If fw/dm mkii without usb on dm3200?

[Gerk]

Just wanted to quickly check in as I've not tried this before, from what I remember in the past (maybe my memory is not serving me correctly) you were required to have both the FW and the USB connections in order to make things work as expected? Is it possible to run with just the FW connected?

Here's my scenario ... I'm using the DM3200 as a control surface on my main DAW setup (therefore using the USB connection), but I'd like to be able to connect the FW I/O to a second machine and route audio to and from the DM3200 that way (my keyboard/VI rig running on a 2009 Mac Pro tower). Does this sound feasible? Is anyone else doing anything similar? I can't easily test this out with my setup because I don't have a long enough FW400 to FW800 cable to patch it into my tower and I can't really move the tower, so before I buy a long enough cable I figured I would ask if anyone else is doing something similar or if I'm wasting my time ... on reading the IF FW/DM mkII manual it doesn't say anything about needing the USB connected. Also wondering how the word clock could work in this setup, does the FW also carry clock bi-directionally? I have the DM clocked to ADAT (my Apollo gear) so I would also need to be able to clock the Mac Pro to the FW if that's possible ...

 

[skier]

It's been a while since I tried this, but I did so when I first got my DM4800 about 5 years ago. In my case, I was not able to control my transport without using the USB cable, and wasn't able to get sound in and out of my DM without using FW. So, I needed both cables to interface with Pro Tools on my PC.

For Word Clock, you need a dedicated connection, usually with a 75 ohm coaxial cable having BNC connectors. While ADAT (lightpipe), AES/EBU and S/PDIF can carry embedded clock signals, you can usually select whether you want to use those signals for time synchronization or use Word Clock instead. And with both, you have to determine the Master and place all the other connected devices in Slave mode. TDIF signals don't have the ability to embed a clock source, so you must use Word Clock for that.

Years ago, I/O devices often had less reliable clocking and jitter problems were common. But today, using a clocking source with an embedded clock usually still results in a high-quality signal with low jitter, so you can go with it or use additional cables for Word Clock. However, I usually try to use the highest quality input device as the Master. I focus on the input device because, if the input signal is converted to digital with a bad clock, the stored digital stream is also of poor quality. Whereas, if you have a good quality digital signal and have an output device with bad D/A conversion, yes, it will sound bad, but all you need do is change to a better quality converter — the signal is still of good quality. That's not the case when the signal was brought into the digital domain with poor quality in the first place.

I hope this helps.

 

[Gerk]

Hi skier, thanks for the reply. I have a good understanding of work clock and the like, I just wasn't sure if the FW interface had any options for selecting the clock. In my case I have my Apollo gear set as the master (although I could externally clock everything with my MOTU MTP AV if I needed to as well).

So long story short here,I managed to figure out a way to get things all hooked up to test without having to buy new cables (I used an old unused FW hard drive case to bridge my long FW400 cable and a short FW400->800 cable) and fired things up and it's working as I hoped it would!

On my Mac Pro in the Audio Midi setup it says the clock for the IF FW/DM is "Internal" (not sure if that means it's internal to the FW card or the Mac Pro), but in testing it out I haven't had any clicks/pops or other obvious clock issues, so crossing my fingers that it's using the DM3200's clock setting (which is ADAT to my Apollo Interface).

Just when I thought I had maxed out the crazy things I could do with these consoles I discover even more uses for them!

I of course now regret selling my old IF AD/DM card because I would love to have a second ADAT connection available on the console now as then I would be able to do a full 16 channels back and forth with the keyboard/VI rig. I might keep my eyes open to see if I can find a cheap adat card to put in (which might be more of a pain than it's worth because I have a 2seemy in the second card slot, which I could move if I needed to).

 

[skier]

Hey Gerk, didn't mean to provide a refresher on clocking, just didn't know how much you knew and was hoping to help you get the best possible sound. Clearly, I realize that you understand that because you're using your Apollo as the Master, though as you said, the MOTU is also good.

As for using the old FW hard drive case as a bridge — great idea!

Though not a Mac user, I suspect the internal clock referred to by your Mac is the FW card in the DM because I don't think there is Word Clock capability on the Mac's mother board, is there?

Yeah, it's always difficult to know if you'll later regret selling a card. I have an F-SM/DM Surround card I might put up for sale. It's an expensive card and I use it less than I thought I would. But fear of future regret has kept me from doing so up to now.

 

[Gerk]

Funny enough I checked our local site for used stuff and I found a guy with 3 of the cards and he's selling them at a very reasonable price. I'm meeting up tomorrow to pick it up, just coordinating timing!

 

[skier]

FW cards or AD/DM cards?

 

[Gerk]

AD/DM cards, exactly what I was looking for.

