Topic: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

Funny story -
Today I checked my new Digiface Dante (DD)
After setting up everything in a proper functional condition, I noticed that all USB3 ports of my
HP Z420 are not usable together with Samplitude ProX4.
Before starting Samplitude everything seems to work fine. Even the settings dialog shows no errors.
When I start Samplitude everything stays good.
But when I open a Vip (Session) the settings dialog shows
a steady Fifo Error count.
Even Audio is affected in a grizzly way. It is not related to buffer size adjustments.

If I do the connection through one of my USB2 ports, everything works perfect.
Even with an opened samplitude vip/session. No underruns down to 64 samples!

My source is Samplitude => Dante Virtual Soundcard => ethernet port of my Lenovo Thinkpad => into primary port of DD.
No Madi devices connected. DD is clock-master.

Kind regards
Stefan

2

Re: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

Latest driver AND latest firmware update for the 'DD' applied?

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

Latest Drivers/Software:
Dante Controller, DVS, and 'DD' -yes!
Did not check the firmware of 'DD' yet!
The Z420 is a Win10 machine.
The Lenovo is a Win7 machine.
Both OS's last Update not older than 6 weeks.

I'll have a look on the firmware version! in

Just to clearify, the FIFO Error starts when I open a project (Vip).
Before that, I get an absolute perfect audio signal through Total Mix.
No FIFO Errors.
This does not happen, when I use USB2!
Allthough I assume that the overall performance of USB2 will be less than that of a healthy USB3.

Thank you for reply
Stefan

4

Re: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

From the readme:

Driver V 0.9685 / 0.9406 (06/25/2019)- Added support for MIDI over MADI for MADI I/O of Digiface Dante. Requires firmware 36.

Firmware 06/12/2019: Digiface Dante V 36: Increased compatibility of the coaxial MADI Out. MIDI over MADI for MADI I/O added. Attention: This firmware version requires Net driver version 0.9406 or higher! Older driver versions are no longer compatible.

Current net driver is 0.9442.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

Firmwareversion has been already 36
The driver is (and was) "driver_madinet_win_09700_09442"

Best
Stefan

6

Re: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

Ok, that out of the way try to use a different USB 3 cable and make sure to run the DF Dante with its included power supply. If it still fails the only way to make sure the DF Dante is not defective is to use it with a different computer.

I would bet that the HP is the problem, though. It uses a server board with C602 chipset which does not have USB 3 at all. That means USB 3 has been added by third party chipsets, needs special drivers and might be just broken.

A dedicated USB 3 PCIe card might be a solution if nothing else helps.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

Re: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

I tried to help myself using external powersupply already. It did not bring any difference.

Yes - USB3 it's third party on this board.
It's Texas Instruments.
I'll try to get dedicated drivers for that.

Thanks for your help
Stefan

Re: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

When the first RME USB 3.0 Interface, the XT was released we found that the USB Controller from Ti is not compatible. It had issues with the iso transfers.
Please use USB 3 Controllers form Intel, AMD, Nec or Fresco. The first controller from ASMEDIA was also not compatible, but newer ones are.
If you notice CRC32 errors you probably have a problem with the cable (or signal integrity) or layout of the USB controller board. 10G USB ports are more likely to work.

Re: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

I can recommend 5m Lindy USB cable, it has 3 (!) shields and work phantastic. With a 5m USB cable you are so much more flexible in positioning the devices.

https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B07F6W … &psc=1

I made the experience that USB devices can influence each other somehow. My server board with C612 chipset was usually able to drive two (!) UFX+ very reliably. This changed once I started to add more USB devices like i.e. Bluetooth and USB3 hub.

Those issues I could fix with an additional USB3 PCIe card which fully isolates the recording interfaces from the rest of the USB infrastructure of the system.

The UFX+ manual gives a list of compatible / tested USB3 controller that work very well.

I got a very special card, Sonnet Allegro Pro (old model with 4 x FL1100 USB3 chips),
https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/son … 79334.html
which is sadly not available anymore.
A little unfortunate that the vendor uses the same name for newer cards with different chipset.
Not cheap (around €150) because it has 4 USB3 controllers on the card, so ideally if you want to connect more than one recording interface. But it needs a free PCIe socket with 4 PCIe lanes connected to it. Not all boards provide this. And careful if you use a second x16 socket, not that your main GPU changes from x16 to x8 operation mode.

Sonnet also offers another card, Allegro (without Pro) which has only one FL1100 chipset shared between the 4 ports of the card. If you connect only one or two recording interfaces, then this should be well enough.
But you should look closely whether it still has the FL1100 chipset.

Another maybe even important thing is to look at the USB drivers. The Sonnet card uses MSI (message signalled interrupts) which work more efficient compared to a pure IRQ based driver model, esp under load.

But as uwekirst says there are also other USB controllers which meanwhile work very well.

I upgraded my PC later with this card to get USB 3.1 gen2 speed with UASP support (USB attached SCSI protocol IIRR)
for high throughput backup purposes:
https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/sta … 03149.html

Those ASMedia chipsets (ASMedia ASM2142) also work very well with the UFX+ and also work with MSI.
So such a card could also be a good alternative to Sonnet cards with FL1100 chip.
But those USB 3.1 gen 2 cards are also high speed cards which require a free PCIe socket with 4 PCIe lanes.

If your mainboard has such a 3rd party ASM2142 chip (or the newer one) on board, then you should be fine to isolate the recording interface behind this chip. You only need to locate the USB connectors on your mainboard which are fed by this chip.

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub14

10 (edited by Carlhynce 2020-01-10 11:58:56)

Re: Digiface Dante Fifo Error USB3 Samplitude ProX4

Thank you for all the useful information.

It was a kind of experimental arrangement to learn and check about the whole thing.
And even becoming better in my Dante knowledge.
In order not buying a second DanteVirtualSoundcard (one license I do have on my laptop) I choosed the known direction of connection.
Which in fact was and is a limitation of possibilities.
I have to give in that the Xeon Z420 was never intended to work with DD finaly,
because it´s my main postpro machine and normaly connected
through my (very old but still working ;-) HDSP 9652.
My laptop is equipped with onboard first party intel usb3 ports.
So I will buy another license of DVS to have the opportunity doing
my experimental arrangement even the other way around, which propably will work.