Hi just wondering if the usb drive that pg sends biab on, is it usb 2 or usb 3? I have an ssd 128 gig drive in my laptop , so not large enough to load biab. I only have the basic installation in my laptop and run everything else from the usb drive. Is there any advantage putting the files on a usb 3 drive ( if pg is only usb 2), or even an ssd usb,, or does the speed of a usb ssd not really make any difference as far as band in a box goes.
The disk drive I have been supplied with is USB 3 but is also USB 2 compatible.
If you have a USB 3 port available, then it is better to use that.
As a general rule, the speed doesn't matter, as the songs are generated first.
I'm sure it's fine to use the USB drive in a USB 2 port.
In my installation, I use the option to install the main program to my HDD, but run the audio files from the USB drive.
Hope this helps
Best
Trevor
BIAB & RB2026 Win.(Audiophile), Windows 10 Pro & Windows 11, Cakewalk Bandlab, Izotope Prod.Bundle, Roland RD-1000, Synthogy Ivory, Session Keys Grand S & Electric R, Kontakt, Focusrite 18i20, KetronSD2, NS40M, Pioneer Active Monitors.
yes, I have Audiophile. I can't say what USB type the standard version is released on, my earlier versions are USB 2.
However, the pin connections are different between USB 2 and USB 3. USB 3 has two sets of connection terminals. One set of 4-pins for backwards compatibility with USB 2 and a second set of 5 pins to handle the USB 3 protocol.
Below photos (courtesy Wikipedia) show a close-up of a Standard-A USB 3.0 connector, showing its front row of four pins for the USB 1.x/2.0 backwards compatibility, and a second row of five pins for the new USB 3.0 connectivity.
So you should be able to determine your drive technology type by viewing the USB plug.
Hope this assists
Best
Trevor
BIAB & RB2026 Win.(Audiophile), Windows 10 Pro & Windows 11, Cakewalk Bandlab, Izotope Prod.Bundle, Roland RD-1000, Synthogy Ivory, Session Keys Grand S & Electric R, Kontakt, Focusrite 18i20, KetronSD2, NS40M, Pioneer Active Monitors.
Update: OK, I just checked the 2014 Audiophile disk cable, and it is definitely USB 2.0, so PGM presumably made the change to USB 3.0 for the 2015 Audiophile version.
BIAB & RB2026 Win.(Audiophile), Windows 10 Pro & Windows 11, Cakewalk Bandlab, Izotope Prod.Bundle, Roland RD-1000, Synthogy Ivory, Session Keys Grand S & Electric R, Kontakt, Focusrite 18i20, KetronSD2, NS40M, Pioneer Active Monitors.
For 2015, and the NON-Audiophile version, the supplied cable for my USB drive is clearly USB 2 (NOT USB 3), the drive appears to be USB 2 and operates as such.
Having said that, and the heavy users of external USB drives for BIAB (Audiophile or not) can jump in here and slap this down but the only REAL benefit of USB 3, vice USB2, for BIAB is the load time for RT's from a external hard drive. And on MY PC - using supplied USB 2 drive to get RT's and using fast internal HDDs the time delta is very small and would be unnoticeable on day to day work.
Once RT's are loaded - they are in memory and, in general, RT's are your heavy disk I/O users besides audio recording or audio editing.
Moving to USB 3 won't hurt - but won't be cost benefit winner IMHO
Larry
Last edited by Larry Kehl; 02/07/1501:48 PM.
Win10Pro,i9,64GB,2TBSSD+20TBHDDs,1080TI,BIAB'24,Scarlett18i8,Montage7,Fusion 8HD,QS8,Integra7,XV5080,QSR,SC-8850,SPLAT,FL21&others,Komp.14,IK suite&others, just a guitar player-AXE FX III &FM9T, FishmanTP, MIDIGuitar2, GK2/3'sw/GI20
The 2015 Audiophile disk is quite large: 1.5Tb, and it contains more than 1Tb of data (much more than the 2014 version, which was less then 1Tb of data)
One reason PGM might have gone to USB 3 for this version is the time to load the files onto it in the first place.