 

[skier]

3 of them? Wow! I haven't seen very many of them lately. Got one a couple of years ago and they seem to have disappeared. Great find!

 

[Gerk]

Picked up the card and installed, it's working perfectly. Very happy!

 

[skier]

Great! But only got one?

 

[Gerk]

Yep I could only use one as I have a DM 3200 (which only takes 2 cards) and already had the FW card in slot 1.

 

[skier]

Didn't realize there are only two expansion slots on the DM3200.

Before signing off on this thread, I presume that you still do need to use both the FW and USB connections; am I correct? If not, I'd love to know how you were able to use just one or another so I have that option. Thanks!

 

[Gerk]

I was able to run the FW connection independently from my second computer without having to use the USB!

Here's the setup for future reference:

Main DAW (iMac) has DM-3200 USB plugged into it. I use the DM-3200 as a control surface with Pro Tools from this machine. Faders and transport working as expected.

Keyboard/VI rig (Mac Pro tower) has FW plugged into it. I'm able to use FW card fully (currently running 16 channels). Running Logic Pro X on this one.

DM-3200 onboard ADAT and ADAT card both patched into my UAD Apollo units (Apollo 8p and Apollo Twin Duo) for full 16 channels via adat. Apollo units are both plugged into DAW directly via Thunderbolt. Currently I have all 16 channels coming from Mac Pro sent back via the 16 busses, through ADAT and into main DAW. Main wordclock is Apollo. DM-3200 is set to use wordclock via ADAT. FW card uses local DM-3200 clock setting fine (on Logic rig the word clock is set to "local" with the FW card which uses whatever the DM-3200 clock is set to I'm guessing as it works perfectly).

Pro Tools and Logic are setup to sync via MTC (over network, not with directly old school midi connections). So I can now setup projects on both and hit the sync button and they are locked together with full 16 channels from VI's directly into Apollo hardware (can do realtime with plugins, etc). I can either capture midi locally in Pro Tools DAW and send to Logic rig for playback or I can record the midi directly in the Logic rig. I can also use a combination of both. For example last night I setup a drummer track directly on the Logic rig that was synced to a track in Pro Tools, then I added local midi tracks in Pro Tools and sent to an armed channel in Logic and it works realtime. It's actually pretty surprising how good the network midi is running. Latency is < 3ms.

It's all pretty slick if I do say so myself

 

[skier]

It truly is very slick, though not simple. There's far more going on there than I had realized, and I wouldn't want to try to debug a problem. That said, it also seems incredibly flexible as it appears you can send pretty much anything to almost anywhere else.

So, some questions:

1. If I understand this correctly, you actually have 32 channels of simultaneous input? 16 via FW into Logic, and 16 via Apollo/ADAT?

2. I presume that you finally consolidate the entire song into PT (which you called your main DAW) and save it that way?

3. Would it not be easier to run just PT on both machines so you could just copy the tracks from the Mac Pro to the iMac?

What am I missing?

 

[Gerk]

1. No. 16 channels FW from Mac Pro into dm 3200 then same 16 channels routed through Adat to iMac. So 16 channels direct from one workstation to the other, through th dm 3200.

2. Yes. When parts are complete I print into PT. but I can still revisit later to tweak and reprint as needed.

3. No. PT would need multiple licenses and it doesn't have the awesome instrument stuff that logic does.

 

[Gerk]

Also just to be clear the apollo stuff has other mic pres. so I also have 10 unison enabled mic pres direct to my PT machine as well as the additional 16 from the dm3200 adat.

 

[skier]

You've got a nice setup! Any photos to share?

 

[Gerk]

A little messy but here's a couple quick pics. THe desk that the DM-3200 is installed into is a custom one I had a local builder do for me (and it was still less than an Argosy 70 series at the time!). It was impossible to find a desk for a large-ish console like this where it was not the center piece so custom was the way to go. I LOVE that desk, it's built to my spec and does pretty much everything I wanted it to do

DAW


Keyboard Rig

 

[skier]

Gerk, good looking setup! I completely understand the preference for a custom desk. I ended up using a commercial workstation desk that I modified. I build furniture as one of my hobbies and that interest has been particularly helpful with the studio where I modified the workstation and built the equipment racks as well as a small assortment of other amenities. If interested, you can see my setup at:

http://www.tascamforums.com/threads/sharing-studio-ideas.4711/

But I especially appreciate your sharing your setup because I love the exchange of ideas where we all can benefit from the good ideas (and avoidance of the bad ones ) to make all our studios better and more enjoyable.

I did look at the Argosy series and others (Omnirax, Zaor, RAB, Sterling, Sound Construction, Studio Trends, etc.) and found the best ones more expensive than need be. Though, they can be a great source of ideas and inspiration.

 

[Gerk]

I added the above post to that thread so we can discuss it in there