Asio Clicks when receiving midi controller data

[Daniel]

Dear Board Members

After eight years I replaced my PC and upgraded to Scope 5. I am very happy to see that my trusty old Luna + Pulsar1 are still compatible with today's computers and Scope version. Unfortunately I am now struggeling with a Midi-Problem which I have never experienced before:

Whenever I use the modwheel or send aftertouch data to the Luna/Pulsar Midi-In ports my asio drivers generate ugly clicks. This happens with Reaper as well as with Samplitude in the following situations:
- direct monitoring of synths (Scope or VSTi) in XTC mode
- direct monitoring of VSTi synths while using Scope mode

- increasing the ULLI latency settings did not help
- replacing the ASIO2 drivers with ASIO1 drivers did not help either

- But: The clicks do not occur when receiving the midi controller data via a separate USB-Midi port instead of the scope Midi-In! So it seems that the Scope midi ports interfere with the Scope Asio drivers in some way.

- I noticed that my Cards share IRQ's with some of the USB ports. I already swapped the cards around to move at least the graphics card to a separate IRQ.

Have you seen this problem before? What could I do about it? Any hints would be apreciated very much.
Thanks and best regards
Daniel

-------------
My System:
Scope 5
1 x Luna
1 x Pulsar 1
PC: Intel Core i5 CPU, 4 Cores 2.66 GHz, 4GB RAM,
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-P55A-UD3
OS: WIN XP Home 32Bit with Scope 5 (on second boot partition: Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit)

[erminardi]

Keep your midi controller and your PC electrically isolated.
I had same issue (I heard every single tick of the 127 midi steps from my pots!!!) when my midi patchbay was into a metal rack with other stuff, so I've isolated it with rubber foil all around and all noises have gone.
The midi is a 5V data transmit so it is sensible to electricity.
Others USB controller are less sensible.

[Daniel]

Hi Erminardi

It seems your problems were caused by midi signals interfering directly to the analog side of the DA-converters on your boards. I also used to have this type of problems in the past, caused by the computer itself (mouse movements were audible on the Scope-outs).

The clicks I experience today however are more drastic. They sound like drop-outs in the signals transfered by asio between Scope and the DAW-software. There is no problem at all if I play a scope synth which is directly routed to the Scope outputs. The dropouts only occur when playing a VSTi synth live or when playing a scope synth live in XTC mode.
In both cases audio is transfered between Scope and the DAW via ASIO.

I already searched the forum but could not find a similar case. Do you remember having heard of this problem?

best regards
Daniel

[erminardi]

Daniel, maybe if U post a little excerpt of the type of noise in MP3, we could help.

[Daniel]

Hi again

Here is a mp3-file of me playing a note on the Minimax repeatedly and moving the modwheel at the same time.
Also attached you can see a close-up waveform of one of the clicks..

I hope this helps to clarify the problem.

best regards
Daniel

[Daniel]

Anyone?

[Neutron]

What is the MIDI controller? I have that problem with maschine, when i touch a pad or turn a dial,I hear a click.
I could only get rid of it y turning off multiprocessor support on cubase, which sucks because even home made things like monome do not do it.(and another native instrument plugin, "massive" when controlled by a behringer BCR-2000 does not do it either, so there is not much excuse)

[Daniel]

Hi Neutron

Do you connect Maschine via Midi or via USB?

Controllers I used while observing the clicks (Connected to Scope Midi-IN-Ports):
- Modwheel of a E-mu E4K sampling keyboard
- Doepfer Pocket Control

I also tried two USB-Controllers and they did not cause a problem (Midi-Ports on my Scope Cards remain empty):
- Korg Padcontrol
- Korg MS-20 replica controler

cheers
Daniel

[erminardi]

it's fundamental that you have installed the last versiono of scope v5.0.2617
the others features in XTC noises similar to this.

[Daniel]

Good evening Erminardi

I do have v5.0.2617 installed already.
In fact the problem occurs in scope mode as well, when playing VST-Synths in realtime. It does not happen in Scope mode when playing Scope synths. Hence my observation that the clicks only occur when the audio stream goes trough asio drivers at least once.

regards
Daniel

[Neutron]

Hi Neutron

Do you connect Maschine via Midi or via USB?

Controllers I used while observing the clicks (Connected to Scope Midi-IN-Ports):
- Modwheel of a E-mu E4K sampling keyboard
- Doepfer Pocket Control

I also tried two USB-Controllers and they did not cause a problem (Midi-Ports on my Scope Cards remain empty):
- Korg Padcontrol
- Korg MS-20 replica controler

cheers
Daniel

Ok then it is a completely different problem. maschine is connected by USB and if i want to trigger anything in scope with it in MIDI mode (which i only did once to see if it works) it uses the MIDI driver from cubase to scope, and wored fine. I only have one thing connected to scope MIDI in/out which is a BCR i use to controll effects and mixing.

[Daniel]

I received a message from Soniccore with the following advice:
- Although Soniccore recommends ASUS Mobos this seems to be a software problem
- For synthesizers Scope mode should be better, Particularly in live use.
- The problem might be solved by using a separate USB Midi-Interface
- The Midi and Audio drivers should be completely independent
- Probably the problem will be solved in Scope 5.1

Based on your reactions here on Planet Z I conclude that this is not a very common problem. Maybe it occurs only with specific combinations of hardware (In my case Pulsar 1, Luna + a new PC).

Thanks for your help
Daniel

[erminardi]

One of our PC had the same problem never solved (just exchanged the PC with another with same power).
In particular when in XTC mode the scope FX are ok, but with synthesizers all goes to crackles :\
Sometimes asio driver crashes.