The Saga part 2

[csp]

Can you believe that since the 15th May the desk has been working perfectly, BUT today after not having it turned on for about three days, I was testing the Talkback system (I have made a combiner box to feed both the Talkback output and the Left Studio Monitor into the one amp input) and on testing and playing a track from the HD24 all worked perfectly for about 20secs and the desk froze --- exactly as it had been doing for the previous 2yrs.

I can only think that for some reason if the desk is not used for a couple of days, something causes the J42 lead to become faulty, so although I really did not want to have to do it, I think that I am going to have to strip everything which is quite a major job as virtually every socket has something connected to it, and install the lead that Y-my-R sent me and see if that finally solves the problem.

AND to think that after doing what I was doing today (virtually finishes the install), during next week I was going to take a photo or two and close off the topic, but now ???????????

David

[Y-my-R]

I read in the manual for my Alesis QSR synth, yesterday, that the Alesis BRC and HD24 (that you mentioned you're using) can natively ONLY run at 48 kHz.

That's apprently b/c they're very old and from the early days of digital, and someone gave the reasoning online, that this is because the music industry thought that having recording gear run at a different sample rate, would prevent CDs from getting copied... and that this is why consumer DAT recorders also only ran at 48 kHz, while more professional ones usually gave you a choice between 44.1 and 48 kHz - I never heard that story before, but could be true, maybe (not to mention that annoying status bit that was supposed to prevent copying a copy of a DAT a second time, that was simple to defeat).

It said something about, if wanting to use the 44.1 kHz sample rate on a BNC/HD24, since they lack a setting for 44.1 kHz, you have to "downpitch" the BRC and HD24 by -147 cents, which would equal the lower rate of 44,100 samples received/transmitted per second.

This made me think... if you are running everything at 48 kHz, it should likely all work OK. But this whole "downpitch" thing sounds pretty weird to me. So, if I'd use a setup that requires this, I'd probably run 48 kHz, just to avoid trouble.

If you're running 44.1 kHz on the D8B, and either the BRC or the HD24 are NOT downpitched by the correct amount of cents, I think that could be responsible for lockups like what you're seeing.

I only found this, because the word clock input connector on my Alesis QSR (that's the rack version of the common Alesis QS7/QS8 synthesizers) is labeled as "48 kHz In" and I always thought I can't tie it into my system because I'm typically running 44.1 kHz and don't want to run 48 kHz, just to be able to use the digital out on that synth... I finally looked at the manual, and they explained that you CAN run the QSR at an external clock of 44.1 (it's got a setting for that), but if you're using a BRC, you have to "downpitch" the BRC - I never heard of this before.
But, yeah, coming to think of it, I think my Blackface ADAT also only did 48 kHz, back in the day.

Anyway, my QSR now clocks nicely to my "house clock" at 44.1 kHz via that "48 kHz In" connector, and I can avoid another conversion when recording stems from that synth

Anyway, if you added a BRC or HD24 to your system, double-check the "pitch" setting and leave that at zero if you're running 48 kHz, or downpitch to -147 cents if you're running at 44.1 kHz.

If this isn't it, hopefully the cable you got from me will solve the issue!

[csp]

Y-my-R,

Thank you for that information and it made me think, that I have not checked for a while that the desk and HD24 are both operating at the same clock rate.

I was thinking about going to the Centre today to strip everything and to replace the cable, BUT prior to doing that I will have a look at the two clocks --- both should be 48K as that is all that I have ever recorded at and the HD24 should be set to "Word' sync rather than Internal or Optical --- I have noticed a couple of times in the past that the HD24 has for some unknown reason swapped to one of the other sync options instead of the Word option.

By the way, I am currently not using the BRC unit (do have the supplied LRC unit connected buy not used) and for various reasons I doubt if I actually will/would in this environment --- far too complicated to the members, as the desk will be complicated enough.

I really do not want to have to strip the desk to swap the cable at this time --- if you saw a photo (a video would be far better !!!) of the rear of the desk and the number of cables, coupled with the space available for me to work in and the effort that I have to go to to get to the rear of the desk, you woud understand my reluctance --- I reckon that I could presdent a video of me getting to the rear of the desk as an audition as a contortionist for AGT or something !!!!!

