This seems interesting          Mushkin Enhanced Mulholland 16GB USB 2.0 Flash Drive Model MKNUFDMH16GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a … llFullInfo

I was able to record 12 tracks @ 24/96 with no problem with this stick. I tried the same with 24/192 and got 6 errors. It's close! If I dropped it down to 10 tracks, it would probably be fine. Seems like a good stick! I could probably do 24 tracks @ 24/48 with no problem.

Just recorded 30 tracks at 24/44 for 64 min. 8 wave files  0 errors between 35-40% Hd average max r/w time 250-300 with spikes over 600,

By the way, does SSD (SATAII) in enxternal drive enclosure work, like the way USB flash memory or hard drive, as long as it is formatted in FAT32? Did anybody test SSD?

Weird, UFX won't read my flash drives now? I recorded on them yesterday, Erased them and now I'm getting error message. Firmware 138 /total mix .94 /usb driver 981

After I tested the flash drive,I removed it from the UFX and moved the files to my computer. I then deleted the files on the flash drive.. I put the drive back into the UFX. I got the initializing message and then an FS error message.

It should be fat 32/4k cluster size/primary partition?  Can anyone recommend a program? thanks

On my never ending search for the perfect USB recording stick (drives a plenty, just stick...), that could handle the max of 34 channels at 96 kHz, I tested the latest german magazine winner 'WINKOM Pendrive USB 3.0 SLC 32 GB'. This is a very small stick using a new controller from Innostor, and has SLC RAM. With USB 3 this one transfers more than 100 MB both write and read - wow. Under USB 2 and at the UFX it shows a similar behaviour to other USB 3 sticks. After a short time (here about 1 minute) there is an interruption in writing, of more than 600 ms length (I saw up to 1.2 s in my tests). That makes the stick operate worse than my old Corsair Voyager GT. So while the stick is slim and super-quick on both USB 2 and 3, it is no winner on the UFX.

There is no need for 7200 rpm, at least not for the UFX. Current external drives will all do the job, and they should all operate on one USB connection.

Regards
Daniel Fuchs
RME

Are you sure the sticks still work correctly? Or are they defective now?

I've tested a number of stick/HD's to achieve error free recording USB-recording 6 channels at 24/44.1.
All sticks/HDs were formatted with fat32formatter.

Here are my results of three tests on each of them:
1) "winsat disk -write -ran -ransize 4096 -drive <drive letter>" as admin on windows 7 32 Bit.
    This tells me the transfer rate for small block sizes, which is very important, in order to get not stucked at
    closing/opening files at the 2 GByte limit border

2) "winsat disk -write -ran -ransize 524288 -drive <drive letter>" as admin on windows 7 32 Bit.
    This gives me a hint of the overall speed of the HD/USB-Stick for large file sizes, i.e. if it's possible to write
    down my ~1MByte/s to the stick for 6x24/44.1.

3) running a 3h recording on the UFX whit 6 channels 24/44.1 and count the error rate

a) SandDisk Extreme III at vivance USB 2.0  Card Reader, 16GByte:
    0.04 MByte/s @ 4k
    2.39 MByte/s @ 512k
    FREE OF ERRORS

b) CnMemory airy, 16GByte:
    0.02 MByte/s @ 4k
    1.71 MByte/s @ 512k
    ERRORS, especially at 2GByte-Borders

c) WD WD5000MES-00 5309A, 500GByte:
    2.03 MByte/s @ 4k
    25.64 MByte/s @ 512k
    ERRORFREE

d) Samsung S1 Mini 120GByte, 120GByte:
    0.15 MByte/s@4k
    2.09 MByte/s@512k
    ERRORS, especially at 2GByte-Borders

e) ADATA N005 USB 3.0 32GByte (one of the last benchmark winners of germans c't magazine)
    2.08 MByte/s@4k
    24.59 MByte/s@512k
    ERRORFREE

so, I'm settled with number c)-HD and e)-USB-Stick and I will not buy any more equipment, which doesn't have at least 2 MByte/s at small file size (4k) and at least 20 MByte/s at large file sizes.

Udo

I repeated the test as suggested for the 34 channels 96kHz (I don't expect to ever use that).

The ADATA N005 doesn't work for this case - it shows a very similar behaviour as described for the WINCOM Pendrive:
it starts very well with 80 ms max read/write time and 80% HD.
After ~1min it changes behaviour to a slow mode: suddenly max read/write raises to above 550 msec and errors show up.
I suspect an overrun in a fast front cache or an internal organisation process within the stick.
The ADATA N005 doesn't restore anymore from this slow mode.

When channel number is decreased to 14, first sign's of recovering from this slow mode show up but there are still errors.

When channel number is decreased to 12 (still 96k), the ADATA N005 periodically falls back to this slow mode after ~1-2 min.
But there is a complete recovering from this slow mode every time.
UFX is able to handle that without errors - even at the 2GByte-Borders when closing/opening files.