Best
Trevor
BIAB & RB2026 Win.(Audiophile), Windows 10 Pro & Windows 11, Cakewalk Bandlab, Izotope Prod.Bundle, Roland RD-1000, Synthogy Ivory, Session Keys Grand S & Electric R, Kontakt, Focusrite 18i20, KetronSD2, NS40M, Pioneer Active Monitors.
Thanks Guys, I don't actually have the audiophile version, so, I checked the plugs on the usb drives that I do have. Sort of got a bit confusing as an old Seagate back up drive I have, only had a single plug at one end, whereas the pg usb's have a double. I also have a new Seagate usb, and on closer inspection of the cable it has an icon with a diagram and an ss written on it , which my old Seagate and the pg drives don't have. So yes, I believe they are only usb 2. Thanks for that.
So is it really only that usb 3 loads the real tracks a tiny bit faster than usb 2, but makes no difference to the actual playback of the real tracks because the real tracks actually get loaded in. ie it's the computer that's the important part, not how quickly you load the tracks in.
I'm sort of getting myself a bit confused with some of the software synths I used to use a few years back, that used streaming, and I think maybe drive speed would have mattered?
So really, usb 3 speed is more important if you're using it for copying or backing up large amounts of data.
Great, you may have saved me money buying additional usb3 drive. haha
... So is it really only that usb 3 loads the real tracks a tiny bit faster than usb 2, but makes no difference to the actual playback of the real tracks because the real tracks actually get loaded in. ie it's the computer that's the important part, not how quickly you load the tracks in.
Yep, for the BiaB program, that's it in a nutshell
Originally Posted By: rikkisbears
I'm sort of getting myself a bit confused with some of the software synths I used to use a few years back, that used streaming, and I think maybe drive speed would have mattered?
So really, usb 3 speed is more important if you're using it for copying or backing up large amounts of data.
Yes, BiaB has been designed to work very flexibly with computers that have a wide range of performance capabilities (processor speed, memory etc).
USB3 has higher transfer rates, but BiaB loads whatever it needs to get going before it starts playing.
BIAB & RB2026 Win.(Audiophile), Windows 10 Pro & Windows 11, Cakewalk Bandlab, Izotope Prod.Bundle, Roland RD-1000, Synthogy Ivory, Session Keys Grand S & Electric R, Kontakt, Focusrite 18i20, KetronSD2, NS40M, Pioneer Active Monitors.
Thanks Guys, I don't actually have the audiophile version, so, I checked the plugs on the usb drives that I do have. Sort of got a bit confusing as an old Seagate back up drive I have, only had a single plug at one end, whereas the pg usb's have a double.
The USB 2.0 standard limits current to a maximum of 500 milliamps (1/2 amp). In fact many front panel USB 2.0 connections are limited to 100 milliamps (1/10 amp) of current to avoid accidentally popping motherboard fuses while plugging and unplugging USB connections. Many external drive and enclosure manufacturers supply USB 2 cables with two connectors. Only 1 connector is needed for communication but the second is provided in case two connections are needed to provide enough current.
The Wikipedia photos Trevor posted are nice. Another easy way to tell if a connection is USB 2 or USB 3 is by the color of the plastic inside the connector. USB 2 uses black or white plastic. The USB 3 standard states the plastic color must be blue as shown in the photos.
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202 New RealTracks Released with Band-in-a-Box 2026!
With Band-in-a-Box® 2026, we've released 202 incredible new RealTracks (in sets 468-488) in a variety of genres—featuring your most requested styles!
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MIDI Styles Set 92: Look Ma! More MIDI 15: Latin Jazz
MIDI SuperTracks Set 46: Piano & Organ
Instrumental Studies Set 24: Groovin' Blues Soloing
Artist Performance Set 19: Songs with Vocals 9
Playable RealTracks Set 5
RealDrums Stems Set 9: Cool Brushes
SynthMaster Sounds Set 1 (with audio demos)
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FLAC Files (lossless audio files) for the 20 Bonus Unreleased RealTracks and RealDrums
MIDI Styles Set 93: Look Ma! More MIDI 16: SynthMaster
MIDI SuperTracks Set 47: More SynthMaster
Instrumental Studies 25 - Soul Jazz Guitar Soloing
Artist Performance Set 20: Songs with Vocals 10
RealDrums Stems Set 10: Groovin' Sticks
SynthMaster Sounds & Styles Set 2 (sounds & styles with audio demos)
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