If after checking the clocks I do have to swap the cables, I will post the results after doing some solid testing.

David

[csp]

After Y-my-R's posting earlier today I now definitely need some help !!!!!

Went to the Centre early this afternoon and booted the desk and then the HD24 and discovered that the HD24 had reverted to its "Internal" clock, so re-set to the "Word" option as the d8b is set to Internal and is locked and acting as the master clock. Both are set at 48K. So before changing the J42 power lead, I thought that I would now try the desk to see if it worked OK.

As a quick background. When I initially set up the Centre for the Behringer analogue desk and the HD24, I copied from one of my HD24s a full 24-track song to each of the Centre's HD24 hard drives (a different song on each drive).

At the start of the process of working on the donated desk for when testing I set up two sessions called Witchy (drive 1) and Walk (drive 2) and have been using the Witchy song and session for my testing.

Since the desk started to play up a few days ago after having worked perfectly for about 5 weeks, I have been loading the Witchy session and playing the HD24, BUT on every playing the desk has physically frozen at 1.52 mins into the song, BUT the sound has continued. All that I could do was to re-boot the desk and try again, but each time it froze at the same time. It did not matter if I did this as soon as the desk booted or if I let the desk sit for an hour or more before loading the session and playing the song. When booting the desk as advised in the manual the HD24 is switched off until the desk is fully booted or until I want to play/test the song.

Today, after discovering the clock problem, I loaded the test session and song and hit play and again at 1.52 mins the desk froze. Because there was a meditation type client in the Centre's main room (ie the studio), I could not turn on the Control Room's monitor speakers, so I have no idea if sound was being produced through the desk --- there is a bit of sound leakage between the studio and control room.

Thinking that there must be something wrong with the song on the disk I changed over to Drive 2 and loaded the Walk session, then hit play. The song played perfectly. I repeated this playing 3 times and each time it was OK.

I then selected Drive 1 BUT did not change the session from the Drive 2 session and then hit play to see if Witchy would play through or cause the desk to freeze. Again it froze at 1.52 mins.

I now presumed that there must be something wrong with the song on the Drive 1 or possibly even a fault on the Drive itself, so I decided to see if the fault was a particular track on the Drive 1 song that was causing the problem, so I decided to pull out Optical leads 2 & 3 leaving only Optical lead 1 installed (ie just playing the first 8 tracks of the 24) --- I muted chnls 33 - 48 on the desk. I loaded the Disk 2 session song, but played the Disk 1 song from the HD24. The song played perfectly.

I then repeated the process removing Optical lead 1 and installing Optical lead 2 (giving me tracks 9 - 16) muting desk chnls 25 - 32 and unmuting 33 - 40. The song played perfectly.

I then repeated the process leaving only Optical lead 3 inserted and again the song played perfectly.

This more or less told me that there was nothing wrong with the song on the Drive 1 hard drive or the drive itself.

Leaving the same session loaded (ie Walk session) and leaving Optical lead 3 inserted I inserted Optical lead 1 and unmuted the required chnls, then hit play. The Witchy song played OK until it got to somewhere around the 1.52 time when the entire control surface of the desk went black (as if the desk had been switch off), the only indication that the desk still had power was that the desk's VDU screen was still lit as was the external monitor so I was able to stop the HD24 (via its Stop button) and shut down the desk.

After waiting about a minute I re-booted the desk, but this time on booting most of the desk's meters were at about the 20 - 12 db mark, BUT chanls 5,7,9,11,14,16,18 had no Vu reading showing (as should be the situation) I rebooted the desk 7 times but each time on booting the desk displayed the exact same meter readings.

After the 7th attempt I gave up !!!!!

Can anyone give any light on why the desk is not booting correctly and why with only one optical cable connected it worked Ok with that particular song but more than one Optical lead inserted it fails at about the same 1.52 time.

