1 Topic by stukiedo (edited by stukiedo 2012-05-20 15:52:07)

  • Registered: 2012-05-20
  • Posts: 3

Topic: Anybody got a Fireface 800 & Saffire 56 Working togeather?

Hi All,

I've got a Fireface 800 and a Saffire 56 with a Focusrite Dynamic Ocotpre connected to the Saffire via ADAT, the problem I have is as soon as both devices are switched on together and connected to my MAC via firewire, the Fireface gets swamped and starts to drop out, I also loose my Focusrite Liquidmix 32 which is also Firewire I've tried making the Saffire the master clock but still no joy,the MAC has 3 Firewire ports and all three devices are connected to separate ports (not daisy chained)

Anybody who has a similar set-up your help would be greatly appreciated   

Stuart

2 Reply by fishbone (edited by fishbone 2012-05-21 18:52:11)

  • Registered: 2010-02-22
  • Posts: 29

Re: Anybody got a Fireface 800 & Saffire 56 Working togeather?

Hi Stuart,

I have an identical setup as yours and, after a lot of trial an error, I came to the conclusion that this configuration stresses the firewire bus and cannot work as expected. Although Macs have multiple firewire ports(iMac in my case), they all share the same firewire bus, and seems that DSP operations going on Saffire and LiquidMix demands too much bandwidth to be handled with a single firewire bus.

Because of that, my final solution was to hook up my FF800 to Saffire with ADAT(after making the needed patching in totalmix), and use Saffire as the master clock, since Saffire seems to be very pick about that and I couldn't make it function as slave in that configuration either. You will loose totalmix functionality(which requires firewire connection to work) with that configuration, but it's the trade off I had to live with to use all my inputs simultaneously.

The good news is that there are a bunch of thunderbolt/firewire800 adapters planned to come to the market at reasonable prices in the near future, which will allow us to use it to ad another separate firewire bus to hookup FF800 in all it's glory... unless you are willing to spend big bucks with a Apple Thunderbolt display, which will also give you a separate firewire buss as a bonus.

Hope this help.

see ya

Marcus

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  • Registered: 2012-03-13
  • Posts: 4

Re: Anybody got a Fireface 800 & Saffire 56 Working togeather?

I've got a UFX and an LS56 running together however I run the UFX via USB and the LS56 into the UFX ADAT 1. I set the LS56 I/O via the Saffire MixControl and hit save to hardware so it would run standalone without having to connect it to the computer through the FW port. It leaves TotalMix functionality and If I have to access the LS56 I can bring up the MixControl via FW to change the Liquid pres etc.

I realize the FF800 does not have USB connectivity but I'd try running the LS56 in to ADAT 1 and the Octopre into ADAT 2 on the FF800 with the FF800 master. Seems like you should be able to get a workable setup there.

  • Registered: 2012-05-20
  • Posts: 3

Re: Anybody got a Fireface 800 & Saffire 56 Working togeather?

Many thanks to you both for your help; I have a high end Hackintosh which I run in the studio (which works flawlessly) so I do have the option to install another FW card although I’m not sure if the bus limitation is hardware or OS?

Could I please trouble you both for a snapshot/configuration file of both your total mix/Mix Control settings so I can understand your routing?

Like I said, I also run a Liquid Mix 32 FW interface which goes off line if the S56 and it are both connected via FW!

I never thought this would be a limitation when I bought the S56, but I would love to get them both working together rather than trading the S56 for another FF 800

I’ll report back with my findings so hopefully other people in the same situation can find this solution

Stuart@merseysidemusic.co.uk

  • Registered: 2010-02-22
  • Posts: 29

Re: Anybody got a Fireface 800 & Saffire 56 Working togeather?

As far as I know, there's no OSX limitation to firewire busses, which is only a hardware issue in all standard mac configs. I don't know about hackintoshes, but if we can compare it to a MacPro, adding another PCI card with firewire will solve your problem, since it will operate in a different bus, eliminating the bus saturation problem. About totalmix routing(assuming that you will hook up FF800 to Saffire using ADAT), just make sure to map all your physical inputs to all correspondent ADAT outputs, so you be able to manage your ins/outs using Saffire Mix Manager.

Hope this help.

see ya

  • Registered: 2012-05-20
  • Posts: 3

Re: Anybody got a Fireface 800 & Saffire 56 Working togeather?

Yes, my hackintosh is very much a MacPro, It's using the same hardware, almost, but has saved me over £2,500 over the equivalent MacPro, I would highly recommend one as its crashed far fewer times than my iMac or my MacBook

I've just purchased another firewire card and I'll report back with the findings once fitted. nice to know that there is always the ADAT's to fall back to

Many thanks for your help

Stuart