• Registered: 2007-05-01
  • Posts: 104

Topic: What happens if I change Firewire cards?

Hi,

Using a FF400 on WinXP and having random host DAW software lockups, so was contemplating changing from a PCIe firewire card back to a PCI card.  Both are TI chipset.

What will happen if I do this?

Is it a change handled within the OS, so that it is transparent to the FF400 and RME Windows drivers, as well as host software, or will I have to re-install or re-initialize things again??    I'm sure the host software (Sonar) will be fine as long as the I/O mappings remain the same (which they should).  But I'm not sure what the impact will be on the RME drivers.....  I *think* the XP OS minport and/or class drivers will handle the card swap transparently to the RME drivers as well, but I'm not sure.

Anyone .... ???

Sonic

  • ramses
  • DAW Mastermind
  • Offline
  • From: UTC+1
  • Registered: 2012-10-14
  • Posts: 12,888

Re: What happens if I change Firewire cards?

TI chipset is not TI chipset, i.e. XIO2200A is bugged, which chipsets do you have on these cards ?

The RME Firewire driver will detect the device, no matter whether you use a PCI or PCIe firewire interface.

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub13

3 Reply by SonicExplorer (edited by SonicExplorer 2018-05-17 23:32:07)

  • Registered: 2007-05-01
  • Posts: 104

Re: What happens if I change Firewire cards?

ramses wrote:

TI chipset is not TI chipset, i.e. XIO2200A is bugged, which chipsets do you have on these cards ?

The RME Firewire driver will detect the device, no matter whether you use a PCI or PCIe firewire interface.


The PCIe is the Syba/IoCrest card that seems rather common (SY-PEX30016 with TI Chipset XIO2213BZAY).
http://www.sybausa.com/index.php?route= … uct_id=119
This one is a TI chipset AFIK...it was recommended on the forum so please let me know if this chipset is not Ok....

The PCI card in my old W2K system is an Adaptec (red board) which I'm certain is a pure TI chipset.  Ran that for 10+ years without even a single Firewire issue.


Lock-up randomly happens when I stop the transport (sometimes when I start) but never during playing or recording.  Only the host software (Sonar 5) locks up, nothing else.  Even the FF400 still seems responsive inside Total Mix.  Sometimes I can go hours with no problem, sometimes only 10 minutes before lockup.   Never had any problem on my old W2K system with identical software and plugins.  Rebuilt a  DAW using XP and now this lockup problem.   Otherwise, everything works great.

Sonic

*** UPDATE ***

Lock-up was determined to be unrelated to the firewire card. Rather it was a software component in the DAW that was having issues running correctly on a multi-processor machine.