d8b Forum

Well folks I'm beginning to make a hard decision and need all of your help in making that decision. I am thinking that I am almost at the end of the road with my D8b's. After building custom power supplies and cleaning my units they are still wonky at best and very noisy. I understand that I have a lot of inputs because I have a lot of analog devices, and the way I have them hooked up is probably not a good idea noise wise. My master D8B has all 56 inputs running and the 2nd one has 24. The main and bus outs are being rooted to a mackie 32 by 8 bus input channels, and then to my recording equipment. I have tried adjusting everything and I still am riddled with noise or with noise what sounds to me like fan noise invading the audio circuit.

I am beginning to look at another solution such as the Yamaha PM5D RH. That would mean I could get everything into one mixer with some add on cards to bring it to about 80 channels and go directly to recording equipment via matrix outs. If I can find one in a reasonable price there's a lot packed into the unit with on board effects and being able to control from an external computer. But I love my D8b's and hate to part with them. Despite the miraid of problems with guessing whether or not the units will boot up correctly at any given moment they are elegant and easy to work with when they work. And the gui is really easy to work with.

Beyond my experience And technical knowhow we're disassembling the console and cleaning it. I would have to bring the units to a professional to ask them to replace any damaged components which could also be very costly.

So given my description of the above what does everyone think. What do you think about the Yamaha PM5D5D has compared to the D8B?

Rjh

sounds like its time to finally get a patch bay!!! and quality bantam tt or some try patch bays with have isolating grounds configurable by patch point!!

Hey RJH... thought I'd wade in up to my neck here...

I recall you stating that you have continual issues with the 5VDC supply, and in the back of my mind I always sorta wondered what it was, and more importantly, what you were doing in terms of your hardware platform... and I have a theory (imagine that) that may or may not make sense (no pun intended moving forward)...

When I read here about the # of I/O connections you're working with, it made me think about what kinda load is that putting on the D8B's various functional internals - maybe, just maybe that increased load is taking out the supply... the demand simply being too much for the limits of the current supply specs. It makes me wonder what a 5VDC sensing supply with an increased load current spec would do to tighten things up. For everything I've read on this forum over the years, you seem to particularly stand out when it comes to potentially testing the I/O limits when it comes to the D8B... unless I'm still missing something here...

Whatcha think... interested to hear your thoughts on this based on your actual experience unit testing this stuff for yourself...

You know :
[Standard Mgmt Disclaimer] - "Your actual mileage may vary..."

totally understand where you are at RJH,... technology - IMHO - is suppose to be the great enabler BUT when we have to spend many cycles fixing instead of mixing, you have to ask yourself what kind of musician you want to be? Like many folks here on the forum, I have many years of electronic, audio and computer knowledge but when I sit in front of my d8b, the last thing I want to do is tech stuff....as I get older I realize time is very important and I would much rather spend time looking at a piece of score or listening SRV than read another tech white paper on S/N ratios on digital optimization....all important but very easy to get lost on what the focus is suppose to be about...making music!
I am hanging on to my d8b because the next board I want will cost me ~ 100K...so far now, I use the tools and try not to let them use me. But if you have the cash and want to move on...go for it. Like a bad relationship, sometimes you have to step outside to see the light.

As mentioned in a recent post of mine, I'm also getting to a point where I feel I HAVE to start looking for something else... or at least keep an eye out.

I don't need as much I/O as you, but when looking at alternatives, also stumbled across the PM5D (and PM1D) before. I didn't look deep enough into it at the time, but let me say this:

I have NEVER, EVER, EVER owned/used a piece of digital equipment that is as unreliable as the D8B (or the HDR/MDR for that matter). I mean, it's their age, of course, but I have a lot of other really old gear that doesn't suffer as much as this stuff.
Besides... I hope I won't offend anyone, but when it comes to mass-produced products (vs. hand-built higher end stuff), IMO, nobody beats the Japanese when it comes to designing and building reliable products. Maybe not the most inspiring and exciting products, but from my experience, that stuff just works.

I never worked with the higher end Yamaha digital mixers, but owned a 01V right after it came out, worked on an 02R occasionally, and had a Promix 01 at work, back then. Never any issues (but the Promix 01 is weird and only runs on 48 kHz). There’s some details I didn’t like (e.g. automating the faders from a DAW, would “lock” them to the touch… you couldn’t just grab a fader and move it somewhere else, when automation was on… this annoyed me A LOT on the 01V).

The pres on those Yamaha mixers were super-bland, though. Like, if you want it to sound weak-sauce AF, use those. Otherwise, use a different pre. IMO, they’re “cleaner” than the D8B pres… but have even less life in them.

