• Registered: 2020-02-02
  • Posts: 6

Topic: Digiface Dante, Driver 3183, ASIO problems

Hello...

I encountered a problem with Driver 3183 and ASIO using the Digiface Dante.
I was in preparation for a major production when I noticed the problem and it took quite some time to narrow down the problem to the driver.

I run a professional mobile production company and use the Digiface Dante as my backup recorder. The computer is a Macbook Pro and the software is either Tracks Live or Nuendo Live 2.  When I purchased the Digiface a year ago, everything worked as one would expect.  There have been a few driver updates since but nothing flagged my mind that there should be an issue.

In this case, when Driver 3183 was installed the first time, I could go into Nuendo (which maddeningly depends on ASIO drivers) and everything is fine.  However after shutting down, the driver would get "locked".  That is, any other application that depends on the ASIO driver would not be able to reopen the driver.   

This would persist for Nuendo Live 2 after reboots, reinstalls of the software etc.

I had need to do a clean install of the computer so it gave me an opportunity to debug this.  Different combinations of power cycling, opening and closing the driver, choosing other drivers before the Digiface Dante driver etc...nothing would allow the driver to be "reopened".  And remember...this is after a clean install of the OS. 

I also fully uninstalled the RME driver, and reinstalled to ensure that the MacOS security wasn't blocking the driver in some strange manner.

I truly thoguht the problem was with Nuendo and was surprised that in one of my attempts, I decided to fully uninstall the RME driver and downgrade to the 3-16 driver.  Once I did that, everything worked perfectly.  No problems with either Nuendo Live 2, Tracks Live etc.

I've searched the forum, but I don't see anyone else with this configuration.  In fact, I see very little discussion of people using the Digiface Dante.

In your next driver update, could someone take a look to see what is the difference between 3-16 and 3-18.3 that would cause such operation?

Thanks

  • From: Germany
  • Registered: 2007-04-10
  • Posts: 9,549

Re: Digiface Dante, Driver 3183, ASIO problems

There's no ASIO here, this is Core Audio... Not a known issue, what exactly happens, what does "not able to reopen the driver" refe to? Is there an error message?

Regards
Daniel Fuchs
RME

Regards
Daniel Fuchs
RME

RME Support's Website

3 Reply by MC

  • MC
  • MC
  • Administrator
  • Offline
  • From: Germany/Thailand
  • Registered: 2007-04-06
  • Posts: 24,824

Re: Digiface Dante, Driver 3183, ASIO problems

And what macOS X and computer is this?

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

MC's Website

  • Registered: 2020-02-02
  • Posts: 6

Re: Digiface Dante, Driver 3183, ASIO problems

Thanks for the reply...

The machine is a MacBook Pro Retina 2012 running Mojave. 
While I understand the Mac runs Core Audio, all of steinbergs products refer to "the asio" driver.  As I mentioned previously, I thought the problem was with the Nuendo Live 2 application causing problems but it also reared its head with the Tracks Live application once the driver was "locked".

I would have included a screenshot of the problem however your image embedding only seems to allow links to urls.

Anyways, when you open Nuendo Live 2, you have an option for a "settings" screen. 
In that screen, there's a dropdown called "ASIO driver" and allows you to choose between your audio drivers or none.  Just below that is an "ASIO State" that shows whether that driver is actually running.
When I had driver 3183 installed, any time you selected "Digiface Dante" it would show "ASIO State: Not Running".  Once you went into the session you were unable to arm and record. 

As I stated in the OP, I went through lots of iterations on a clean machine to try to find out what the root cause was.  The only way I could get stable operation was when I downgraded to driver 3-16.  Everything works as it should.

So, while I think the problem may be in the way Steinberg wraps the core audio driver as an "ASIO", the fact of the matter is that when I change the RME driver, things work.

So what I'm wondering is what is different between 3-16 vs 3-18.3.  Nothing in the release notes seems to point to anything I can action Steinberg on.

Thanks

  • andia
  • ADAT user
  • Offline
  • Registered: 2009-06-01
  • Posts: 17

Re: Digiface Dante, Driver 3183, ASIO problems

I had maybe a similar encounter with digiface dante on 3.18 and liveprofessor on a mac machine running 10.13.6.

I updated to 3.18 and in liveprofessor, when i changed buffersizes the program would report the audio device (digiface dante) being on and off in fast interwalls. this lead to the machine being very slow and unresponsive with a high cpu-load in liveprofessor.

went back to 3.16 and all was good again. this machine is only used for liveprofessor, nothing else happens on it.