Daisy chains...

[Raindogred]

Hey guys, I just bought a used Traveller mk1 for great price. I plan to daisy chain it with its cousins from the same era, 828mkii and 8pre. Mostly to get 16 outs for my mixer
A couple of questions
1. My 2 original devices are stable in Win10. Adding a third, is this when I should think about an external master clock? Even without going that far, does just linking the devices with bnc cables help to keep the system stable?
2. What is the best/preferred solution for monitoring with multiple devices? I have tried a couple ways..hooking my monitors to a mixer (current scenario), and running cables out from the main outs of both boxes to 2 stereo channels. Was wondering if its possible patch the main outs of one box into a pair of line ins on the next box. I would much prefer to give up inputs, than lose mixer channels.
Anyone tell me the best way to set up monitoring 3 daisy chained motu boxes. Any other pro tips..let me know
Regards
The world’s oldest newbie

[Raindogred]

Think I found the best way to do monitoring. I have 3 boxes ..Traveller (in the mail), 828mkii and 8pre. Set up the 828 as the unit that connect to fw port, connected the 8pre..thats a stable setup. Routed the mainout from the 828 into the first pair of inputs on the 8 pre. Yeah i lose a couple inputs..no big deal, then will do the same when the traveller arrives..rout its main outs to inputs 3-4 in the 8pre. Flip the pad switches, do an adjust in cuemix..pretty balanced. I got mainouts from the 8 pre running into my yamaha mg12/2 which drive the monitors..and a soundtrac 16-4-2 patched into the yamaha. The soundtrac will have 16 inputs (8 from 828mkii and 8 from Traveller). So, I still end up with something like 22 inputs..across all 3 boxes. All conjecture till patch in the traveller, may need to get a master word clock device.
Cheers
The stable genius

[Raindogred]

One flaw in my genius plan. The Traveller does not have seperate main outs like the 828mkii..they are 1-2 of the 8 analogue outputs. So I will make a balanced TRS..to 2 x TS “Y” cable ( stereo to 2 mono phono 6.35mm cable). Its only for monitoring...yeah the 8 outputs are going to the mixer...easiest way to make one of them, from memory is cut a guitar/instrument cable in half, cut off more of the outer shell than usual or it won’t fit in TRS casing..wrap the ends together ..apply solder and Bob is your uncle..plenty of heatshrink.
Unsure of the impedance coming out of phone jacks..usually pretty high...that will be my next test/experiment in the man cave.
Hooroo
The Thinker

[HCMarkus]

Don't forget the Litepipe (ADAT) I/O... maybe that can work into your scheme somehow.

[Raindogred]

Yeah I haven’t forgotten about the lightpipe. Played around with it plenty, but I’m trying to avoid adat option. ..its like a last resort because, to my way of thinking, your only getting 8 channels total out of box like an 828 mkii that have a lot more i/o..seems like waste of resources If I were going the adat route, i would get a dedicated adat box like a behringer ada820000 ( behinger always have incredible names like ultra euro ) or whatever the heck they are called haha. Daisy chaining firewire is what i love about old motu gear..honestly I think these things work better today than they did back in 2005/6 when i first bought em to the quad cores and stability of win10..and the unofficial drivers that keep these old things working. Don’t want to jinx myself...

[Raindogred]

Impressed with the traveller. Super light weight. Has better quality preamps than 828mkii and 8pre, or is it just more gain?sounds good. Only downside is an audible click, that sounds like a solenoid or relay. Its not audible or showing up in the recorded tracks..thank goodness..i could live with it, or learn to ignore it...probably should take notes from my wife..shes a master ignorer when i start ramblin on about audio stuff..
The unit I bought did not come with its own power supply, just running it bus powered at the end of a 3 device daisy chain. Everything seems fairly stable but theres the occasional glitch in daw playback, that is not there with just 2 devices. May need to sync devices with word clock cables. Also want to play around with the order the devices are connected. That seems to have an effect on the stability of the whole system. The newest device, the 8pre firewire seems be the best device to connect to the computer when i just use an 828mkii....Got a whole lot of testing to do, trying different combinations..the device that get connected to the firewire card becomes the master clock, and the others sync to it.
6 Combinations to try:
828-8pre-traveller
828-traveller-8pre
Traveller-828–8pre
Traveller-8pre-828
8pre-traveller-828
8pre-828-traveller
Hoping one or more of those will be stable and/or glitch free, before buying a word clock master device.
Shall report my findings
Fondest regards
Captain Sensible

[Raindogred]

Going to delete the 8 pre from the equation. 3 devices not that stable on playback. And its not critical for me to have more 16 inputs. 3 devices requires a master clock according to the manual, and I just realised the original 8 pre has no s/pdif or clock connections..pretty dumb actually as it has no outputs just 8 pres and adat. Served me well over the years but it will see out its days in the old rack unit graveyard. What I did figure out is the way to fix the monitoring issue between 2 fw motu boxes daisy-chained...s/pdif? Just turn the optical out (toslink) of one, and the optical in (toslink) run cable..all sorted. Still get my 16 outs and 20 in. Honestly I’m a one man band, and incedibly flexible for a man my age, but even if i use every mic, synth, drum and guitar simulaneously in some crazy musical version of twister..i can’t use that many inputs. So Traveller and 828mkii it is
Stay classy
Julio