It almost sounds as if there is something in that song (irrespective of what session is loaded) that when more than one Optical cable is connected it is causing the desk to pull too much power from the power supply, BUT if so why, especially when with all three Optical cables connected the Drive 1 session and its test siong have worked perfectly --- could it still be the J42 cable or something more serious ?

Any assistance will be VERY greatly appreciated.

David

[Y-my-R]

As for the desk not booting, I'd unplug the power cable from the wall, and let it sit for about an hour or so, to let it cool down.

Every now and then when I have to shut down the D8B for whatever reason, it doesn't boot back up, seemingly not being able to deal with the power peak required to start (i.e. weak twitching of the faders in pulses., sometimes with some meters jumping, sometimes without.. kinda like the rail-cap issue, but I don't think it's that).
Anyway, so far it ALWAYS worked again, if I had let it cool down for a bit (sometimes longer than half an hour or it would still do this... so, best would be to let it sit over night, but with an active session, that would of course not be practical).

As for the freeze problem, what I/O cards do you have installed in that desk for the ADAT optical connections?

If you're using DIO8 cards (the ones with TDIF via DB25 and also ADAT optical ports and a BNC connector), then the firmware chip on each one of those cards installed, needs to be v2.x.

If any of the cards has the old firmware on it (pre V2... they might have different labels on the chip, but if there's no "2" for the version, it's no good), then there's a good chance that the desk will lock up if using the ports simultaneously.

I initially had problems when trying to sync the D8B and a Mackie HDR together. I think there was one DIO8 card in the HDR that wasn't using the version 2 chip, that caused dubious lock-ups at random times.

I swapped that card out with a V2 DIO8 card, and everything worked as it should, afterwards. (Luckily, I had one extra DIO8 card in a spare desk... but only have a total of 6 DIO8 cards with V2 chips... just enough to run my D8B and my HDR together, and be able to switch between ADAT optical (DAW I/O) and TDIF (HDR I/O) on the D8B.

If you're using only OPT8 cards (the ones that ONLY have a pair of ADAT optical connectors on them - nothing else), then you shouldn't have this problem because of some firmware mismatch. Those should all work together, no matter how old or newer they are, from what I understand.

[doktor1360]

After Y-my-R's posting earlier today I now definitely need some help !!!!!

{deleted for brevity purposes...}

It almost sounds as if there is something in that song (irrespective of what session is loaded) that when more than one Optical cable is connected it is causing the desk to pull too much power from the power supply, BUT if so why, especially when with all three Optical cables connected the Drive 1 session and its test siong have worked perfectly --- could it still be the J42 cable or something more serious ?

Any assistance will be VERY greatly appreciated.

David

Here's a thought based on what I've just read; IF something is pulling (sinking) too much power, then whatever is the causing that (sourcing) is the issue (duh) - that being said, the formula to apply here is a function of Ohm's Law



Plug in the value(s) you've measured into the appropriate formula... the resistance is most likely the value to pay attention to, due to the power and amperage (current) being a derivative of resistance and the voltage being a constant value. Stare and compare with a known 'good' (operating properly) circuit, efx card, whatever to a 'suspect' one, and you can probably start to get to the bottom things that way... this is all just off the top of my head, how it's always been done in the R&D labs, but that's been decades ago for this old Geek...

Of course, David... you absolutely knew this was coming, so here it is :
[Standard Mgmt Disclaimer] - "Your actual mileage may vary..."

[csp]

Thank you both for the replies.

Y-my-R --- The optical cards that are in the desk are the OPT8 cards, but I am not sure why (and I haven't checked with those in my desk) but two of the cards look the same and the third is different --- it has more components. I woud have to pull them out to see if there is a version number written on them.

There is one DIO8 card but it is not being used.

I have had the meter problem on booting numerous times over the last 20 yrs, but previously (even with the donated desk) on re-booting (possibly a couple of times at most) it was OK, and if it did fail on re-booting the meters were not showing the exact same readings as was the case yesterday and this is what had me stumped.

