1

Topic: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hello,

the next FireWire driver coming up includes some significant changes. After a lot of internal testing it is now ready for public beta testing. As usual do not use this one on a production system and with sensitive data. If you need to make money with our hardware - don't fool around, use what works, stay safe!

Its most spectacular feature is the addition of multi-client mixing. You can now use any number of programs of any sort (WDM, ASIO) to play back on the sa
me channels. Note that as long as you use only one program per playback channel the driver works as before, including bit-perfect playback.

This new driver also delivers what we promised before: an update to the 'old' TotalMix, addressing the most important features wanted, for the FF 400 and FF 800. TM will never become a TM FX, but some things were really bothering us too, so you now get 4 fader groups (plus a temporary one), an undo for the most worst error (accidentally loading a preset), and additional MIDI remote functions (see below).

- New TotalMix FX 0.93 (FF UFX)

- TotalMix FX help and Settings dialog are correctly installed under Win 64

- Settings dialog saves the current position

- Settings dialog FF400/800: Buffer size 4096 in QS mode removed (more than 2048 is not supported by the hardware)

- Settings dialog: Pitch menu/list box improved

- Settings dialog: sample rate list box improved

- Various small improvements of the WDM driver

- WDM UFX: ADAT 2 1/2 is no longer labelled SPDIF

- FF 800 stand-alone channel 1: Limiter state is stored correctly

- FF 400 Encoder: selecting invalid channels caused crash

- Multi-client playback mixing on identical channels


- TotalMix Update (for FF 400/800):

- - 4 fader groups definable. Use 'Save All Presets' to store them to a file.

- - Undo of the last Preset loading

- - New options to deactivate the Mackie protocol and the Level Meters

- - Level Meter data added to Mackie protocol

- - Post fader mode added (Mackie: F16. On: MIDI channel 1, note on A 4. Off: MIDI channel 1, note off A 4)

- - Direct submix selection via Control Change commands (channel 1/2: BC 68/69 xx, channel 3/4: BC 6A/6B xx etc.)


Happy testing!

!!!! Update  04/01/2011 !!!!

https://archiv.rme-audio.de/download/fw_win_3044.zip

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hello,

you rock !

The multi-client feature is really a great improvement, makes things much easier.
Level meters are quite helpful too, it allows to use all the screen space for the daw while being able to do quick visual check of the signals without clicking to bring up the mixer.
FF400 on Athlon X3/W7 64 SP1 is running like a breeze here up to now
Thanks for this great update

Personal website https://www.lorcan.me
Company website https://www.lmdsp.com

3 (edited by Moshiko 2011-03-14 10:12:20)

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hi Matthias,
Thanks for the new driver.
After installing the new driver, DIGICheck is no longer working. It starts with an error message:
Device Opening Error - Opening audio device: Error number 4
(FFUFX[fw] 3.040/3.36, DigiCheck 5.33, WinXP32 SP3)

Edit:
SoundForge also fails to open the device and it seems like there no asio driver...
After doing a "Roll back driver" everything is working again, with the previous driver.

4

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

We can not reproduce this error, everything works as expected. Please try again, this time with version 3.041.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Is this update supposed to fix the error Sonar produces when the project sample rate is different from the previously set sample rate? If so, it doesn't work for me...

I'm using Sonar Producer 8.5.3 x64 with ASIO in Win 7 64-bit and I'm getting this error:

RME Fireface 800 - The above Audio/MIDI device has been disconnected from your system.

Example: sample rate is set to 44.1 kHz (might be default or set by another ASIO program). Open up a project in Sonar with a project sample rate of 48 kHz. Start playback. Playback is fine for a few seconds, then ERROR. Click "Yes", wait another few seconds, start playback again - now everything works as expected - until another program changes the sample rate again. 100 % reproducible here. It's not a real show stopper but annoying nonetheless.


However, I have a suggestion for the new FADERGROUPS, which I think is a great feature!