On the other hand, though… not all Japanese digital mixer designs are good. I had to use a Roland VM7100 at a different job, later on. I HATED that thing with a passion. It was crazy unintuitive, and I remember trying to route something out the S/PDIF port and giving up, after like, 30-40 minutes of looking (I guess I could have looked in the manual, but didn’t). I always hated Roland’s user workflows and menu structures, though - also on their synths - so, maybe I’m biased.

Anyway… personally, I’d also put everything on patchbays and patch in what I actually want to use on any given project. It’s actually VERY intuitive and fast to work that way, once you’re used to it (otherwise, how many 8x8 MIDI interfaces do you have stacked, to even trigger all these synths at the same time, without patching “something” (in this case, maybe via a MIDI patchbay)?

If you “insist” on having that much I/O, then personally, I think I’d get a couple of rack mixers and cascade them, then control them from an iPad or something. The PreSonus Rack mixers work that way.

If budget is not an issue… I mean, the higher-end digital mixers, usually have separate “control surface” components, and separate I/O and processing components. With those, you can usually customize how much I/O you need, and then you control everything from a “generic” console that works for this type of mixer system… regardless off how much I/O you have connected, etc. This is not a market I can afford to look in, though… so I couldn’t even give you examples of desks that do that… but you probably know what I’m talking about anyway… but it’s out of most people’s budget’s reach

I’m not sure what I’ll do, still, when I get rid of the D8B… maybe a stronger focus on control surfaces and ITB mixing, and more DSP to support it (e.g. the UA Apollo I have and the Satellite unit with more DSP that I have, do pack a punch, and go pretty far)… but I’d still keep a small mixer for real-time monitoring (e.g. DSP processed stuff coming out of the UA interface).

Sorry… I don’t really have any useful feedback… but as much as I like the D8B when it works, IMO, it can’t get much worse than that, when it comes to reliability, etc. (After I switched the rack unit the other day, it worked for 2 days, and now I had to start 3 times again for the past 2 days, b/c of meters being stuck again, and once a fader motor was stuck on the bottom… calibrated and fixed).
I think I’ll start counting the days on which I do NOT have to troubleshoot the D8B when trying to turn it on… would probably be a lower number than the other way around…

" After building custom power supplies and cleaning my units they are still wonky at best and very noisy"

i have had alot of help over the years from all you guys on here past and present over mainly silly things and all in all in terms of my work flow now against then, is mainly been down to back up from guys on here, really it has, its become a direct line incase of trouble i know i will get useable practical answers, i dont know anywhere else i would get that without gear snobs telling me iv got a boat ancher and dump it as soon as poss, but....... to be fair had mine getting on 15 years and i have not had anything like the trouble some get here, i use it nearly every day and just looking in my song book im on song 74 done on this thing, so.... it does get used.
ok a few light dont work and one or two switiches dont react on the desk but do on the screen, i do have a spare just incase though
meehhhh, its old, and like any old bit of equipment you have to maintain it or it will fail, most of what i find is down to caps or cap related, drying out, blown leaking etc
but... it serves me very well and i have done nothing to upgrade it, in that time i have had loads of gear go down old and new, of which some i can repair and some are in the spares basket or the bin,
so fear not guys.. lets try and sort it.
i dont know with this so im going to have a stab at it in a bid to try and help, it may be bollo@ks and obvious but worth a stab.
if your doing your own power supplys you obviously have something about you,
so going on the quote above, the power supply hum/buz is this not something coming from the mods you have done ?
and have you tried to narrow it down by unpluging/disconnecting everything to see if it stops ?
im guessing you have here, and cancled out earth loop hum to see if any item is sending anything down to ground, on some stuff you can just disconnect the earth from the plug for a few seconds just to cancel out that bit of equip, if so what was the most basic thing you have connected with everything else disconnected from the d8b and plug ! you still get with the hum ?
if you have a meter im guessing you have, i would prob start with a quick passive test by unpluging your master plug from the wall power supply, plug and turn on and switch on all your equip ...BUT again with your master plug unplugged so no power from the outlet.
then on your master plug do a cont test between your
earth pin and live
then the earth pin and neg
just to see if anything is there, obviously its just a quick test and wont work for soft switched gear like the hdr and monitor screens.
if there is just unplug or turn off things untill you get nothing,
its a start maybe
but think your past that already ?

As I am fighting with my d8b now I have no advice, but I am rather curious.

With all those inputs, I would really like to hear some music from you. (I know off topic a bit)