The desk has been switched off at the wall since I gave up yesterday (currently about 17hrs). I will try to get to the Centre later today (it is now about 7.30am) and see what happens. If it is still failing to boot correctly, or if it does, but on playing the HD24 with more tha one OPT8 card connected it freezes, I will bite the bullet and strip the desk and do the J42 cable swap and see what happens.

If it boots OK I will do the initial test of only one OPT8 card at a time and will then do the test with two cards, but rather than use the combination that I used yesterday (3 & 1) I will try 3 & 2 to see if that combination works or causes the desk to freeze and if OK I will then try the 2 & 1 combination, etc.

As I think I stated in my long post yesterday --- why has everything worked pefectly for about 5 weeks and then decided to fail after it was turned off for a couple of days (this situation has happened before with this desk !!!), but then after a bit of pushing and shoving it has starte to work again.

What I don't understand (and what I don't think I have ever seen before --- but I could be wrong) is what caused the entire control surface to go black apart from the VDU screen and when that happened if I had the speakers turned on would it have caused the explosive thump through the speakers --- I really do not want to damage the speakers !!!!! AND as there was no warning i would not have been able to turn them off before the event happened.

DOK --- I haven't seen ohms law presented that way (ie so fully) probably since before you were crawling !!!!! Only difference is that back in those days we didn't know what "Volts" were we only knew "Electricity" hence we said (and I still do) E=IR rather than this foreign thing V=IR.

I have over the two years done a bit of measuring of voltage, but haven't gone so far as to do complete calculations. I even purchased a new (and expensive) multimeter last week because I stupidly blew up my really good one that I have used for years --- for some reason it didn't seem to like being connected across a 240 AV line when set on the 200 ohm resistance setting !!!!!!!!!!!

David

[Y-my-R]

Completely different thought, for something else to check:

How does the HD24 handle its MIDI I/O, in terms of a "Thru" setting? Are there any settings for the MIDI port on that thing? If so, what are the options?

What I'm getting at is, if the HD24 is sending timecode over MIDI, it could happen that the timecode would also "pass through" the D8B's MIDI Out (...or doesn't it do that?), and then this somehow reaches the HD24, again, you might have created a MIDI loop, and it could get confused about what timecode to follow (or more likely, an overload from a data-feedback-loop)... internally generated or incoming from the MIDI in on the HD24.

Or rephrased, if there's a MIDI loop (out feeds back to in... and goes for a spin... haha), then it might get hung up because of the data-feedback loop.

I'd suggest to try with MIDI only connected in one way... from the device that creates timecode (HD24?), to the device that should receive timecode (i.e. the D8B).

So, basically, try unplugging the MIDI cable from the MIDI Input of the HD24. Only leave the MIDI Output of the HD24, connected to the MIDI Input of the D8B.

When doing this, the transport controls on the D8B will not work (b/c the D8B can't send data back to the HD24), but IF that song were to play through with that cable disconnected (and thus, a possible MIDI loop prevented), then it could just be because of.... a MIDI loop.

...for context, I've been working on bringing back my old hardware synths and FX units (i.e. I added more MIDI ports for that specific purpose...Unitor8+AMT8), so I can control them from a software GUI (e.g. old Sounddiver in a "bottle" and I'm playing with a demo of MIDI Quest). I think in the process, I inadvertently created a MIDI loop a COUPLE of times, causing the software, and sometimes a synth to not respond (i.e. power off/on. Force-quit software).

In short, MIDI loops are not to be underestimated

I'd at least give it a try...

[csp]

This will possibly be a long and possibly my 2nd last post on this topic.

This is my third attempt at answering Y-my-R’s reply received this morning, because the previous attempts failed when my internet browser decided to close just as I was about to sign off --- so here goes but via Word !!!

I am really no MIDI expert as I don’t think that I have ever used it in the normal sense and I don’t use a DAW but rather consoles and recorders. I leave MIDI to a young local brilliant musician and arranger to do all of the MIDI stuff --- he spends quite a bit of time in the US apparently working for some of the best producers on some of the top recordings.

