Bump

hello,

I am experiencing similar problem with a FireFace400-UC on a MacBookPro with OSX 10.6.4 bought in april 2010.
Anyone found a solution ?
Rebooting either soundcard and/or computer doesn't work for me...
Here is what I experienced and sent to RME support (no response from them so far) :

//////////// mail #1

I have trouble with a RME-fireface400 UC that I bought recently (new).
I have installed the lastest drivers and did firmware update.
Soundboard is detected correctly but produces awfull noisy/crunchy sound, somehow as if sample rates or clock would not match, plus some ~8Hz crunchy beating frequency.
I tried with the following software, always getting the same dirty result :
- Ableton Live
- Cycling74' Max5
- Audacity
- Quicktime / iTunes

Here are my system information :
- MaxBookPro 2.8Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo
- Memory : 4Go 1067 MHz DDR3
- OSX 10.6.5

//////////// mail #2

To give you a more precise idea of what my problem *sounds like*, here is a 8s audio example of what Igor Stravinsky's "Italian Suite Introduction" sounds like when played through my RME fireface 400 UC.
I searched in web-forums to find a hint on what the problem can be, but I really can't find anything wrong in my setup.

NB : I uploaded the sound on this link : Igor Stravinsky throuh Fireface UC so that forum users can listen to what the trouble sounds like...

//////////// mail #3

OK, I went back to the soundcard reseller yesterday and we ran tests for more than a hour.

- On a MacPro OSX 10.5.4 with Digidesign driver installed
First we tried to install the fireface-UC on a MacPro with OSX 10.5.4, the card was merely not recognized by the audio system.
Device was correctly showing in the USB devices in the system information panel, but not appearing in the sound configuration panel (in Preferences)
along with built-in device.
According to the tech guy in the shop, this could be due to (quote) "the presence of Digidesign driver that fuck the sytem"

So we tried on another MacPro with 0SX 10.5.4
And here, the fireface UC appeared correctly after we installed the driver and the sound was good.

So... I am happy that the hardware seems OK, but I still have the trouble on my MacBookPro, as the sound is very noisy (as I sent you an audio example in my previous email) while I play with exact same settings as we did in the reseller shop.

The only differences I can see are :
- computer is a MacBookPro, not a MacPro
- system version is OSX 10.6.5 (aka Snow Leopard),  not 10.5.4 (aka Leopard)

Do you think of anything else that could be wrong ?
Did you perform tests on a similar computer + system ?
Did you encounter any problem like that ?

Thanks in advance for any hint, please do help me (!!!), et do not hesitate to ask for more info if you need it.

I do not have any NI instrument, so I cannot tell anything on this point.
But yes, what I hear (and you can hear in the audio example posted above) could be something like broken USB transfer.

I do not have any VMware installed, so it is probably not the culprit (or say, not the *only* culprit).

---

Some new things since my previous post, I manually removed the Fireface driver by following these instructions : http://www.rme-audio.de/forum/viewtopic.php?id=9233.

Then re-installed the lastest drivers, and magic, the sound was OK when I played some MP3 through VLC.
I did a test on the 6 analog audio output with Max/MSP audiotester, and sound was fine.

Then I launched Ableton Live and  try to play a (light) session (no RAM/disk overload to accuse), and I encountered some ~8 Hz glitchy clicks.

These clicks were not due to Live, as they appeared as well in any other audio app I would use at the same time.

I had to switch OFF, then ON the Fireface to get a clean sound back.

Here's where I am at, for now. Some things better but I'm still far from being confident to use the Fireface for a live performance...

If anyone find the nasty bits causing all these troubles, please scream it loud around here.

Since the clicks I mentionned in earlier post (that disappeared after setting OFF/ON the fireface), I had no further trouble until now. I hope this will last and I will jump back on this list if any new information on this topic.

That is a good point that you mention, Timur, that settings such as audio buffer length but also samping rate, and maybe some other soft/hardware settings are modified by Live (but no only). I am not sure what caused the trouble,  but I'll keep an eye on this if the problem happen again.

Thanks a lot anyway for your help and tips.

Bumping on same topic again....

I have a question that would maybe save me some time, while the problem has not been fixed with the drivers :
is it possible to reboot the RME drivers *without* rebooting the computer ?

I tried the following command found on this forum :
sudo kill -9 `ps ax|grep 'coreaudio[a-z]' |awk '{print $1}'`
which seems to kill (and automatically reboot, i guess) CoreAudio driver, but it doesn't seem to addect the Fireface drivers.

Switching on/off and unplug/replug the sound card doesn't help either.

Not rebooting the computer would still save some time when the problem occurs...

RME developpers :  please !

i have the same problem here...

...quite annoying...

A utility to reset the drivers etc. would be great - just as long as we didn't need to reboot the MAC to get everything working after every unplugging

/br

Take a look in the Console application- Do a search in All Messages for: IOAudioStream

Then look for an error message that contains: IOAudioStream - Error: attempting to clip to a position more than one buffer ahead of last clip position

Look in the Console immediately after a dropout/glitch & you'll probably see this error message occurring at the same time as the glitch.

I'm having the same dropout/glitch problem which are associated with these error messages. I'm going to contact Apple & report back. My next test will be using the built-in MacBook Pro audio output to see if I have the same dropouts.

Does anyone in RME support have any info regarding these IOAudioStream errors?