What about some more visual representation of the groups? Something like this:

http://i1094.photobucket.com/albums/i455/fripholm/TMsuggestion.gif

Every group has its unique colour and can be renamed. The level value would still be visible and is not replaced by the group's number. And one can see whether a particular group is active or not without going to the menu first. Deleting a group could be managed by right-clicking or something like this.

What do you think?

6 (edited by Moshiko 2011-03-15 22:13:12)

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

MC wrote:

We can not reproduce this error, everything works as expected. Please try again, this time with version 3.041.

Hi Matthias,
Driver version 3.041 has the same problem - it's like there is no asio driver and DC starts with error 4.
One thing that might say something to you: During driver installation, Windows warns that fireface_asio.dll has a different language (English on 3.04x, instead of German on 3.033). (Of course I choose to overwrite with the new file.)
Did you test the new version with an English/non-German Windows?

For now I have to roll back to version 3.034 sad

Thanks.

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hello,

I got similar problems with this new driver (3.040 as well as 3.041) as Moshiko reports under XP, SP3, Fireface 400.
Originally I experienced a multiclient issue with 3.034 and tried these new betas, because I was told, they could be a possible solution to my problems...
Samplitude reports this error: ASIO Fireface loading failed.
ASIO Multiclient Server (little workaround that bypasses my original problem with multiclient use of 3.034 for the moment: (http://www.vidance.com)) reports: ERROR: ASIO Driver could not be loaded!
On my system portaudio V1.19 cannot use this driver either => shows a strange behaviour with a message box "Der Prozedureinsprungpunkt "_ftol2" wurde in der DLL "msvcrt.dll" nicht gefunden."

All these new problems disappear luckily, if I switch back to 3.034... but I would really like to get rid of the workaround mentioned above....

8 (edited by groovy_80s 2011-03-15 22:31:25)

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hi Matthias

i have the same Problem as well Moshiko with the driver v3.040 and now with v3.041.

WinXP32 SP3 > FireFace800.

Everything correctly with version 3.034.

Thank you for a prompt correction

-George-

hear...hear now?...hear this, as the music plays finely....this is HighEnd.

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Just a question question. Are any of these changes coming to Mac? I'm going to test this out on Windows now, but I was just curious.

10

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Thanks for the detailed feedback, the ASIO problem should be fixed quickly.

Treefingers, the changes of TM are already in Mac driver v2.9 FW. HDSP coming.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

11

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

fripholm wrote:

Is this update supposed to fix the error Sonar produces when the project sample rate is different from the previously set sample rate? If so, it doesn't work for me...

Not yet. Otherwise I would have mentioned it in the readme.

fripholm wrote:

However, I have a suggestion for the new FADERGROUPS, which I think is a great feature!

Thanks, but we intentionally added the new features in a way that no new bitmaps or changed bitmaps are required.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

MC wrote:

Thanks for the detailed feedback, the ASIO problem should be fixed quickly.

Treefingers, the changes of TM are already in Mac driver v2.9 FW. HDSP coming.

You're correct. Sorry. I was confused by fripholm's post.

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

(on Mac) How do we access the four different fader groups?  (sorry if this is a dumb question)

----------------
Matt McKenzie-Smith (UFXII, UFX, Babyface) MacStudioUltra OS13.2.1
----------------

14

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Via the menu Fader Groups.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

I'm not able to find that menu option (on Mac), MC.

16

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Sorry guys, the Undo function and the Fader Groups were implemented after the 2.90 release. But will be available shortly, don't worry.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

The ASIO problem is fixed in 3.042 :-)
Thanks Matthias.

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Thanks for the quick solution of the ASIO problem!
I tried 3.043 today and it not only works on my XP, SP3 - System, but also resolves my original multiclient problem!
... the only noticable different behaviour remaining at installation time is the language difference between the fireface.dll-versions...

19

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

But does it still force you to drop the warning dialog during installation?

