Channel strip and Channel EQ

From top to bottom:

Part	What it does
Setting	The channel strip settings menu (see Channel strip settings).
Input	Audio tracks: the mono/stereo button and the input (“No Input”, “Input 1”…, “Input 1–2”…). Instrument tracks: the instrument slot (No Plug-in, Marbble Synth, other built-in instruments by group, or a VST3 instrument by category or vendor). Auxes show their bus (“Bus 1”), or the instrument output they’re on (“Drums: Direct out 0”, see Multi-output instruments); summing stacks show “Subtracks”.
EQ thumbnail	The Channel EQ curve; click to open the editor.
Audio FX	Insert slots: the filled ones plus one empty slot (up to 8). The label shows the strip’s plug-in latency.
Sends	Up to 8 send slots.
Output	Stereo Out, the summing stack, or an aux.
VCA	The VCA fader that controls the strip (see VCA faders).
Automation mode	Off, Read, Touch, Latch, Write (see Automation).
Pan	Drag vertically (Shift for fine); double-click to centre.
Readouts	Volume in dB and the clip indicator: the highest peak since you last reset it, in dBFS, red once a peak went over 0 dBFS. Click it to reset it, Alt-click to reset every strip’s (or use the key command Reset All Clip Indicators, unassigned at first).
Fader and meter	Drag the fader (Shift for fine), double-click for 0 dB. -96 to +6 dB. On a strip assigned to a VCA, an outlined cap marks where the strip really plays (its fader plus the VCA). The meter holds peaks for 2 s, and its top lights red while the clip indicator is on. With a Compressor, Limiter, Noise Gate or De-Esser on the strip, a thin gain-reduction meter beside it grows down from the top as the first one that isn’t bypassed reduces the gain (up to 30 dB).
Power	Turns the track off: silent, and it runs nothing (see Turning tracks off). Not on Stereo Out.
M S R I	Mute, Solo, Record Enable, Input Monitoring.
Name	With the track colour. Right-click it for the channel strip settings menu.

The clip indicators keep their peak until you reset them, as in Logic: playing again doesn’t reset them, and they are the same in the Mixer, the Inspector and a Mixer in its own window. Opening another project starts them afresh; bounces and exports don’t touch them.

A folder stack’s strip shows only its fader, buttons and automation mode (“A folder has no audio of its own”). Stereo Out has Channel EQ, Audio FX, its fader and meter, and an automation mode pop-up for the Output track’s lanes.

Mono audio tracks pan with a -3 dB compensated pan law (unity in the centre); stereo tracks and buses use balance.

Channel EQ

Every strip, Stereo Out included, has a built-in eight-band EQ modelled on Logic’s Channel EQ. It processes before the Audio FX inserts and costs nothing while flat.

• Click the thumbnail above the Audio FX slots to open the editor. It opens like a built-in effect’s panel (see Built-in effects): floating by default, or docked in the bottom section, and it can be moved between the two and resized. Click the thumbnail again, press Esc or click × to close it. One strip’s Channel EQ is open at a time.
• Bands: Low Cut (off by default, 30 Hz), Low Shelf (80 Hz), Bell 1–4 (160, 500, 1500, 5000 Hz), High Shelf (10 kHz) and High Cut (off by default, 18 kHz). The cuts have 12, 24 (default) or 48 dB/oct slopes; click the slope to change it.
• On the graph: drag a point to set frequency and gain (Shift for fine; the cuts move only in frequency), scroll to change Q, double-click a point to switch its band off or on, Alt-click to reset its gain.
• Below the graph: each band’s on/off switch, frequency, gain and Q can be dragged (Shift for fine) and double-clicked to reset.
• Toolbar: On / Bypassed, Analyzer (a live post-EQ spectrum, on by default), Reset, the preset pop-up (see Presets), Copy and Paste, and Output gain (±24 dB).
• Copy and paste: right-click the thumbnail for Copy Channel EQ and Paste Channel EQ (with several tracks selected, also Paste Channel EQ to Selected Tracks). Pasting replaces the strip’s EQ settings, Stereo Out included, as one undo step. The copy survives opening another project.

Channel strip settings

Click Setting at the top of a strip (or right-click the strip’s name) for Logic’s channel strip settings menu. A channel strip setting is the strip’s instrument, its Audio FX plug-ins with all their settings (a VST3’s whole state, a built-in effect’s values, bypass) and its Channel EQ. Sends, routing, volume and pan aren’t part of it.

Item	What it does
Copy Channel Strip Settings	Copies the strip’s setting. The copy survives opening another project.
Paste Channel Strip Settings	Replaces the strip’s Audio FX and Channel EQ with the copied ones, as new instances. On an instrument track it also replaces the instrument, when the copy has one; an audio track or aux ignores the instrument. The menu shows where the copy came from.
Reset Channel Strip	Removes the instrument and every Audio FX plug-in, sets the Channel EQ flat, the fader to 0 dB and pan to the centre.
Save Channel Strip Setting As…	Saves the setting under a name, for any project. Side-chain sources aren’t saved, since they name tracks of this project.
Delete Channel Strip Setting	Deletes a saved setting.
saved settings	Load one onto the strip, as Paste does.

When the strip is one of several selected tracks, Paste, Reset and loading apply to all of them, as one undo step. A folder stack has no channel strip settings. A VST3 that isn’t installed on this computer comes along as a missing plug-in (its slot keeps its settings, as in a project from another computer). Saved settings are files, one <name>.json each, in the channel-strips folder of the settings folder (~/.config/marbble/channel-strips on Linux and macOS, %APPDATA%\marbble\channel-strips on Windows).