Hey guys, in this video we’re going to cover how to install and configure SoundBridge on
our computer.
SoundBridge is a free digital audio workstation we can use in the home studio for recording
audio and editing MIDI with virtual instruments.
In this first tutorial, we’ll go through a lot of the setup process for SoundBridge
and navigate through the preferences.
First let’s start by getting SoundBridge installed on our system.
To do this, go to SoundBridge’s website, which I’ve linked in the video description
down below.
Type in your email address and select a password.
You’ll need to remember this to activate the program in a minute.
Then click get free DAW.
You’ll be redirected to a download page.
I’ll be downloading the version for Windows 10, but you can also choose to download it
for Mac.
Once the program is downloaded, launch the installer.
Follow the on-screen prompts to install the program.
The first time the program launches, we’ll need to login with the username and password
we used to download it to activate SoundBridge.
Once we’ve got the program started, let’s start looking at some of the general settings
we need.
First is the File menu in the bottom left corner.
This has the features that allows us to create a new project, open a project, and save the
project.
We can also import both audio and MIDI files.
Freeze track allows us to save a track with its effects and settings as an audio file,
allowing us to reduce the CPU usage if it starts to get too high.
Then we can export MIDI tracks or loops.
After that we can exit the project, or open a recent project.
Next we have our Edit menu.
This starts with the Undo and Redo buttons, like we have in other programs.
Then we can duplicate our clips, cut, copy, paste, rename, and delete.
We can also select all, group tracks, split, merge, adjust length, and quantize here, but
that can also be done from other buttons after.
Last, we can enable and disable auto quantize notes, auto preview, and automation follow.
A lot of the major settings we’ll need are found in the Preferences menu, which we can
open by pressing the Preferences button.
To setup an audio interface, click the preferences button in the bottom left corner.
Audio is the default section that comes up first.
We’ll set the soundcard driver to ASIO for low latency recording.
In my case, I’ll set the device to the Focusrite Audio interface, but this depends on your
drivers and what interface you’re using.
If you’re using an interface without its own driver, you’ll need to install and select
the ASIO4ALL driver.
One thing we need to know about SoundBridge compared to some other digital audio workstations
is that the application takes exclusive control over the audio interface.
This means that to get the audio interface to work properly, we need to close any other
programs on our system that can also try and use it.
Once SoundBridge has control over the interface, no other programs will be able to play sound.
Next go to Input / Output.
This opens a window that allows us to choose what inputs and outputs from our audio interface
are available to use.
I want to select all the inputs, and clicking on them turns them blue which means they’re
active.
I’ll leave the outputs as default, since I don’t need access to additional outputs
with this audio interface.
After that, just press Use Recommended Buffer Size to optimize the audio interface.
Next we’ll cover MIDI.
This step is only necessary if we plan on using a MIDI input or output device, but you
can skip it if you plan on doing everything with software only.
Since I’ll want to configure a MIDI input device, I need to enable it.
In my case, I’m using an Akai MPD218, so I’ll press the button to enable that interface.
I won’t add any MIDI output devices, but you can do that here as well.
The VST section of the preferences window allows us to specify where our third party
VST plugins are stored on our computer.
To get started, press the Add Directory button.
Then navigate to the folder on your computer where you VST plugins are stored and press
the Choose button.
You can do this again to add multiple folders, or select a folder and press the Remove Directory
button to get rid of it.
Once you have your directories, press the Find New button to add the plugins to the
program.
Not all the plugins will show up in the program after because some of them don’t work properly
with it.
You’ll need to make sure you match 64 bit plugins with a 64 bit version of the program
to get it to work properly.
The next section we can choose is Blacklist.
This allows us to navigate to certain VST plugins on our hard drive that may be within
the scanned folders, and exclude them from SoundBridge.
We want to use this to exclude certain plugins that may be causing problems, such as stopping
the program from opening properly.
Next we can log in to a SkyTracks account if we have one.
This is a cloud-based service that allows us to create music and collaborate with other
musicians, but we won’t be using that in this tutorial.
After that, we have a Shortcuts menu.
We can use this to assign difference controls to keys on the keyboard if we want to.
We’ll leave these as default for now, but it can be helpful to come back to these tools
and make changes, especially if we prefer certain shortcuts from other programs.
The options menu gives us a few more controls.
The first one is Match Block to Track Color, which causes blocks to match the track color.
Next is Create Fades on Clip Edges, which adds a 4ms fade to audio blocks when we import
them.
After that we can choose to autosave the project and keep bounced files in the projects folder
so they’re organized.
I have multi-core support enabled and that will allow the program to use more of your
CPU resources.
I disabled Windows On-screen keyboard because by default it was popping up all the time.
I haven’t set a default MIDI input, but you can also do this if you’ll be using
the same input device every time.
Last we can save our current project as the default.
The last option in the preferences window is for the GUI.
The GUI option allow us to change the way the program looks.
By changing the skin, we’ll be changing the colors of the program.
The options for the skin are Coal, Mountain, Forest, Frost, and Earth.
We can also change the scale of the program.
This is helpful if you find everything too small, especially if you’re using a monitor
with a high resolution.
The scale can be set to 100%, which is the default, 125%, 150%, 175%, and 200%.
Both of these settings will only change after restarting the program.
Thanks for checking out this video on getting SoundBridge setup on our system.
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