Topic: MADI FX - Bad / weak AES I/O?
I recently purchased a MADI FX. I have it in a Sonnet Thunderbolt enclosure, connected to a 2012 Mac Mini. Current driver & firmware. Optical MADI and Wordclock I/O are fully functional. I have no way to test coaxial MADI.
The AES on this thing is a mystery. While TotalMix sees it physically looping back OK (even through 60ish feet of cable), it will neither send nor receive a valid AES signal to or from any piece of equipment I connect it to, regardless of the piece or the cable. Tried rebooting, switching between pro and consumer, and everything else I could think of in the driver (there's not much). Even the ADI-4 DD won't pick up what it's putting down. I've gone through a Kramer 466, a Broadcast Tools RDDA, and an RDL HR-DAC1 on the output side, as well as an RDL HR-ADC1 for input, all tried individually.
110Ω Cabling is solid – Belden, Mogami, all points checked repeatedly. The physical loopback worked the same even through Hosa cabling. The Kramer is the only thing I can move around, and that won't acknowledge an AES link even when directly connected to the card's DB-15 fanout.
I don't have a scope, but I do have a multimeter. I'm getting .1V AC between pins 2 and 3 of the AES output. Another unit's AES output measured .5V AC. I'm not sure whether this matters, but thought I'd include the info.
Any insight? Is this a known occasional issue on some batch of serial numbers? Any chance it could be a ribbon cable issue? Am I doing something wrong?