using an ADAT/optical interface at 96k

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joninc
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using an ADAT/optical interface at 96k

Post by joninc » Sat Dec 05, 2015 6:21 pm

Is anyone using an optical interface at 96k?

I am trying unsuccessfully to get my Radar24 to talk to my RME hammerfall 9652 dsp
cards at 96k. I've always recorded and mixed at 48k and wanted to experiment with higher rates.

The Radar24 will do 12 tracks at 96 k and I can record on it fine. The issue is that nothing is showing up down the lightpipes in my daw.

I understand that it splits the capability in half (from 44 or 48k) so rather than sending 8 tracks/channels per cable, it should only send 4.

the question is - how does that show up in the DAW? If 1-8 is now only sending 4 tracks then which channels do they correspond with down the pipes
1 through 4?
1, 3, 5, 7?
2, 4, 6 and 8?

I can monitor the inputs on my DAW and I am playing back some tracks recorded at 96k off the radar and the DAW is showing nothing on the inputs so clearly the tracks are not being sent down the optical to the DAW correctly.

another observation:

The hammerfall card says that the adats are not synced. I am using Wordclock from the RADAR to sync. Aat 48k these will always display that the adats are synced.

what am i doing wrong?!!
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Post by digitaldrummer » Sun Dec 06, 2015 7:23 am

ADAT per the spec is only up to 48Khz sampling, so that's where SMUX comes in and glues together 2 ADATs to allow you to go up to 96Khz. However, not all devices that support ADAT also support SMUX. I googled for a RADAR24 manual and I saw nothing about SMUX. Only mention of ADAT. Possibly there was some kind of firmware update that enabled SMUX? but if not, then its probably not going to work like you want.

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Post by joninc » Sun Dec 06, 2015 12:40 pm

right - i have been reading about the SMUX and haven't been able to find info online that clearly states whether the radar24's adat card will do that or not either.

BUT i was looking in the menu on the radar's ADAT SETTINGS and came upon an option called ADAT WIDTH which I am assuming has something to do with the SMUX - just trying to figure that out...

I am on software V3.39 BTW.

http://www.izcorp.com/wp-content/upload ... Manual.pdf
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Post by Randyman... » Sun Dec 06, 2015 2:21 pm

I think the ADAT Width and SMPL PT is more to get optical transceivers jiving properly (not something I'm familiar with - all of the ADAT transceivers I've ever used have just worked for me w/o futzing with these kinds of settings).

I'd look into the SDQ setting, and consider setting it to Dual. This is generally an AES setting, but the manual indicates it affects the multi-channel digital I/O which would include your ADAT I/O board to my knowledge. But there is also the UserBit settings - so I'm not sure if the SDQ actually affects the ADAT Card or not???

Sorry - I guess I'm not of any help to speak of :oops:

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Post by digitaldrummer » Mon Dec 07, 2015 6:09 pm

As Randyman also noted, check out page 138 -- ADAT out userbit. According to the SMUX description on wikipedia (I know but it popped up on a google search...) user bit 2 defines SMUX for 96KHz. So I think this is the droid you are looking for.

Not sure how you select 96 or 192Khz though.... maybe you know already. btw, the "width" setting would likely be to increase the output of the lightpipe to compensate for a bad receiver or bad cables, or long cable, etc. it is probably adjusting the width of the digital "eye"

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Post by Nick Sevilla » Thu Dec 10, 2015 9:50 pm

Page 136 :

MAIN/I/O MENU:
DIG I/O SDQ

For ADAT SMUX it is DUAL WIRE. for 88.2kHz and 96kHz operation.
For higher rates it will be QUAD.
For 44.1 kHz and 48kHz it is SINGLE wire operation.

SDQ is an acronym for Single, Dual, and Quad
wire. It refers to the way RADAR? handles high
sample rate digital audio going to and from
external sources via the digital multi-channel
I/O. The choices in this menu will vary
depending on the sample rate of the current
project. At a sample rate of 192 kHz the
selections will be:
? SINGLE
? DUAL
? QUAD
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Post by Nick Sevilla » Thu Dec 10, 2015 9:54 pm

Page 138:

ADAT SETTINGS:
ADAT OUT USERBIT
The default setting, ENABLED, conforms to
the ADAT output specification regarding the
userbit (U2) when 96kHz or 192 kHz are
selected. However, if you are experiencing
noise when outputting ADAT from RADAR?,
try the DISABLED setting.
ENABLED = You can use ADAT for 96kHz operation.

I hope this explanation has helped.

1. You set your SDQ to DUAL.
2. You set your USERBIT to ON.

Usually, you want to set it, and on the HAMMERCARD:

Make sure you set your ADAT lightpipe settings to SMUX DUAL wide, 96kHz operation.

the channels then go like this:

1-2 are CHANNEL 1
3-4 are CHANNEL 2
5-6 are CHANNEL 3
7-8 are CHANNEL 4.

The meters will give it away pretty easily.

Cheers
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Post by joninc » Fri Dec 11, 2015 5:22 pm

yep - i figured it out BUT found out that using the 96k smux shuts off the analog outputs of the converters so there's effectively no way to monitor the outputs making it somewhat useless for me (where I use the Radar as A/D and D/A).

basically i can record 12 tracks at 96k on the radar and that's it. That won't work for 99% of what I do.

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Post by Nick Sevilla » Mon Dec 14, 2015 4:18 pm

joninc wrote:yep - i figured it out BUT found out that using the 96k smux shuts off the analog outputs of the converters so there's effectively no way to monitor the outputs making it somewhat useless for me (where I use the Radar as A/D and D/A).

basically i can record 12 tracks at 96k on the radar and that's it. That won't work for 99% of what I do.

BUMMER!!
You can't monitor off the computer via a DAW?
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Post by joninc » Mon Dec 14, 2015 4:53 pm

No - I use channels 23/24 on the Radar as my DAW outputs.

If I had another converter I could but that would introduce new problems
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