Yep it happened during my practice this morning and lo and behold:

2/28/11 8:20:53 AM    kernel    IOAudioStream[0x94a6100]::clipIfNecessary() - Error: attempting to clip to a position more than one buffer ahead of last clip position (1d7,6e8)->(1d9,678).
2/28/11 8:20:53 AM    kernel    IOAudioStream[0x94a6100]::clipIfNecessary() - adjusting clipped position to (1d8,6e8)

I will try using my rme standalone and using the outs to go into the macbook pro's audio in so I can keep my setup yet use the built in audio. I'll let you know what I find.

@Oblique Strategies- Here is a recent quote from Tim Exile saying that he can't use his Macbook pro i7 for live performance because he can't get around the CPU Speedstepping. He uses a Macbook white and uses coolbook software to disable speedstepping.

I have also raised this issue, but from what I know, it has been with certain macs for some years. I think the issue was confirmed, but no solution so far. It is really annoying.

Does anyone in RME support have any info regarding these IOAudioStream errors?

"Does anyone in RME support have any info regarding these IOAudioStream errors?"

Oblique Strategies,

Maybe we should start another thread. I feel like we're invisible.

We did a global check of the current Mac performance on all our 6 Macs in the lab and did not find anything unusal. Therefore we have written a small monitoring tool for the hardware's playback FIFO, working with the Babyface and Fireface UC. A typical display for a simple iTunes playback at 44.1 kHz would be

Fireface UC test
Samples in Out FIFO:
MIN:  6
MAX: 7

At 96 kHz you would see MIN: 12 and MAX: 13

If the playback is disturbed you might see completely different values. Please check it out.

https://archiv.rme-audio.de/download/Fi … C_Test.zip

Hello. I have the same problem with my new Babyface on Mackbook Pro 2009. OSX: 10.6.6. Firmware: 179. Drivers: 1.50.
It sounds the same as two samples above. In my case the problem appears when i unplug USB cable, then plug it again. Reboot helps to put things right.
Fireface_UC_Test shows the same min:6 max:7 at 44100 when sound is distorted and when everything is ok.
On Vaio-Z with Windows 7 x64 have no issues by the time.

p.s.I'd be glad to help with beta-testing this issue.

I also did the same thing as bbred did with the exact setup as bbred has: macbook pro 2009, 10.6.6 1.79, 1.50.
The problem with my Babyface--the distorted sound when it is unpluged and plugged back in--continues. And the "Fireface_UC_Test" shows no change with or without the problem: min-6, max-7 at 44100.

@MC: Are you and RME aware of this issue? Are you working on it to resolve this issue?

Something must characterize us/the macbooks  with the fault - we're evidently a few across the world with the same issue

...i wouldn't mind having to run a script or something, as long as I didn't have to reboot!

Otherwise - the sound is GREAT from my new fireface uc!

br

I get the problem everytime i switch the soundcard from one mac to another.

I should have tried that before I made the Win7 bootcamp partition:)

I did end up removing the second HD because I couldn't install Windows from the external dvd drive. I also put that drive in an external case and now have that second hard drive hooked up to the firewire 800 port. So it would be easy to test it out now and see if it makes a difference in OSX.

If it does solve the problems, it'll be pretty funny that I just spent 24 hours going through the process of setting up windows 7 on the MBP but I guess either way it's good to keep my IT skills healthy and I learned a lot.

How did you "boot your old MacBook" (and what model is it)? Did you put the new hd into the old one or did you boot from the old ones installation? Or did you boot from the new ones installation on the old Macbook via FireWire connection to the new one?

So you used the new MBP as external harddrive for the old MB via Firewire, effectively running the old MB with the new installation. That part I understand.

But how did you then connect the UC to the new MBP while running the old MB ("plugged the fireface into the new mbp and playback seemed to work fine")? Does Target Disk mode allow USB ports of the new MBP to be shared with the old MB (not that I know of, but I never tried)?

Or did you mean that you connected the UC to the old MB while running from the new MBP's drive?

Ok I finally got rid of the distortion, I tried reinstalling the updated firmware again and now everything seems to be working fine. Jeff Petersen at Synthax was very helpful.

The obvious solution to that would be to increase buffer size, but that would not indicate a driver issue IMHO.

Regards
Daniel Fuchs
RME

Just to clarify my particular issue:
The drop outs I am experiencing are not like those I have typically experienced due to the buffer settings manually set too low. When I have experimented with buffer settings I usually get more than one dropout per session.

The problem I have is that I am getting ONE highly noticeable dropout per session. Fortunately, this is not occurring every time I use the FFUC, but quite often.

I can get this after running Live for hours, or only a few minutes after launching Live. I also can get these with the most minimal session possible: one soundfile (a pre-recorded song) playing. No plugins, no midi, etc.

So while it may indeed be my buffer settings, I don't recall ever getting drop outs with any other audio I/O with buffer settings as high as 512 samples. I've used a Multiface with both PCMCIA & Expresscard interfaces & had better latency.

Also, I do not get these dropouts with iTunes, QuickTime, or the DVD Player, so Ableton is certainly a possible culprit.

I have seen the performance & stability of my FFUC improve with almost each driver update. Hence, I conclude that it can continue to improve with subsequent, better drivers from RME. When's the next one due?

I'll download Reaper & test it out.

Which do you suggest for my purposes:
OS X Intel (7.9MB DMG)
OS X 64-bit Intel (9.2MB DMG) beta

I am running at 64-bit, but don't really want to be a beta-tester!