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hi Matthias,

At switching from 3.043 to 3.034 (new back to old) I get several message boxes forcing me to confirm that I really want to overwrite a file with an older version and one box asking the following for fireface_asio.dll:
"Die Zieldatei ist bereits vorhanden und in einer anderen Sprache als die Quelldatei. Soll die Datei in Englisch (USA) von der Datei Deutsch (Deutschland) überschrieben werden?"

When I go from 3.034 to 3.043 (old to new) I consequently only get one dialog - the one for fireface_asio.dll:
"Die Zieldatei ist bereits vorhanden und in einer anderen Sprache als die Quelldatei. Soll die Datei in Deutsch (Deutschland) von der Datei Englisch (USA) überschrieben werden?"

Is there a general way to suppress this kind of warning (or automatically confirm to disregard this difference) within a driver-installation other than using DLLs of the same language for all versions?

Regards, Jens

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

MC wrote:

Sorry guys, the Undo function and the Fader Groups were implemented after the 2.90 release. But will be available shortly, don't worry.

Cheers MC, I thought I was going crazy.. (errr, I probably am anyway) ;-)

----------------
Matt McKenzie-Smith (UFXII, UFX, Babyface) MacStudioUltra OS13.2.1
----------------

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

To RME-Team >>> Thanks for the quick fix with the ASIO-Drivers.

Now works correctly with v3.042 and v3.043. I will now test the others. I'll report.

WinXP32 SP3 > FireFace800

-Geroge-

hear...hear now?...hear this, as the music plays finely....this is HighEnd.

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

In the apparent absence of a help file or documentation, could we please have clarification of the Fader Groups menu in the FF400 TotalMix implementation, namely Activate, Define and Delete. It would appear that a group is first activated (ticked) then defined by selecting (freely) the appropriate channels by selecting them and pressing Define.  A Group can be deleted, but the same effect can be achieved by selecting that group in the Activate menu, at which point it becomes un-ticked.

Is there a help file or manual update on the way?  (Perhaps when this comes out of beta?)

De gustibus - et sonus - non est disputandum

24

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

It's more logical and simple. You can only activate a group that had been defined before. And you cannot define a group as long as no faders are selected (the normal standard function turning the labels yellow). Deleting a group is obviously something different than temporarily switching it off (to change individual fader positions etc).

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Thanks - the intention is now clearer.

And is it intended that a group defined in one submix applies to those same faders in all submixes?   In some instances, I have seen faders grouped in one submix follow the same grouping in another submix; in other instances the faders do not appear to be grouped and can be moved independently. 

I saw this particularly where groups were set up in the main submix, but when 4 ADAT out submixes were used to set the 8 analog inputs to 8 ADAT outs in the matrix view, the faders appeared to be unlinked in those submixes, that is, independent of the groups.  Which, in this instance, is the way I would prefer it.

De gustibus - et sonus - non est disputandum

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Matthias,

Does this driver already supports ASIOSetSampleRate() with 46080Hz and 48048Hz?

27

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Sorry, no.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

28 (edited by LarsErik 2011-03-30 14:33:40)

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Tried out the latest beta (update 3) and in Cubase 6.0.1 (64 bit) with a ASIO buffer of 64 samples everything went completely bananas when inserting an VST compressor (Cytomic The Glue v 1.15).

"completely bananas" = Something ate up all CPU (my guess) making everything extremely sluggish including keyboard input and mouse pointer movements. No way to shut down Cubase or Windows instead I have to use the off-switch on the power supply.

Did a restart of my computer and created a little test project 24bit/48 with a single stereo track and imported a WAV-loop. Inserted the same VST compressor and it happened again.

After the third restart I raised the asio buffer to 128 and it worked better but still not perfect. Got a lot of snap, cracke and pops..

Going back to the previous production stable drivers (version 3.034) the same cubase project (and the little test project) worked like a charm with a 64 sample buffer.

