XO Wave: New Track

The New Track window allows you to configure a new track. It appears when you click the New Track button in the Edit window, or when you drag a region into the New Track Area.

The parameters you can set are:

Track Name: You can give a track any name you like, except one already used by another track, or "main", which is reserved for the main outputs -- usually the sound hardware. The track name is used not only for display, but also for naming files that are recorded on that track. If you created a track by clicking on the New Track button, the default name will be "New Track". If you created a track by dragging a region into the New Track Area, the default name will be the same as the region's name. If you select a track name that is already in use, a number will be added to the end of the name to ensure that each track has a unique name. You can change a track name later by double-clicking on its name in the Edit window or Mix window.

Channels: A track can either have 1 or 2 channels. Most of the time, you'll want to create stereo tracks (that is, tracks with 2 channels), because that is the only way to play back regions from stereo files or use stereo effects. Mono tracks (i.e., tracks with 1 channel) can only play back mono files and use mono effects. Another limitation of mono tracks is that they cannot be "panned" (moved in the stereo field) as flexibly as stereo tracks. A mono track can only be panned hard-left, hard-right, or to the center (muted on the right or left speaker, or played back on both speakers, respectively), whereas stereo tracks can be panned to intermediate positions (through the pan control on the main volume effect) and can even have the pan position change over time through automation. However, if you do not need these panning, effect, or playback features, you can save a little CPU time by using mono tracks.

Type: Every track has a type. For simple sessions, you might always use the "Source Track" type, but if you want to mix some of your tracks into other tracks, you will need other types. You can think of these tracks as types on a multi-bus mixer: some tracks are used for reading audio off the disk, while others are used for combining tracks into "sub-mixes", and others may represent the final mix of all your tracks. For the purposes of routing audio from one track to another, there are two things to keep in mind: 1) If a track contains an audio region (or "clip"), it must be a Source Track, 2) if you want to route the output from one track to another, the second track must be further down on the type list than the first track. For example, a Source Track can feed any type of track except another Source Track. An Aux 2 can feed an Aux 3 and a Sub-Mix 1 but not an Aux 1 or another Aux 2. The same rules for output routing also apply to the Aux send effect.

Source Tracks are special, because they are the only tracks that can contain audio regions. The names of the other track types suggest their purpose, but you are not limited by these names. You can use Aux 4 as a Sub Mix if you really want to. On the other hand, using the names for their intended purposes makes things easier to keep track of, and avoids later confusion when you or someone else wants to review or tweak an older session.

Output Track: The output of each track may be sent or "routed" either directly to the audio hardware or to another track. To send it directly to the audio hardware, select main. To send it to another track, select that track from the list.

Channel Mixing: This section allows you to select which channels of this track will be added to each channel on the target track or sound hardware. For example, you can pan a mono track hard-right or hard-left, or you can reverse the channels, so that the left channel on the source track is sent to the right channel of the destination.