How to connect DIGITAL OUT to Pulsar I card

Fevre · Post by **Fevre** » Wed Oct 05, 2005 7:25 am

Hi

I have a Pulsar I card Plus, which means XLR connections and therefore EBU/AES digital I/O. I recently bought a Focusrite ISA220 with AES/EBU DIGITAL to benefit from exactly this option, but Pulsar won't receive the wordclock from Focusrite. I put Pulsar in SLAVE mode and the the 44.1 kHz is replaced by a -. I have a genuine manufactured AES/EBU cable, so it should work just fine. What am I doing wrong? I must mention that the only Hardware I/O in the 3.0 software I can find to connect to the virtual mixer is one called SP/DIF SOURCE. I figured this was the one, but perhaps I'm missing one Hardware I/O "unit" called AES/EBU SOURCE. Does anyone know about this, PLEASE...??

Fevre

Post by **garyb** » Wed Oct 05, 2005 11:13 am

sp/dif source is right.
you need to sync to sp/dif in scope and set the mic pre to master(sp/dif) and NOT word clock. word clock uses an additional cable and requires the syncplate.

Fevre · Post by **Fevre** » Wed Oct 05, 2005 11:42 am

Hi Garyb!

Thanks for taking the time. Still it doesn't work. I may be a fool at this but please tell me:
Sync to SPDIF in Scope, where is it exactly? I've been to Samplerate settings, tried everything here, nothing works.

On the Focusrite there is no way to make it SPDIF master. I can pick which samplerate I want, the amount of bits and if I want an external wordclock in. Nothing about DIGITAL OUT, which I assumed would be the state it's in when nothing is pressed or chosen! Do you know this machine?

Regards
Henrik

Mr Arkadin · Post by **Mr Arkadin** » Wed Oct 05, 2005 11:53 am

i don't know the Focusrite, but maybe you're trying this the wrong way round. i have a Podxt Pro which looks at the incoming AES signal to clock to, with Pulsar as the master. Maybe you should set Pulsar as the master and clock the Focusrite to that. is there an option to set the Focusrite to clock from AES?

Fevre · Post by **Fevre** » Wed Oct 05, 2005 12:55 pm

Hi there

Thanks for taking the time.

There is no AES IN on the Focusrite, only out + SPDIF OUT and OPTICAL OUT. There is a wordclock in, but that requiers a wordclock out from the Pulsar card, and there is none, as far as I can see.

Regards
Henrik

Mr Arkadin · Post by **Mr Arkadin** » Wed Oct 05, 2005 1:50 pm

It looks like you require the separate Sync Plate then i'm afraid, or you could use the balanced out on the Focusrite (i'm sure it will be balanced

) into your Pulsar's balanced input, the Pulsar converters are pretty good.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Mr Arkadin on 2005-10-05 14:51 ]</font>

Post by **garyb** » Wed Oct 05, 2005 1:54 pm

with that pre, i'm pretty sure that you need scope to be slave unless you have wordclock and a syncplate. the samplerate dialog in scope should show a red light by sp/dif(aes/ebu...they're the same, aes/ebu is balanced +4db, sp/dif is unbalanced -20db). setting scope to slave and selecting sp/dif as the source(put black point in the spot by sp/dif(or aes/ebu). there's not much more to it than that....of course the sp/dif source module must be connected properly to the mixer(or whatever you are monitoring)and you do need to have the focusright connected to the sp/dif input. you will likely have to use a converter box if one unit is sp/dif and the other is aes/ebu. also, be sure that you have a 75ohm digital cable. do not set the pre to wordclock.

good luck!

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: garyb on 2005-10-05 14:55 ]</font>

Fevre · Post by **Fevre** » Thu Oct 06, 2005 7:18 am

Hi Garyb

It says 110 Ohm on the cable, but this was the only AES/EBU cable they had, so I figured it was the right and only one for the machine. Could this be my problem?

Regards
Henrik

Post by **garyb** » Thu Oct 06, 2005 8:34 am

excuse me, 110ohm is correct for balanced aes/ebu...

this really should work.

at0m · Post by **at0m** » Fri Oct 07, 2005 8:02 am

Also, keep in mind some earlier p1's can't slave to S/P-DIF.

Post by **garyb** » Fri Oct 07, 2005 12:32 pm

wow, must be REALLY early ones. mine does. well, if that's the case, you might need a newer card or there might be a fix available. contact cwa.

Fevre · Post by **Fevre** » Fri Oct 07, 2005 2:42 pm

thanks everyone. i'll look into it all.

Fevre