Marci

The following is a fix for anyone using Mark Of The Unicorn (MOTU) firewire audio interfaces under Windows XP with SP2 installed.

(Applies directly to MOTU 896, 896 HD, 828, 828 MkII, 2408 Mk3 & 24I/O products. Disabling DEP may resolve issues with older legacy PCI based units running from PCI-324 or PCI-424 host cards)

1: Symptoms
Random pops, clicks and drop outs in audio playback thru ASIO Enabled applications such as Cubase SX or Nuendo 2. Reducing Buffer size appears to make problem worse. Increasing buffer size reduces problem but results in ridiculously high latencies giving ghosting effect on audio passthru.

2: The Fix
Step 1) Disable DEP completely if using windows XP SP2

To do this, open My Computer, C:
Tools > Folder Options > View > Tick Show Hidden Files and folders, and untick "Hide Extensions for known file types" and "Hide protected operating system files"

Now on c: you should see boot.ini

Open it up in notepad. The last line should end in /fastdetect /noexecute=optin

Change it so it now ends /fastdetect /execute

File Save Exit.

Adding your ASIO-based app to the DEP Exclusion list is not enough. DEP must be disabled completely.

Step2) DOWNdate Drivers for all 1394 host controllers.

The Firewire drivers in SP2 are flawed and restrict bus bandwidth to 100Mb/s instead of 400Mb/s

Download THIS ARCHIVE and extract it to a folder on your harddrive (eg: c:\1394sp1) - this archive contains the Windows SP1 Firewire drivers - 138Kb

Now, rightclick My Computer > Properties > Hardware > Device Manager > Expand "IEEE 1394 Bus Host Controller" > Double click on OHCI listing > Driver > Update Driver > No, not this time > Install from a list or specific location > Don't search. I will choose the driver to install > Have Disk > Browse > browse to c:\1394sp1 (or wherever u extracted archive to) > ok > ok etc

Do that for each listing under IEEE 1394 Bus Host Controller.

Voila. Problem solved. No more pops, clicks or dropouts.

The above basically downgrades your Firewire host controller drivers from the Microsoft SP2 drivers (ones with the flaw) back to the SP1 drivers (that don't have the flaw).

Step2) on it's own won't fix the problem.
Step1) on it's own won't fix the problem.

Combine the two and you can now use WindowsXP-SP2 without problems, but yes, the easy fix is just not to install SP2 in the first place however if your system is online or likely to go online then really SP2 is a requirement these days.

This fix has also been posted over at Unicornation for reference.

**ADDITION - If you STILL get problems, change ACPI driver from "MS ACPI Uniprocessor PC" to "Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI)" and disable System Restore.

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Marci

Next fix = monitoring using the Motu896

The MOTU 896HD (new version) has full CueMix Console support, however the original 896 doesn't, hence when you attempt to run the CueMix Console found in the new drivers all you get is a "plink" then nothing. It only allows monitoring of a single stereo pair (done thru the FWAudio applet)

Many users install and can't get an output from their input-source for monitoring purposes when using with CubaseSX.

This is a common cockup - go to File > Preferences > VST and check automonitoring - it's likely set to manual.

If it IS set to manual, you can enable monitoring on a channel-by-channel basis in the Channel Inspector... it's the little round button with a speaker on it, positioned beside the "record enable" button.

Alternatively, back in preferences > vst you can set monitoring to "Record Enabled", so when you hit Record-Enable it'll automatically turn on monitoring for that channel. Experiment with the other options to see if they're suitable for your application.

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Marci

Next fix = noise on Lightpipe Input.

If like me you're using the MOTU properly to it's fullest, you won't just be running 8x analogue inputs thru the front mic pre-amps. You'll be using 8x analogue inputs on the front and 8x digital inputs via the ADAT lightpipe on the back.

(To make this into 16x analogue inputs, just invest in a Behringer ADA8000 and link it up to the ADAT lightpipe input and you can then record 16x simultaneous channels, 8x analogues directly thru the MOTU, and 8x analogues via the ADA8000 Analogue to Digital converter)

Anyways, if you're doing this you may encounter noise issues.... almost like ghosting. Once audio stops, there's a faint echo of it behind it that can be annoying when recording low level tracks etc...

Anytime two digital devices are "talking to each other" one must be the master and the other the slave. So for example, if you connect an ADA8000 to the ADAT ins and outs of an 896, you might set the ADA8000 to be the master clock and choose "ADAT lightpipe" as the clock source of the 896, in the FireWire control panel. Or leave the 896 on internal clock and set the ADA8000 to slave to lightipe or word clock coming from your interface.