After receiving Y-my-R’s posting this morning I checked the MIDI settings on my two HD24s and they are basically the same apart from the ID number, with the settings being:

Send MMC --- Yes
Generate MTC --- Yes
Software – Load Code --- Yes
Software – Send Code --- Yes
Device ID (OPT8 Unit) --- 000 (effective tracks 1 – 24)
Device ID (Analogue Unit) --- 001 (effective tracks 25 – 48)

Both units being set to 48K as is the desk.

On visiting the Centre today, the first thing that I did (before booting the desk) was to check the HD24’s MIDI settings those being:

Send MMC --- No (now changed to Yes)
Generate MTC --- Yes
Software – Load Code --- Yes
Software – Send Code --- Yes
Device ID --- 000

From the d8b Reference Manual in the MIDI setup section it states that the device ID should be:

1 – 8 --- ID 0
9 – 16 --- ID 1
17 – 24 --- ID 2

I am not sure if it is referring to using (say) three 8-track recorders such as the old Alesis ADAT tape based recorders or something like the HD24 where the 24 tracks are fed via (say) three OPT8 cards, with each card having a different ID number.

When I finally was able to boot the desk, I looked at the MIDI ID settings and the setting in the desk were all showing ID 0 for each of the three settings above, so I took a punt and changed these to the ID1, ID2 and ID3 settings.

The following discusses what took place at the Centre today, considering that the desk had been powered off at the wall as advised for something like 19hrs.

I did not alter the desk from the way it was set up when finally shutting down yesterday (ie left with OPT8 set as they were --- OPT8 cards 2 & 3 in circuit).

On booting all meters were up exactly as they were yesterday, so I shutdown and then removed the BNC Out cable from the Apogee card and then re-booted.

This time all was as it should be and the test mic showed signal on its input fader and the Master fader and the external monitor when the two faders were raised.

I then turned on the HD24 and changed the clock from Word to Optical.

I then loaded the “Walk” session and on the HD24 and selected the “Walk” song and hit Play on the transport section. Tracks 9 – 24 (only connected tracks) played OK (again I did not have the monitor speakers turned on for possible safety reasons). It played perfectly for about 2mins and then the desk’s meters froze and no button operated (the way it has been every time the desk freezes over the past 2 years).

I then shutdown and re-booted the desk (the HD24 was now powered off as required), but got the showing VU meters again on booting, so I shut down everything again.

While shut down I removed the MIDI cable as suggested from the rack unit (easier to get to from under the console desk than from the HD24), so then re-booted and all was OK on fully booting.

I then re-loaded the Walk session, then turned on the HD24 and selected the Walk song. I then hit the recorder’s Play button and it played perfectly on OPT8 2 & 3 cards (ie tracks 9 – 24).

When finished (but with the desk still running, I removed OPT8 No, 3 and connected OPT8 1 (now had tracks 1 – 16 connected), then hit the HD24’s Play button and it played OK until 2.10 mins when the desk again froze.

Shutdown the desk and HD24 again and after about 1min waiting I re-booted the desk.

Immediately on fully booting the desk went black (ie as it did yesterday) with only the Rude Solo light and VDU alight. I again shut down and waited.

Re booted and immediately on fully booting the desk’s control surface went black. When it does this the external monitor is still showing the full analogue bank display, but moving the desk’s faders does nothing and talking into the test mic has no display of signal.

Shutdown, waited and re-booted but again the desk immediately went black, so shut down and came home.

Considering that five days ago I was about to inform the Management Committee that after two years and about $3k of my own money, the desk was ready to be advertised, stating that the Association now had a fully functioning digital studio that was capable of recording anything from a rock, folk or any similar small group through to a full Concert Band to a Symphony Orchestra (the studio area is large enough) then this happens.

Even if I can actually get the desk to correctly work again for another five weeks I am now reluctant to use it for a session as I can’t be sure that I will not have (say) a 30 piece band arriving and on booting the desk I find it has failed again.

