My scope system has been running fine until this started happening.
Sometimes my samplerate settings window shows the following behaviour
1. My samplerate flashes on and off
2. The SPDIF red light comes on
It looks like it's trying to lock to a signal on the spdif input but there is nothing there. Even when If I disconnect my cable utter is still does it. but play some generic audio like a wav file and it settles down. Leave it for a while with no audio playing and the computer idle and it will start again.
The problem is if I go and make a cup of coffee and come back in 15-20 mins I have to reboot to get the samplerate stable and playing audio. This is so annoying and distruptive to my creativity. I seem to spend more time fixing things these dayz than making music. Has anyone experienced this before.?
This just started happening ... im pulling my hair out.
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AndrewTurnerAUS
- Posts: 21
- Joined: Sun Feb 29, 2004 4:00 pm
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AndrewTurnerAUS
- Posts: 21
- Joined: Sun Feb 29, 2004 4:00 pm
remove the card from the slot and carefully push it in again, so it really fits - double check that it's perfectly aligned and sits properly, then tighten screws again.
sometimes thermal stress or a bump against the PC case can make the card slightly slip off it's position - then those symptoms may show up.
It's almost invisible - I've experienced similiar effects with a badly fitting Adat connector once. To get it into position more force was needed and apparently that force displaced the card
cheers, Tom
sometimes thermal stress or a bump against the PC case can make the card slightly slip off it's position - then those symptoms may show up.
It's almost invisible - I've experienced similiar effects with a badly fitting Adat connector once. To get it into position more force was needed and apparently that force displaced the card
cheers, Tom
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AndrewTurnerAUS
- Posts: 21
- Joined: Sun Feb 29, 2004 4:00 pm
Thanks for the info astroman. I did re-seat the cards and made sure they were correctly fitted but the problem is still happening. I am upgrading my system in the next week so I might give a fresh install and new hardware a go. A reboot does fix the problem but i am concerned that my cards are reaching the end of their life.
Cheers
Andrew
Cheers
Andrew
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AndrewTurnerAUS
- Posts: 21
- Joined: Sun Feb 29, 2004 4:00 pm
A friend of mine had a problem (blocked eeprom) 2 years ago and he sent the baord and received it with no problem (i mean the board was repaired). If i rmemeber well, it costed 100€ or something which is worth it considering the devices and the original price of such a product. Just ask Ralf how it works (they will give you a DMA number that must be written in order that your board can be tracked from A to Z ...). Good luck !
Jo
Jo
As it happens I had my first Luna 2 card which did exactly as you described,I might add this was a card on its own I sent it to Germany to be repaired.The card was unusable for 18 months without the help of Creamware Tech Support I Might add (You Know Who You are ) .Anyway If it's the same problem as I had It, may be the capacitors on the card.Personally If keeps up or breaks down completely send it to soniccore straight away It cost me 40 euros.
Good Luck
Richard Hargrave.
Good Luck
Richard Hargrave.
Core2Quad Q9400 2.66Ghz, Asus P5Q EPU,Radeon HD4350 4Gb Ram,320Gb 7200Rpm,Windows 7 Pro 32 bit,Cubase 4+5,NI Komplete 5+6, Scope 5 - Mix&Master - Synth&Sampler,Pulsar II Classic - PulsarII XTC,.Core2duo 3.00Ghz.Presonus Firestudio Tascam FW1884
actually the only things with some probability to break are electrolytic capacitors and an eeprom suffering from amnesia.
But for any of these the rate of failures compared to software and mobo configuration errors is extremely low - speaking for the good production quality of the items.
there may be mechanical wearout of the cablewhip, as occasinally reported - anything else is more than exotic. Sh*t happens, tho, from time to time
as simple as it may look to replace a capacitor - the boards are very, very sensitive regarding soldering - only do it if you consider yourself experienced enough - or if you don't care to possibly trash it
cheers, Tom
But for any of these the rate of failures compared to software and mobo configuration errors is extremely low - speaking for the good production quality of the items.
there may be mechanical wearout of the cablewhip, as occasinally reported - anything else is more than exotic. Sh*t happens, tho, from time to time
as simple as it may look to replace a capacitor - the boards are very, very sensitive regarding soldering - only do it if you consider yourself experienced enough - or if you don't care to possibly trash it
cheers, Tom
Not being counted among the very bright......
I had this same problem with my Pulsar 1 (1999) It first started when I scraped my motherboard with a screwdriver and had to buy another one. (10/2004) The new motherboard was an NVidia chipset. When the samplerate was set to master it locked in solid but when it was set to slave to an external ADAT clock it would blink on and off. Shortly thereafter my allkeys stopped working and Ralf has since hooked me up with new keys. (08/2006) I was only able to get a solid external lock after reducing the performance of the system in the BIOS. (I'm sorry but I do not remember which settings did the trick) Unfortunately it made the whole system very crashable and I have since given up.