Sincerely
LarsErik

Fireface UCXII & UCX , MacBook Pro m1, MacOS Sonoma

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

@LarsErik

which driver version did you go back to?

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hi Matthias,

I'm really happy to hear there is a new driver coming out. I apologize if this has been addressed as I only skimmed the thread, but I'm just wondering if the conflicts that arise as a result of assigning FF400 as the default playback device in Windows have been addressed? Please see this thread for further explanation:
http://www.rme-audio.de/forum/viewtopic … 37&p=3

Best Regards,
Andrew

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

pond wrote:

@LarsErik

which driver version did you go back to?

Back to version 3.034.

Fireface UCXII & UCX , MacBook Pro m1, MacOS Sonoma

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

MC wrote:

Sorry, no.

but will you consider it, maybe in another release?

33

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

mattrixx wrote:
MC wrote:

Sorry guys, the Undo function and the Fader Groups were implemented after the 2.90 release. But will be available shortly, don't worry.

Cheers MC, I thought I was going crazy.. (errr, I probably am anyway) ;-)

Mac version 2.91 is now available with all the TM update features.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

34

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

nf-b wrote:

At switching from 3.043 to 3.034 (new back to old) I get several message boxes forcing me to confirm that I really want to overwrite a file with an older version and one box asking the following for fireface_asio.dll:
"Die Zieldatei ist bereits vorhanden und in einer anderen Sprache als die Quelldatei. Soll die Datei in Englisch (USA) von der Datei Deutsch (Deutschland) überschrieben werden?"

I uploaded version 3.044 where all files have been changed to 'language neutral'. That should solve those problems.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

LarsErik wrote:

Tried out the latest beta (update 3) and in Cubase 6.0.1 (64 bit) with a ASIO buffer of 64 samples everything went completely bananas when inserting an VST compressor (Cytomic The Glue v 1.15).

"completely bananas" = Something ate up all CPU (my guess) making everything extremely sluggish including keyboard input and mouse pointer movements. No way to shut down Cubase or Windows instead I have to use the off-switch on the power supply.

Did a restart of my computer and created a little test project 24bit/48 with a single stereo track and imported a WAV-loop. Inserted the same VST compressor and it happened again.

After the third restart I raised the asio buffer to 128 and it worked better but still not perfect. Got a lot of snap, cracke and pops..

Going back to the previous production stable drivers (version 3.034) the same cubase project (and the little test project) worked like a charm with a 64 sample buffer.

Sincerely
LarsErik

I just got the same crash with the latest non-beta driver. Might as well be a problem caused by Cubase 6.0.1 or Cytomic v1.1.5 and not the beta drivers.

/LarsErik

Fireface UCXII & UCX , MacBook Pro m1, MacOS Sonoma

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Tried this beta with my software, win7 32 bit, FF800 and HP8730w. Works OK, I can say it might even work better than latest release. (I got no/less clicks and pops with hard working DSP).

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Drewcipher wrote:

Hi Matthias,

I'm really happy to hear there is a new driver coming out. I apologize if this has been addressed as I only skimmed the thread, but I'm just wondering if the conflicts that arise as a result of assigning FF400 as the default playback device in Windows have been addressed? Please see this thread for further explanation:
http://www.rme-audio.de/forum/viewtopic … 37&p=3

Best Regards,
Andrew

Just reposting this question as it must have been overlooked. The problem is consistent - every time I assign the FF400 as default playback device in windows, it stops working the next time I open Cubase and I have to reinstall.

Has this been fixed in the newest driver? Unfortunately, this is rendering my FF400 more of a hassle than it's worth. Hoping this problem has been solved as I don't particularly want to sell it, but will have to as this really hinders my workflow...

Best Regards,
Andrew

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Drew: Does it only happen with Cubase? I regularly use the FF400 as default output in W7, but don't have issues using it as ASIO output in Live and Reaper afterwards.

