loopback on Motu Audio Express...newbie question

VB-Cable A & B, HIFI-Cable, ASIO Bridge
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xel
Posts: 1
Joined: Fri Oct 04, 2019 10:14 pm

loopback on Motu Audio Express...newbie question

Post by xel »

I managed to get a loopback kind of connection for my Motu Audio Express...still, I'm not really sure what I'm doing and I've jotted down all necessary steps to achieve this loopback (otherwise I'll forget - this because I'm not really in control of what I'm doing right now).
I bought the MOTU Audio Express only recently and I've tested VB-Cable and then the HiFi Cable + Asio Bridge only last week...(after testing Jack Audio a couple of weeks).
This loopback connection allows me to record on Audacity the output from 2 microphones plugged to my Motu and also at the same time the audio from DVBViewer (a TV app). The audio from DVBviewer is streamed to my MOTU and mixed with the 2 Mics and back to the PC and then recorded on Audacity:
I set the Audio Renderer in DVBViewer to HiFi Cable Input
Then on the Windows Sound Settings Playback I set the default to the PC speakers (plugged to the M-Audio Audiophile 192 internal PCI audio card)
Still on the Playback tab I can see the HiFi Cable IN meters are working...
On the Recording Tab I've set the HiFi Cable Out as a Default
Then on the same Tab I can see the meters of the MOTU MIX RETURN 1/2 are working...
On the HiFi Cable/Asio Bridge I can see everything is working fine and the MOTU Asio is selected.

I'm pleasantly surprised it's working the way I wanted (considering the trial and error attitude and the lack of knowledge)...the following questions might appear a bit idiotic to some of you (I've stated I'm a near complete newbie) but I'd like to know exactly what's happening here.
First question - why is it that we see "IN" in the playback tab of Windows Sound Settings (and viceversa "OUT" in Recording's Tab)...this is a bit counter intuitive...I thought the sound come OUT of speakers (this is why on the Playback Tab we see the OUT Devices, except for the VB-Cable Devices which are IN's...
Can I have a step by step indication of how the sound is routed in the above scheme? (the loopback above)
In the HiFi Asio Bridge panel, I see the 8 switches (for IN and OUT so 16 in all) what are these for? I've notice I can mute the IN signals by changing the channel's numbers but on the OUT side these have no effect...

I'm tempted to try the VoiceMeeter - how do this differs from the VB-Cable and the HiFi Cable + Asio Bridge? For example...can I create a loopback connection like the one above only by using VoiceMeeter? And how do these compare to Jack Audio Kit? The latter was a bit temperamental but it allowed me to connect Ableton and FLStudio (but no luck with a loopback to my MOTU)...and it seems to me Jack is the Linux only option (but I don't use Linux).
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