Operation Manual

REASON HARDWARE INTERFACE
74
Introduction
The Hardware Interface is where you connect Reason with the “outside world”. This is
where MIDI is received, and where audio signals are routed to ReWire channels or to
the physical outputs of your audio hardware. The Hardware Interface is always
present at the top of the rack, and cannot be deleted. This chapter is meant to serve
as a panel reference, describing the various sections of the device. How to set up
your MIDI interface and audio hardware is described in the Getting Started book and
in “About Audio on Computers”.
The Hardware interface is divided into two sections: MIDI In Device and Audio Out.
MIDI In Device
The MIDI In device is only used if you are controlling Reason from an external se-
quencer, using the External Control Bus inputs (see $). Normally, you send MIDI to a
track via the sequencer, by clicking in the In column for its sequencer track.
You can select MIDI ports for up to four External Control Busses (on the Prefer-
ences:Advanced MIDI page). Each bus can carry 16 MIDI channels, for a total of up to
64 MIDI input channels. The MIDI In device is where you route each MIDI channel to
a device in the Reason rack:
1. Select one of the External Control Busses by clicking the corresponding Bus
Select button at the top of the MIDI In device.
2. Pull down the device pop-up menu for a MIDI channel and select a device.
The menu lists all devices in the current song.
Now, incoming MIDI data on the selected bus and MIDI channel is sent directly to the
selected device, bypassing the Reason sequencer. The name of the device is shown
in the name field for that MIDI channel.
3. Try sending MIDI notes from the external sequencer, on the selected bus and
MIDI channel.
The indicator below the channel's name field should light up.
Audio Out
Reason supports up to 64 audio output channels.
D Each output features a meter and a green indicator which will be lit for
each channel that is available.
! Remember that the Hardware Interface is where any possible audio clip-
ping will occur in Reason. Keep an eye on the clipping indicator on the
transport panel, and also on the individual meters in the Audio Out
panel. If a channel pushes the meter into the red, the output level of the
device should be reduced.
Using ReWire
If you are running Reason together with a ReWire compatible host application, you
can route any Reason device output to a ReWire channel by connecting the device to
any of the audio inputs at the back of the Hardware Interface. In ReWire mode, all 64
channels are available and any device output routed to a ReWire channel will appear
in the ReWire host application on it’s own channel. See “Using Reason as a ReWire
Slave”.