So - the ADATA N005 has still 4x the resources available for my purpose (6x24x44.1), but indeed not enough for the full stream.
USB-Sticks seem to do strange things internally - I decided to stay rather with HD-drives.

Udo

Thanks a lot for that info! 12 channels at 96 = 24 channels at 48 = a shame for that stick. Most of my outdated USB 2 sticks easily do that.

I tested another two currently available USB sticks, by recording until the device was full or an error ocurred. (UFX SW Version 1.38)

Transcend JetFlash600 32GB USB 2.0:
at 24/96 only 8 channels were recorded without errors; R/W-time around 440 - 600ms; HD/USB load around 30%

Kingston DataTraveller R500 32 GB USB 2.0:
at 24/96 12 channels were recorded without errors; R/W-time around 200 - 400ms, HD/USB load around 40%
After the stick was full, I unplugged it and replugged it to the UFX.
FF-UFX Display says "initializing" for about 10 seconds, after that "Media/Device Error" is displayed.
Even after reformatting with HP USB Formatter or with windows built in format option (both FAT32) the stick will still not be accepted again by the FF-UFX.
The stick does not show any suspicious behaviour, when plugged into a computer.
Seems strange to me.

Regards
Andreas

I've tried it multiple times before and multiple times after reformatting the USB Stick. Suspected a bad electrical connection too; pressed the stick in different directions during the initializing process. Always the same repeatable error.

Andreas

We seem to have found the reason for the problems with the Rage Patriot XT, and think the fix will make the Kingston work as well. A new firmware will be posted soon. Regarding the Rage Patriot XT: it's not worth the money. The stick pauses quite often for up to 800 ms, limiting the number of recordable channels to about 14 at 96 kHz. For a quad-channel-super-hi-speed stick quite disappointing.

Firmware 139 that will make the Kingston and Patriot sticks work (see above) is now available for download:

https://archiv.rme-audio.de/download/fu … in_139.zip

https://archiv.rme-audio.de/download/fu … ac_139.zip

I uploaded a new version of the Win FUT. The firmwares included were ok, just the version display was not. Thanks!

So is there a consensus about the "best" stick to buy? Looking to buy a 16 - 32 GB stick and would like to only have to make the purchase once!

Just wanted to share my experience. I bought this SDHC card (actually bought it for my camera, but decided to give it a whirl for the UFX), along with a cheap SDHC-USB reader stick (similar to this one, but it wasn't the exact same brand so I can't vouch for that particular one -- it was just some random $7.99 one at Fry's).

I didn't do any extensive long term testing or anything like that, but a quick test looks like I can record all input channels (38) at 48 kHz with no problem at all. I only ran it a few minutes so maybe I'd end up with some errors, but since my practical use will require less than 10 channels I didn't bother with anything more extensive.

The SDHC card is a class 10 card (got it for HD video so wanted fast performance for that application). Maybe the SD card is the way to go, as you know exactly the class you're getting. Plus, now I can use it for two purposes! Super stoked!

Sure thing. Just a quick scan through this topic makes it look like 34 channels @ 96 kHz error-free is kinda the "holy-grail"? Just trying to understand before doing my test... it seems like you can conceivably record a lot more than 34 channels, given all of the input/output channels that have the record enable button? Again I haven't played with high track counts too much... but what is the standard combination of record channels to get to 34 @ 96 kHz?

I'll try to run a test tonight and report back...

Ok, so a few more details:

96 kHz:
34 channels - ~85%, 6 errors in first minute
32 channels - ~80%, ~2 errors per minute for first couple minutes
30 channels - ~75%, 1 error at startup, no additional errors over next 5 minutes, but then a burst of about 5 errors right around minute 5
28 channels - ~70%, 1 error at startup, didn't test for long
26 channels - ~65%, no startup errors (reliably), 2 errors (blast!) over 10 minutes
24 channels - ~61%, 1 error around minute 11
22 channels - ~56%, no errors over 15 minutes

A quick spot check of 48 kHz looks like you'd expect... similar performance but with double the channel count (44 channels was ~55% loaded).

Hopefully this info helps! For the $30 total I spent on the card and reader, I'd say I'm pretty stoked!

I suppose it was too much to hope that this system could handle all 34 channels at 96, but these are still great results! This seems more than capable of handling all 34 channels at 44.1, which is what I typically use anyway.  Thanks for taking the time to run the tests and post your results.

Cheers,

David

Hi Matthias, hi UFX users,

have you found a better and bigger or even the perfect USB stick inbetween?
I'm searching for a USB stick 16 GB or bigger that can handle at least 20 tracks@96 kHz errorfree for long term recordings,
without any dangerous timing spikes even at the 2GB borders etc.

What about the Corsair Voyager 16 GB for example?
Any other recommendations for STICKS matching my requirements?

As to portable USB HDDs: Has anyone tested the Samsung G2, e.g. the G2 portable 640 GB HX-MU064DC? It contains a Samsung HM641JX 2.5" SATA HDD running @5400 rpm. Any issues with write time spikes or other errors?

Volker