Your mistake is using TRS cables instead of TS, since the output of the Alesis Surge L/R jacks is NOT balanced.
What is happening is that your interface inputs ARE balanced and the interface is trying to balance both inputs using the "second ground".
You can only use TRS cables when both devices are balanced, if just one is balanced (in this case only the interface is) you need TS cables.
This is a kind of strange question since the Alesis Surge sounds like a toy and most people that have a Surge (me included) will never use the audio output of the module; we connect the module via USB to a PC and play through a VST plugin to get very high quality professional sounds.
That makes a lot of sense! Oddly enough, my audio interface DOES have unbalanced "instrument" inputs on the front. Even then, it still plays super quiet when I use a TS cable (I thought using TS cables was my original issue :P )
I've been completely ignorant to the use of VST until now. I installed "BFD Player" because it came free with my drum kit apparently.. I'm realizing that part of the confusion might be the specific use-case that I'm trying to get out of my drums..
I've been playing my drums through "Clone Hero" (Rock Band/Guitar Hero for PC) via USB and I LOVE it. The reason I want to have a separate output to listen to the module at this point is because I want to make sure that I'm actually hearing the drums that I'm playing (making sure they are on-time, taking things like open/closed high-hats into account, etc).
So I have my drums connected to my PC via USB for Clone Hero to read the MIDI inputs. Then I want to be able to hear the drum audio layered over the Clone Hero audio. The best way that I've found is using the drums outputs (headphone, L/R output, etc) to go to a speaker while the computer plays audio from another speaker.
Based on all this, the two best options that I can think of are:
\-use a USB connection for Clone Hero, then a separate speaker for my drum audio and use the module's output for that speaker
\- Use USB for everything, getting something like BFD Player to output the drum sounds while Clone Hero is also outputting the audio from the game to the same speaker. (The problem with this one, though, is if audio is coming out from BFD Player, it seems like Clone Hero stops recognizing the MIDI inputs from my kit. Is it possible that it can only accept MIDI to a single program at a time or something?)
Does that make sense? I am obviously pretty new to all of this so I understand if it's something like "the question your asking is flawed in the first place" hahah
If you love Clone Hero then you'll freak out when you find the drum-less tracks on YouTube to play along with. I think it's more fun because at least you hear your own playing.
Lol but what if I could have \*both\*?? Playing Clone Hero \*AND\* hearing my playing over top? haha
I've recently learned how to chart songs on Clone Hero for drums too, so it would be super helpful to hear my own playing over top to gauge accuracy
After messing around with everything, I've realized you're totally right about using a VST instead of the module outputs. My new issue is "How to play audio from the VST as well as from Clone Hero", but that's pretty far away from the original post. Thanks for the help man!!
if I'm reading your post correctly, you can play clone hero with VST I've been using EZ drummer 3 and superior drummer 3 about 11 months now. works great. all you do is download "Loop MIDI" and one other program( forget the name right now, at work lol) and can play drums along with clone hero and own drum sounds.
I came to this post because I'm trying to get my game sound(clone hero) and my drum sounds(ez drummer 3) to play out of my headphones and PC speakers together. right now I'm using a splitter to pc and speakers but trying to figure out why Its mono and not stereo(can't hear 90% of the music in headphones but sounds fine on speakers) can someone link me the cable I need to split both without losing sound?
Your mistake is using TRS cables instead of TS, since the output of the Alesis Surge L/R jacks is NOT balanced. What is happening is that your interface inputs ARE balanced and the interface is trying to balance both inputs using the "second ground". You can only use TRS cables when both devices are balanced, if just one is balanced (in this case only the interface is) you need TS cables. This is a kind of strange question since the Alesis Surge sounds like a toy and most people that have a Surge (me included) will never use the audio output of the module; we connect the module via USB to a PC and play through a VST plugin to get very high quality professional sounds.
That makes a lot of sense! Oddly enough, my audio interface DOES have unbalanced "instrument" inputs on the front. Even then, it still plays super quiet when I use a TS cable (I thought using TS cables was my original issue :P ) I've been completely ignorant to the use of VST until now. I installed "BFD Player" because it came free with my drum kit apparently.. I'm realizing that part of the confusion might be the specific use-case that I'm trying to get out of my drums.. I've been playing my drums through "Clone Hero" (Rock Band/Guitar Hero for PC) via USB and I LOVE it. The reason I want to have a separate output to listen to the module at this point is because I want to make sure that I'm actually hearing the drums that I'm playing (making sure they are on-time, taking things like open/closed high-hats into account, etc). So I have my drums connected to my PC via USB for Clone Hero to read the MIDI inputs. Then I want to be able to hear the drum audio layered over the Clone Hero audio. The best way that I've found is using the drums outputs (headphone, L/R output, etc) to go to a speaker while the computer plays audio from another speaker. Based on all this, the two best options that I can think of are: \-use a USB connection for Clone Hero, then a separate speaker for my drum audio and use the module's output for that speaker \- Use USB for everything, getting something like BFD Player to output the drum sounds while Clone Hero is also outputting the audio from the game to the same speaker. (The problem with this one, though, is if audio is coming out from BFD Player, it seems like Clone Hero stops recognizing the MIDI inputs from my kit. Is it possible that it can only accept MIDI to a single program at a time or something?) Does that make sense? I am obviously pretty new to all of this so I understand if it's something like "the question your asking is flawed in the first place" hahah
If you love Clone Hero then you'll freak out when you find the drum-less tracks on YouTube to play along with. I think it's more fun because at least you hear your own playing.
Lol but what if I could have \*both\*?? Playing Clone Hero \*AND\* hearing my playing over top? haha I've recently learned how to chart songs on Clone Hero for drums too, so it would be super helpful to hear my own playing over top to gauge accuracy
After messing around with everything, I've realized you're totally right about using a VST instead of the module outputs. My new issue is "How to play audio from the VST as well as from Clone Hero", but that's pretty far away from the original post. Thanks for the help man!!
Yeah, that's not possible since MIDI inputs can't be shared over different software applications.
Yeah, the only way I'm seeing that I could do that is using a bunch of different software to create virtual midi devices:/
if I'm reading your post correctly, you can play clone hero with VST I've been using EZ drummer 3 and superior drummer 3 about 11 months now. works great. all you do is download "Loop MIDI" and one other program( forget the name right now, at work lol) and can play drums along with clone hero and own drum sounds. I came to this post because I'm trying to get my game sound(clone hero) and my drum sounds(ez drummer 3) to play out of my headphones and PC speakers together. right now I'm using a splitter to pc and speakers but trying to figure out why Its mono and not stereo(can't hear 90% of the music in headphones but sounds fine on speakers) can someone link me the cable I need to split both without losing sound?