Not being counted among the very brave......
The card now is linked to my other two scope project cards and is working fine as extra DSP. (AMD athlon64 3500 VIA chipset) I have not dared to try the samplerate as the other two scope cards are sufficient for my I/O needs and my Karma is telling me not to mess with it.
My 2 cents
- the combo of allkeys taking the dive and samplerate problems says something's wrong with the card
or
- the problem is with certain types of motherboards/chipsets that these boards don't like which I have read numerous times in this forum.
My suggestion is try it in one of the suggested motherboards/chipsets and see if it solves your problem, otherwise I would send it to SonicCore and have them look at it, since yours is a Pulsar 2 it would probably be money well spent. I am very interested to know the outcome of this as well since I never did really solve the problem, just sidestepped it and am very happy that I still have use of this card after 8 1/2 yrs.
Dan
I had this same problem with my Pulsar 1 (1999) It first started when I scraped my motherboard with a screwdriver and had to buy another one. (10/2004) The new motherboard was an NVidia chipset. When the samplerate was set to master it locked in solid but when it was set to slave to an external ADAT clock it would blink on and off. Shortly thereafter my allkeys stopped working and Ralf has since hooked me up with new keys. (08/2006) I was only able to get a solid external lock after reducing the performance of the system in the BIOS. (I'm sorry but I do not remember which settings did the trick) Unfortunately it made the whole system very crashable and I have since given up.
Not being counted among the very brave......
The card now is linked to my other two scope project cards and is working fine as extra DSP. (AMD athlon64 3500 VIA chipset) I have not dared to try the samplerate as the other two scope cards are sufficient for my I/O needs and my Karma is telling me not to mess with it.
My 2 cents
- the combo of allkeys taking the dive and samplerate problems says something's wrong with the card
or
- the problem is with certain types of motherboards/chipsets that these boards don't like which I have read numerous times in this forum.
My suggestion is try it in one of the suggested motherboards/chipsets and see if it solves your problem, otherwise I would send it to SonicCore and have them look at it, since yours is a Pulsar 2 it would probably be money well spent. I am very interested to know the outcome of this as well since I never did really solve the problem, just sidestepped it and am very happy that I still have use of this card after 8 1/2 yrs.
Dan
I am 99% sure you got a bad card on your hands. I had the same problem with my Pulsar 2 card for a looooong time , tried all the software tweeks possible, but the samplelock on the damn card kept going on and off. I finnally sent it to creamware for repair (and then kept calling them for the next 3 months as it was in the middle of Sonic core takeover). When I finnaly got hold of the repair guy (most helpful by the way ) he could tell me that some cards produced before a certain date had a thinner print card and PCI slots on some motherboards had problems because of this. (dont think that this was the case for my card) As for my card; he could see no obvious reason for my problems. All his tests showed that it was ok. Creamware finnaly sent me a replacement card (Thanks to the repair guy and Mr.Wolf Roth who went into actionman modus) and now my card is the most stable and trustworthy companion ever to be spawned in the land of scope.... And it makes a world of difference.
As for sending it for repair... I would buy a spare card to be used while the other one is in repair cos it's gonna take forever to get it back- And forever without the possibility to record your music is not worth the money you "save" by waiting for your card to be repaired.
Endre70
As for sending it for repair... I would buy a spare card to be used while the other one is in repair cos it's gonna take forever to get it back- And forever without the possibility to record your music is not worth the money you "save" by waiting for your card to be repaired.
Endre70
If you havent had Pulsar hardware problems, then you really don't know what pain is..........
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CarvinGuitarFreak
- Posts: 130
- Joined: Wed Sep 20, 2006 4:00 pm
bump
Hi AndrewTurnerAUS,
Did you get this problem sorted? I had this problem when I used an external USB HDD (not sharing IRQ). I had to reinstall Scope, it seems to be fixed. I also had to switch of all unused USB (all but one for midi), Firewire, serial etc and made sure that IRQ was not being shared. Scope does not like sharing.
Im sure that this is not the problem... Have you got in contact with Creamware/Sonicore... Im trying at the moment but no luck yet! I think one of my cards is failing....
CGF
Did you get this problem sorted? I had this problem when I used an external USB HDD (not sharing IRQ). I had to reinstall Scope, it seems to be fixed. I also had to switch of all unused USB (all but one for midi), Firewire, serial etc and made sure that IRQ was not being shared. Scope does not like sharing.
Im sure that this is not the problem... Have you got in contact with Creamware/Sonicore... Im trying at the moment but no luck yet! I think one of my cards is failing....