If you have many digital devices you can slave them in a clock "daisy chain", with one master and multiple slave, or make a word clock generator the master of all your digital devices.

(For reference, lightpipe = good ole optical spdif connector; gets referred to as lightpipe when used with a multichannel mix - ie: more than just a stereo signal being transmitted)

Once all of the above is in play, you should be able to succesfully record 16 simultaneous channels cleanly.

Of course, this is assuming you have the basics setup correctly - the most important being that you've selected the MOTU Firewire driver in VST Devices > VST Multitrack instead of the ASIO MME Driver (which will always produce noisy out of sync recordings)

Hope this helps some folks! I had to work it all out fer meself the hardway as most MOTU users out there are on MAC with a whole heap of other problems

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Fancy a game of BF1942 / DC / Vietnam??

illmatik

How are these Firewire units these days? I evaled one of the original 896s but couldnt get it to run on anything than a mac back then (firewire on pc was flaky at best)

Right now I'm torn between the Digi002 and the Yamaha 01x

Marci

They're tops - using an 896 currently got 16x input, 8 output... all simultaneously on a Sempron 2800+ laptop. (8x Analogue inputs on 896, 8x analogue inputs on ada8000 linked to adat input of 896 = 16 inputs on 896 altogether)

I wouldn't use anything other than MOTU after hearing the preamps in this.

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Fancy a game of BF1942 / DC / Vietnam??

illmatik

Sounds killer. Maybe I'll have to take a stroll down to 48th St (1 solid NYC block of specialty music stores/guitar builders/instrument shops) @ lunch time and have a look at MOTUs latest offerings!

You have any tunes I can sample that are using this unit?

Marci

Not as of yet - only got it recently and haven't finished mixing anything that's been done on it so far... Try asking over at www.unicornation.com or www.cubase.net forums and someone'll post up some examples of their tracks using it...

The newer 896HD features slightly better preamps and 192Khz sampling rate.... the one I have is discontinued now (original 896).

The 896HD preamps also feature in the 828MkII.

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Fancy a game of BF1942 / DC / Vietnam??

Marci

(The only stuff I've read about as being better than MOTU is RME gear, but you can triple the pricetag for that)

We landed lucky - got the 896 for £400 2ndhand, and the ADA8000 (8 channel analogue to ADAT Lightpipe converter) for £159, so all in all, 16 analog inputs for £559 = bargain!! Specially when the 896HD is £700 minimum at the mo everywhere I look.

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DFI NFII LanParty Ultra-B, 1Gb OCZ EL-DDR 3500, Rad9700Pro, 2x 80gb SATA BarraV (Raid0).
Promi MkII (r404a) - XP-M2500+ FQQC4 IQYHA @ 225x13, 1.975V
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Fancy a game of BF1942 / DC / Vietnam??

illmatik

Wow, thats a pretty sweet deal. At one point I was considering the apogee ad8000 with the firewire card, but I just couldnt justify the cost for something thats pretty much a hobby now and not generating income.

The 01x and 002 are kind of appealing because they can function as a standalone mixer in addition to DAW and plain control surface. If I had the space and money, my ideal setup would be an ad-16, da-16 running in and out of a spirit ghost console w/ a studer reel to reel and bellari valve compressor to spool to for warming up electronic works and gritty live recordings.

If only my lotto numbers would come in...

What kind of stuff are you recording?

Marci

Rock - generally live... with as few overdubs as possible! For instance these guys - http://www.themusiccollective.co.uk...download&cid=13 (cept the audio on that was just stereo mix straight off the Midas FoH board)

It's the Behringer ADA8000 we use, not the Apogee.

We have a Tascam 1/2" 8 Track that we rarely use... we have a Soundcraft 32:8:2 console and run the 16 analogues off the directouts on channels 1 > 16, and then return doen 17>24 with the 8 outputs, then have the 8 track hooked up on the back set of returns (25 > 32 to the right of the master faders)

Couplea racks of TLA Valve Preamps / compressors, a few Symmetrix preamps, TC Electronics FX racks (can't remember offhand which ones), and a load of good old Yamaha MPX90s n suchlike... rarely put into use these days. The valve preamps were to compensate for the weak preamps in our previous STAUDIO DSP24 / C-Port 2000 8I/O setup... we don't bother with them now as the MOTU preamps are plenty good enough.

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DFI NFII LanParty Ultra-B, 1Gb OCZ EL-DDR 3500, Rad9700Pro, 2x 80gb SATA BarraV (Raid0).
Promi MkII (r404a) - XP-M2500+ FQQC4 IQYHA @ 225x13, 1.975V
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Fancy a game of BF1942 / DC / Vietnam??