As an honest opinion, from you experts, should I persist or should I really pull the plug and say I have given it my best shot (and money), then remove the desk to the tip (I couldn’t allow myself to sell it and there is no one in this country that I know of who could service it) and then try to re-install the Behringer analogue desk --- will be a super major job as I pulled out most of the cables when I got the d8b and very few were labelled when I installed/built the room about 8 years ago.

Your honest valuations/opinions will be greatly appreciated. My only other option would be to uninstall my own desk and install it, BUT I really do not want to do that at this time as it means too much to me and I would hate to see it get damaged --- it is still after 20+years in a physically brand new out of the box condition.

David

[Y-my-R]

If it still freezes while there's no MIDI cable going back to the HD24 (...and no other devices are part of the MIDI setup, that could be routed in a loop), then this isn't the problem. Good to rule that out, though.

When you said that there's a DIO8 card, but it's not in use... you mean that it's is not installed in the desk, right? If it IS installed, I'd remove that card first, and try again - just in case it has the old firmware on it (even if it is installed in a slot you're not currently using... like the Alt-I/O slot).

Other than that, yeah, trying to figure out if one of the OPT8 cards is bad or a card slot in the D8B is causing the problem, is a logical thing to try.

I'd do that, and then try to replace that one cable you got from me, since that appeared to have been the cause of prior freezes. I mean, you said you pushed the cables into the connector really hard with a screwdriver (or something along those lines)... doesn't necessarily sound like a permanent fix... so, since you went this far, I'd replace that one cable (after eliminating one of the OPT8 cards to be the cause... and removing the DIO8 card if it was in the D8B), and would probably give up, after that.

I mean... one of the first things I had posted when your journey with that "to be donated" desk had just started, was to ask you if you're sure you want to do this, b/c the D8B isn't exactly the most reliable desk, and IMO, needs ongoing maintenance. And added something along the lines of, if you are someone who's good with these old "computers" etc., then maybe it makes sense, but if you're not really into this, then I'd probably avoid rolling a D8B out to a place where it would need to work all the time. (As opposed to a home-studio situation, where it's not the end of the world if the desk is down for a few days).

This is still my opinion. I also have a pretty negative opinion of that Behringer desk, though (had an MX8000 myself, unfortunately, and usually just "unaffectionally" referred to it as "the noise generator"). But in terms of it powering up and doing it's job every day, and being easy to operate, I do think it would make more sense than the D8B.
(I think you mostly were thinking to add the D8B b/c of the built-in FX, since there isn't a lot of outboard gear at the Centre... makes sense, but for the money spent, I guess you could have added some digital rack units from the same era (late 90s) for less than what you meanwhile invested into the D8B... like, a Lexicon ALEX for $50 and a couple DBX266 compressors that usually go for less than $80 each, used, etc.).

Of course it is difficult to let go, after so much time, and probably literally blood (scratches), sweat and tears... but at some point, IMO, when the balance between expected benefit and invested money/effort are THIS FAR out of whack, it's time to step away.

As mentioned above, the last things I'd do would be to systematically figure out if any of those I/O cards has a problem... then maybe also try a completely different song, or a new song... maybe one of those songs (or both), are somehow causing this havoc, and it wouldn't happen with a brand new recording... I mean, you could just record silence for an hour on all tracks and see what happens, when you try to play that back.
Then as the last-last thing, if the desk still freezes, I'd replace that cable with the spare you got from me...

...and if it's not that, I'd call it quits at that point, and treat the desk as a parts-spare, for your desk at home.

I don't really think that you can expect that you'd eventually roll out the D8B, and it would just work happily and outlive you, without further maintenance. Someone will need to always be available who understands that thing, and can fix the various issues that might come up (even something like setting the clock back to external on the HD24, is something I'd expect students, or people who are inexperienced with digital audio, not to be able to figure out... and then end up with pops and clicks on the recording, or random freezes, etc.). An all analog recording chain (or a digital recorder that only uses the analog I/O and runs on it's own clock) would be more "foolproof" for use in a shared studio space.

Sorry again, that this thing is still giving you trouble! Luckily, you don't have any other hobbies, right? (I'm kidding, of course... I know your other hobby is involuntary gardening... mine is, too, haha).