Can I run UAD plug-ins on Satellite without UA interface?

[Forum Admin]

[Couldn't fit my full question into the topic title...]

Silly Question 101: Can I run UAD plug-ins if I own a Satellite but do not use an Apollo audio interface?

I've scoured the UA site and re-read the SOS reviews, but every internet review/blog/video I could find is using the UAD plugs with their Apollo interface. It's never made clear whether you could buy a Satellite, install the UAD 'control' software and plug-ins, and enjoy the results with a non-Universal Audio interface (like my PreSonus Studio 192).

Anyone doing this or know it can be achieved?

[Kwackman]

I'm pretty sure you can.
I have a couple of the old UAD PCI cards and run the plug-ins using a Audient ID22.
As you probably know, the PCI cards have no I/O, just like the Satellite.

[Forum Admin]

Thanks Kwack... my friends who use non-UA audio interfaces all have the UAD PCI card in their old Mac Pro towers -- but I've never actually read about or met or heard of anyone doing it just with a Satellite.

All the Satellite owners I know are Apollo users. Or if you read about mix engineers in 'Inside Track' articles, they're typically using Pro Tools rigs off a Mac Pro tower, with a UAD PCI card in one of the slots.

[Kwackman]

I'm not sure if this clears anything up for you.
http://tinyurl.com/yavle7kg

My logic (which may be very flawed!) is that the Satellite existed before the Apollo interfaces, and therefore could run only with third party I/O interfaces. Whether it has enough "power" for some of the newer UAD plug-ins is another thing to consider.

But, hopefully someone with proper evidence will respond soon!
Good luck.

[Forum Admin]

I'm not sure if this clears anything up for you.
http://tinyurl.com/yavle7kg

Sadly it does not. Thanks for searching.

As I said earlier, I've never seen it explained with certainty that you can do what I potentially wish to do. UAD obviously would like everyone who wants to use their plug-ins to do so with an Apollo, but I would have thought the overall market for non-UAD audio interface owners being interested in a Satellite would be larger.

[desmond]

The Apollo has only been around a few years, but UAD DSP has been around a couple of decades...

As far as the host goes, you load a UAD plugin. The plugin will communicate with the UAD driver software, which will see the UAD DSP available (across multiple cards), and allocate it so the plugin will pass audio to the DSP process and back again.

It shouldn't matter where the UAD DSP is coming from, as long as you have some DSP resource available. The driver should unify whatever DSP you have on your system, and it's the same software whatever UAD device the DSP comes from.

The DSP part of the UAD system is separate from the audio interface part.

So, if you have a Satellite running, your UAD driver will show you that you have UAD DSP, and any UA plugins you load will run.

Note - you need to have both the Apollo card, and the Satellite card, registered and authorised in your account to be able to use the plugins you have purchased.

Note: I've been using a UAD card since long before there was UAD audio interfaces, and still do. I currently have a little UAD2 Solo for my MBP to access my UAD plugins. All a Satellite is is UAD2 DSP with a computer interface + power in a box - it's essentially an external UAD2 PCI card system - no real difference to an internal UAD PCI card. And an Apollo is an audio interface, with a Satellite built in (and a bit of internal routing so you can route audio to UAD plugins without round tripping through the computer, for better latency.)

[Forum Admin]

Thanks desmond.

Note - you need to have both the Apollo card, and the Satellite card, registered and authorised in your account to be able to use the plugins you have purchased.

Your mention of needing an Apollo card is confusing to me.

Like everyone else I know, you've been using a UA card in your computer.

I'd still love to hear from a confirmed user of a Satellite box and a non-UA audio interface.

I think I get it.... you're saying YES then, right?

[desmond]

Your mention of needing an Apollo card is confusing to me.

Sorry, I thought you already had the Apollo, but wanted to also/instead use a Satellite. All I meant was that your plugins will only run on UAD cards that are in your account and authorised for those plugins - whether it's PCI, Satellite, or Apollo DSP. The DSP is all the same, regardless of which box & interface it's using.

Like everyone else I know, you've been using a UA card in your computer.

No, it's a Solo/Laptop card, in a thunderbolt adaptor, plugged in to my MBP via thunderbolt. It's esentially the same thing as a little Satellite, just with an uglier footprint

Before this, I had a UAD Xpander, which was essentially a UAD1 "Satellite" (USD DSP in a box with an interface that you could use with a laptop) and before that it was a conventional UAD PCI card in a tower computer.

I think I get it.... you're saying YES then, right?

Yes. You can run UAD plugins with only a Satellite. That's it's sole purpose. If you couldn't run UAD plugins on it - then it's kinda a useless product, eh?

You do not need an Apollo to run UAD plugins - you just need UAD DSP, whether it's in an Apollo box, or a Satellite box, or in an external or internal card. As long as you have some UAD DSP, authorised for your plugins, your UAD plugins will run fine, regardless of which device you use for audio I/O.

[Bob Bickerton]

Desmond was saying that ALL UAD hardware components in a system need to be registered for everything to work.

What you probably can’t do, and I can’t test it as I only have an Apollo, is use the control software with non-UAD interfaces.

Best contact UAD support for definitive answers.

Bob

[Forum Admin]

Thanks guys.

[CS70]

Silly Question 101: Can I run UAD plug-ins if I own a Satellite but do not use an Apollo audio interface?

Doh, I always understood that what you mention is the sole purpose of the Satellite - to run UAD plugins via few/usb even if you don’t own or use their interface.

[desmond]

Desmond was saying that ALL UAD hardware components in a system need to be registered for everything to work.

Correct.

What you probably can’t do, and I can’t test it as I only have an Apollo, is use the control software with non-UAD interfaces.

Correct. The control/mixer software talks to the audio interface part of the Apollo, which won't work without an Apollo, but has nothing to do with using UAD plugins in your DAW.

[desmond]

Doh, I always understood that what you mention is the sole purpose of the Satellite - to run UAD plugins via few/usb even if you don’t own or use their interface.

Exactly. And these came way before the Apollo even existed.

All the Apollo is is an audio interface, and a Satellite, in one box. You can use either part independently, or together, (almost) exactly as you could if you had a Satellite, and a different audio interface.

[Hugh Robjohns]

The answer is yes.

It doesn't matter to the UAD software where the physical DSP lives -- whether on a PCIe card, a Satellite, or an Apollo interface (or a combination of them) -- the DSP just needs to exist, be recognised by the UAD controller, and be of sufficient capability to host the plugins you want to run. Obviously, the newer, larger platforms can do more than the older smaller ones.

H

[Forum Admin]

Thanks everyone.

Told you it was a silly question. Now I know it can be done.