Waveform Free audio device issue

[WyzeGye]

I’m working on a piece using Waveform Free. I’ve been specifically using a yamaha keyboard hooked up to a focusrite scarlett solo device, which is then connected to both headphones and my laptop, in order to record the sound of the keyboard directly. However, I’ve encountered a problem recently that has completely halted my progress. For the setup to work, waveform has to have the scarlett solo selected as both the input and output device using windows audio exclusive mode as the sound device (if the sound device is changed, the recording sounds mushy and wet when played back for some reason). But now, I can’t put the solo on both input and output. I can have it on one, and I can have it on the other, but when I try to select it for both, it gives me an error saying “Couldn’t open the output device!” and then sets both input and output to nothing automatically. Any idea what could be causing this, or what I can do to get around it? I'm doing all of this on windows 11, by the way.

[Peter Widdicombe]

The "wet and mushy" is probably an input/output latency issue, where you're hearing the localized sound directly from the keyboard, PLUS the echoed sound from Waveform. Lowering latency might reduce the mushiness (by using ASIO4ALL) but will still be there.

What you might want to do is disable either local monitoring on the Scarlett; or disable the "live input monitoring" in Waveform for the track being recorded. This second option, though, will not allow you to hear any processing (i.e. reverb, etc.) that you may have on that audio track.

PS - depending on the Yamaha itself (does it have great sounds?) and use MIDI with a .VST? Easier to correct notes and edit; unless you're relying on the Yamama device for other things - like the auto-rhythm provided by the keyboard?