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hi Timur,

That's a good question - the actual breakdown does only seem to happen within Cubase (sometimes I just get no sound, other times it starts as crackling and the degenerates quickly) but then affects the driver globally. That being said, Cubase is the only pro audio app I use consistently, so it's hard to say for sure.

I got the impression from surfing the forum that this is a fairly common issue and not just with Cubase users, but I might be mistaken...

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hi MC,

I have used beta driver daily and it has worked just perfectly.
My setup: TI chipset 1394b, 1 x FF 800 v1.0, Asus PT6, 12 GB DDR3, i7-950, W7 64bit, SONAR X1b x64

-Panu

sonarmods.com

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

panu -
Good to hear, I will start testing tonight. My setup is close to same as yours. (Ti 1394, win 7 x64, Sonar X1b, supermicro X7DAL-e, dual Xeon 5150, 8 Gb ddr2, FF800)

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Hi,
i get dropouts an stuttering with latest beta drivers @128 Buffersize, TI1394, 7 Pro x64.
No DPC Spikes! No Errors in Fireface Driver Window seen.....
Tested with Cantabile, Forte, C5 and Live8.
Go back to 3.034 all fine again with out any problems.
THX
Steffen

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Drewcipher wrote:

I got the impression from surfing the forum that this is a fairly common issue and not just with Cubase users, but I might be mistaken...

Could you point me to another thread? I don't remember having read about this kind of behavior on Windows, but I don't read all threads neither.

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

OK, installed 3044. Before I did anything I ran the DPC Latency Checker and got this:
http://yhqzcw.blu.livefilestore.com/y1pRj0CQVJ0VMrmgCDvZCbM-omDW-BOfsDuujHvecIW9k64x732BKPcbYdwSrdVP9ZDzJE1dAZjBe_IXQOc2Piwx8LrsvwimYJ6/With3044.jpg?psid=1

Disabled Fireface and got this:
http://yhqzcw.blu.livefilestore.com/y1p65ypw4aSCZXAySB5T4Ud4UCk_Ue4uikZKDuy6nXt7Bl3NNWjUPlC0hbr0eAl6jwKDVOeo929PlRspsgkOU2VlplMcI_VURNl/With3044FF800Disabled.jpg?psid=1

Enabled Fireface again, fired up SONAR, and everything was fine. Played around for awhile, opened up one of those fairly large tutorial projects and recorded another track with it, still fine. Then I ran Latency Checker again and there were no spikes. Maybe the driver had to be further configured with use? IDK, but so far all seems good. Sonar X1b, Supermicro X7DAL-E, dual Xeon Dual core 5160 3GHz, 8GB RAM, WIN 7 x64, FF 800. Haven't tried the new totalmix features yet.

45

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Our driver does not cause DPCs. You might see them again on next boot. 700 ms sounds like a DVD drive or an external hard drive where the computer had to wait for.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Or you started DPC Latency Checker right after installing the drivers and Windows was still busy initializing them. wink

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

My Cubase 6.0 project is set to 48 kHz, wenn I set the DAW in suspend mode and wake it up again Cubase tells me that 48 kHz is set, but when
I press play, I can clearly hear it's set to 44,1 kHz. Switching sample rates in Cubase back and forth fixes it. Did I find a bug? smile

48

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

Anyone who has a Cubase (any...) project open when he sends his computer into suspend mode should give back his computer user licence. Sorry.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

No problems here, only the RME soundcard...

Re: New FireWire series Windows driver - public beta - update 3

A small strange thing.  The onscreen display (Lenovo preload-ware) to notify a change of volume on my internal soundcard pops up randomly since I installed 3.x   The FF800 is not set to windows sound default device, and system sounds are off.

Love the new multi-client!

pot.

Madiface XT, Madiface, 3x Micstasy, ADI8QS
Sequoia 17, W10 x64
https://bsound.co.nz/tools-nix