Topic: HDSPe MADI FX records clicks on some MADI inputs

Hi everyone,

I hope someone can help me troubleshoot this problem.
I've recently switched from ADAT (HDSPe AIO nonpro) to MADI (HDSPe MADI FX) and since day one I'm having issues.
Whenever I try to record specific MADI channels (1, 2, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 & 18), there are clicks in the recorded signal. Tiny spikes, sometimes less than a second, sometimes 20 seconds apart, all reaching -12dB, but only on the channels listed above. Here is a short video of recording the spikes https://0ahnung.de/MADI%20Fehler.mkv.
The worst thing is that even the phones/line-out has these clicks whenever I play audio from the operating system (Windows10), making the card basically unusable.

I tried turning off my AD/DA converter, even disconnected the optical MADI cable from the card. That didn't change anything.
And after I got a replacement card from my distributor, which didn't change anything either, I'm pretty sure it's not a hardware problem.
I also tried different driver versions (2.16 and 2.18). Even attempted to update the firmware, but the updater tells me, I'm already at the most recent version.

The spikes are visible in DigiCheck, but they do not show up in TotalMix. They are not buffer-underruns, my system was and is capable of handling lots of tracks with multiple plugins each. DPC Latency Checker and LatencyMon both tell me 'the system appears to be suitable for handling real-time audio without dropouts'.

What else could I check/try? Has anyone got similar issues and got them solved somehow?

My system specs:

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X
32 GB RAM
Nvidia RTX3080
Mainboard MSI MPG X570 Gaming Plus

OS: Windows 10 Pro, Version 21H2
Driver HDSPe MADI FX: 2.18
TotalMix 1.76

Re: HDSPe MADI FX records clicks on some MADI inputs

What's the MADI signal source here?

Regards
Daniel Fuchs
RME

Re: HDSPe MADI FX records clicks on some MADI inputs

The source is a Ferrofish Pulse 16 MX via optical cable, but the spikes occur even if the cable is not plugged into the card.