may show regressions, like you have.

Tried chrome, firefox, also Zoom app... all the same -- no joy with forte -- no problem with any other interface, including a real cheapo Behringer.

I'm 99% sure there was no driver 'supplied in the box' with the interface, rather a case of downloading the official driver package, which -- of course -- is the one I'm using. I even tried re-installing it under win 7 and win 8 compatibility mode. Still no different.

To be bluntly honest, I don't have time for this sort of thing. The interface is GREAT for what I use it for -- straight recording of voice or instruments into DAW via ASIO drivers. Of course, I don't ever expect to use it under Linux... fair enough. But there's also clearly no point in trying to use it as a windows system audio device for any kind of video conferencing. [ironically it WILL play back audio from youtube and the like in my web browser, which I have often done while researching pronunciations, etc. for audiobooks -- while at the same time running a live recording session via the ASIO driver in Reaper]

I now have the 'cheapo' behringer connected to a second laptop and am running zoom on that machine. I'm feeding my microphone audio via the Forte line out into that, then getting the second laptop's audio out back in through my forte's 2nd input line in. It works fine!

[AudioBabble]

Just posting back to say, I finally got the Forte to work properly. Just on a whim, I though I'd try searching for updated drivers with windows update via the device manager... it worked, the correct WDM (presumably generic) was installed and now it shows up as a Windows device. Strange that this worked, whereas repeatedly uninstalling/reinstalling with the official driver package didn't help. But there it is.