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Zoom R8 sending audio with effects over USB while in AUDIO I/F mode

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A not-so well documented feature that's actually really nice to have... once you know how to use it.

I wrote a book about the ZOOM R8 because it has so much stuff packed into it. There's a ton of info in that book, but I found out something recently about the R8 that I discovered completely by accident.

Before continuing, this might be documented somewhere in the R8 original manual or the supplemental USB interface manual. Maybe. If it is, I honestly don't know where. What I'm about to describe is something I found out about just by chance from experimentation.

The R8 of course has very nice built-in effects. Reverb, delay, flanger, phase, distortion, overdrive, amp modeling, tremolo, pitch shifting and so on.

The R8 also has the ability to, of course, act as an audio interface over USB to a computer.

BUT...

I thought, incorrectly, that you could only use the built-in effects when recording direct to the R8 and not to the computer when the USB audio interface mode is active. Not true. You can.

And fortunately the process is really easy.

On the R8, press the USB button. Select AUDIO /IF and press ENTER. Select EXECUTE and press ENTER.

And here's the magic part: Now press EFFECT, then use the jog wheel to enable it. Whammo, now you have all the effects available for audio-over-USB. Everything.

You may be thinking, "Well.. um.. that sounds easy." Yeah, it is once you know how to do it. Again, if this is in the manual provided by Zoom, I didn't see it in there.

Why is this awesome to know?

What this does is allow the R8 to truly act as an all-in-one recording solution.

If, for example, you wanted to plug in a guitar and send the audio from the R8 to the PC with effects enabled to record with different software (such as Audacity), you can totally do it.

Prior to finding this out, I only thought you could send audio from the R8 to the PC totally dry. But now I can enable effects for use whenever I want. For guitar in particular this is especially useful because the R8 effects are good enough to where I don't even need to plug in a pedal or any other external effects. Just use the R8. Works real nice.

Believe me, this little tidbit of info is good to know.

Published 2020 Jan 30

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Best ZOOM R8 tutorial book
highly rated, get recording quick!

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