CGF
Hi,
I had this problem recently when I upgraded my PC.
I solved it by:
- cleaning with an eraser all connectors (PCI and STDM)
- carefully re seating my cards (take care to constraint on the PCI connector
if your card is touching any MB components),
- and patiently re seating my STDM cables (old STDM cables connectors
become loose as they heat up, resulting in lost clock).
Hope it might helps (by the way ... it took me 2 months to solve it).
cheers
Michel
I had this problem recently when I upgraded my PC.
I solved it by:
- cleaning with an eraser all connectors (PCI and STDM)
- carefully re seating my cards (take care to constraint on the PCI connector
if your card is touching any MB components),
- and patiently re seating my STDM cables (old STDM cables connectors
become loose as they heat up, resulting in lost clock).
Hope it might helps (by the way ... it took me 2 months to solve it).
cheers
Michel
Hi Michael
I use the P2 by itself and I tried cleaning pci connections and reseating. Here is what I have sent Sonic Core who have only responded with repair upgrade prices so far (which I can't justify - to scope project eu710, to scope pro eu1250)
"It constantly switches clock settings, looking at the
sample rate box after about 5mins lights begin to flash randomly, sample
rate changes erratically. Connecting the d-sub cable to the classic
plate makes it much worse and it misbehaves immediately.
I run it as a single in a MSI 865GV intel chipset board. I have run two
of my other cards together in this machine with no problem, I am very
familiar with IRQ conflicts and how to solve.
With this troublesome board, just running it with no digital connections and as master causes
the same behavior. Running it with other motherboards has the same
problem."
So you see I have been scraping the forums and researching. I would like to be able to give it to my local tech with suggestions as to what components to check. I have also bought a classic i/o plate in case it is that. It arrives in 2 weeks. If not I have a spare.
I use the P2 by itself and I tried cleaning pci connections and reseating. Here is what I have sent Sonic Core who have only responded with repair upgrade prices so far (which I can't justify - to scope project eu710, to scope pro eu1250)
"It constantly switches clock settings, looking at the
sample rate box after about 5mins lights begin to flash randomly, sample
rate changes erratically. Connecting the d-sub cable to the classic
plate makes it much worse and it misbehaves immediately.
I run it as a single in a MSI 865GV intel chipset board. I have run two
of my other cards together in this machine with no problem, I am very
familiar with IRQ conflicts and how to solve.
With this troublesome board, just running it with no digital connections and as master causes
the same behavior. Running it with other motherboards has the same
problem."
So you see I have been scraping the forums and researching. I would like to be able to give it to my local tech with suggestions as to what components to check. I have also bought a classic i/o plate in case it is that. It arrives in 2 weeks. If not I have a spare.
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AndrewTurnerAUS
- Posts: 21
- Joined: Sun Feb 29, 2004 4:00 pm
Re: This just started happening ... im pulling my hair out.
Hi Guys,
As this was causing me no end of frustration I went out and bought a eleven rack and use PT and Cubase. A couple of days ago a friend and I tried to revive the cards and here are our findings.
1. The cable whip made no difference connected or disconnected.
2. I removed the I/O plate and installed the card, re-installed scope 4.5 and SFP ran fine. Enabled XTC mode and could use synths in cubase
3. removed the pulsar II board and installed the SRB board doing the same tests with SFP and XTC mode, no problems
4. installed both Pulsar II and SRB boards, connected the STDM cables and re-installed SFP, ran same tests, worked fine.
5. Re-attached the I/O plate and re-installed SFP, working for about 10 mins then same shit started happening
So I think I have narrowed it down to the I/O plate.
I guess the last test to try is to put the I/O plate on the SRB card and see if the same thing happens. If it does then I know the problem is with the I/O card. Does anyone know if the master clock is located on the classic I/O plate?
As this was causing me no end of frustration I went out and bought a eleven rack and use PT and Cubase. A couple of days ago a friend and I tried to revive the cards and here are our findings.
1. The cable whip made no difference connected or disconnected.
2. I removed the I/O plate and installed the card, re-installed scope 4.5 and SFP ran fine. Enabled XTC mode and could use synths in cubase
3. removed the pulsar II board and installed the SRB board doing the same tests with SFP and XTC mode, no problems
4. installed both Pulsar II and SRB boards, connected the STDM cables and re-installed SFP, ran same tests, worked fine.
5. Re-attached the I/O plate and re-installed SFP, working for about 10 mins then same shit started happening
So I think I have narrowed it down to the I/O plate.
I guess the last test to try is to put the I/O plate on the SRB card and see if the same thing happens. If it does then I know the problem is with the I/O card. Does anyone know if the master clock is located on the classic I/O plate?