[LAU] RME Multiface and an extra 8 output channels

Iain Mott mott at reverberant.com
Mon May 13 22:52:35 UTC 2013


Thanks Brent and Ralf. I also wrote to the RME forum. Seems that even if
I do get a new MF/HDSP combo - one of the respondents thought the sync
wouldn't be sample-accurate if I were to combine an MFI with an MFII. He
thought it would though if I got hold of a second MFI - but wasn't sure.
I'm waiting to see if anyone from RME confirms. Does anyone here have an
opinion on that? I'd rather not buy a used MFI - as things often go
missing in the post in Brazil - and taxes on used imports are huge.

Does anyone on the list have a 16-out system running on linux - with
firewire, usb or otherwise?

Just came across some info on the Allen and Heath ICE-16. Looks great
but couldn't find anything about linux drivers... Also has unbalanced
outs - but I'll be using short cables to multichannel amps so that
should be Ok.

cheers,


Em Seg, 2013-05-13 às 17:11 -0500, Brent Busby escreveu:
> On Mon, 13 May 2013, Iain Mott wrote:
> 
> > I have an RME Multiface I/HDSP PCI card. This gives 8 balanced audio 
> > outputs. However I require an extra 8 outputs for a specific project.
> 
> I've also looked at my options for expanding beyond 8 analog i/o's on my 
> Multiface II....
> 
> > One option is to sync two Multiface/HDSP PIC card together. Although 
> > not exactly necessary, I understand the extra hdsp card is needed if i 
> > wish to use sampling rates higher than 48k which i do. There are some 
> > other set up benefits too I gather.
> 
> Something to be aware of is that although you can have up to 3 
> Hammerfall cards in a single computer, they cannot share any kind of bus 
> for monitoring or headphones in TotalMix (or its Linux clone, 
> hdspmixer).  You will end up with separate headphone lines, which you 
> may be able to merge with cabling yourself at the expense of a couple of 
> inputs, but that's messy.
> 
> Alternatives to getting a second Hammerfall card include:
> 
> * Taking advantage of the digital i/o's that you already have...  I've 
> had some trouble finding the exact specs of the Multiface I, but on the 
> II, there is an SPDIF digital i/o (2ch. in, 2ch. out), and an ADAT port 
> (8ch. in, 8ch. out).  The analogs, the SPDIF, and the ADAT can all be 
> used at the same time, but the catch is that because ADAT itself has a 
> 48kHz limit, there's no way to use the ADAT's at 96kHz unless you bind 
> the 8 i/o's together as 4 virtual i/o's that each combine two channels 
> to get double speed (called SMUX).
>  	Since I've seen that the Multiface's analog converters don't 
> really sound right (probably due to filter design) unless you run it at 
> 96kHz, and since it's not possible to run the analog i/o's at 96kHz 
> while you run the digitals at another speed, the net effect of all this 
> boils down to that you're going to want to run at 96kHz, and if you're 
> using the ADAT ports at that speed, you will have to use SMUX even 
> though that will cut you down to 4 ADAT i/o's instead of 8.
>  	And the net effect of all that totally is that you have the 
> potential for up to 14 i/o's if you put all the analogs, 
> SMUX'ed-together ADAT's, and the SPDIF l/r pair together and use them 
> all, from one Hammerfall card.  Not quite the 16 analog i/o's you'd get 
> from having two Hammerfall's, but at least it all ends up in one unified 
> TotalMix/hdspmixer session with one headphone monitor.
>  	There is one further complication:  There aren't a lot of 
> 8-channel standalone ADAT AD/DA's out there that I've seen that aren't 
> either rediculous expensive or suspiciously cheap.  It's amazing how 
> much you might end up paying for those 4 SMUX'ed i/o's if you go this 
> route.  RME themselves make one, but it's one of the expensive ones, and 
> oddly, it costs way more than getting a whole second 
> Hammerfall/Multiface setup even though it does far less.  (But again, if 
> you get that second Hammerfall, it will have its own separate busses in 
> TotalMix.)
> 
> * You can go with RME MADI, which is MADIly expensive, but has an insane 
> channel count.  Sadly, as far as I know, there's no support in Linux for 
> TotalMix or anything like it if you go this route, though it is driver 
> compatible with Alsa and Jack.  You just won't have any GUI mixer like 
> hdspmixer, which would kind of stink, especially on such pro-grade 
> hardware.
> 
> * You could get someone else's audio hardware, perhaps taking adventage 
> of FFADO to get it done by firewire...but then you'd lose the stability 
> and it-just-works experience that you get from the RME Multiface on 
> Linux.  Or you could take a chance on USB, which is becoming more and 
> more popular despite that it reminds me of trying to use a Volkswagon 
> Bug for an Antarctic polar expedition.
> 
> All of the above is why, for the moment, I'm just living with my 8 
> analog i/o's and dealing with it.  :-/  At least the analog i/o's the 
> one Multiface comes with just work, and splendidly.
> 




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