New Mac Pros with PCIe424

[westla]

Hi all,
Do we know if the new Mac Pros just announced will support the PCIe-424 cards that we are using in 4,1 and 5,1 Mac Pros?

[mikehalloran]

Hi all,
Do we know if the new Mac Pros just announced will support the PCIe-424 cards that we are using in 4,1 and 5,1 Mac Pros?

No and we won't till September.

Intel has something in the firmware that prevented those PCIe over Thunderbolt cards from working with any audio card except a UAD Quad that had upgradable firmware (and then it was a long time before UAD got those working).

No one knows if that will be an issue till the next Mac Pro ships and someone tests it. MOTU will have to write a 64 bit driver first but these use the same one as the USB & FireWire interfaces so that's likely to happen.

If there is still a firmware issue, MOTU would have to build a new PCIe card—how likely is that? If it does work, that will be something and the price of 424e cards on eBay will probably increase.

[travis.funk]

I sent support an email about this subject (and asked about future Thunderbolt support. Here is the exchange:

MOTU Customer Service
10:24 AM (26 minutes ago)
to me

Travis,

In theory, MOTU PCI cards should work just fine with Thunderbolt PCI enclosures, but their use is not officially supported my MOTU as we've seen varying rates of success using them. I do not anticipate this behavior to change with the 64 bit update.

Ryan - MOTU


On Fri, Jun 14, 2019 at 12:21 PM Travis Funk <saxofunk@gmail.com> wrote:
Thank you for the extremely quick response, Ryan!

Will the 64bit driver also come with Thunderbolt enclosure support? I'd much rather pay $300 to keep using my 424 card in a thunderbolt enclosure than $5000+ for a new Mac Pro tower...

Thanks again,

Travis

On Fri, Jun 14, 2019 at 10:18 AM MOTU Customer Service <customerservice@motu.com> wrote:
Travis,

Thank you for your interest in our products! At this time, MOTU is planning on updating the macOS driver for MOTU PCI interfaces to 64 bit for macOS 10.15 Catalina. All current drivers are 32 bit, but 64 bit versions will be released alongside Apple's macOS 10.15 Catalina release.

If I can be of further assistance, please let me know.



Ryan - MOTU


On Fri, Jun 14, 2019 at 12:15 PM Travis Funk <saxofunk@gmail.com> wrote:
Hello,

I'm writing to inquire about whether MOTU plans to update the MacOS driver for the PCIe 424, now that the newly announced Mac Pro will have native PCIe slots that won't require a Thunderbolt enclosure?

Are the current drivers fully 64 bit? (All 32 bit applications are being dropped from support.)
Will MOTU support MacOS 10.15 Catalina with the 424?

Thank you,

Travis Funk


--
MOTU Customer Service

1280 Massachusetts Ave
Cambridge MA, 02138
http://motu.com
customerservice@motu.com

[mikehalloran]

Hmmmm... No one ever got those cards working over TB 1/2. Lots of old threads about this from 2012–2014. MOTU claimed to almost have it working but blamed the firmware change on the TB Macs. That's in those threads, too.

"In theory" my a...

If the TB3 chassis works, we'll know when someone buys one and tries it. It will be great if it does.

Same with the Mac Pro in September.

[travis.funk]

I've been watching this subject for years without really contributing to any threads. From what I can tell (in layman's terms), the PCIe via TB spec is supposed to be 'transparent' (and is on Windows), but MacOS has an added requirement that the driver be "thunderbolt aware". Which, I'm assuming must prevent Kernel Panic when unplugging the device. MOTU seems completely uninterested in re-writing the driver to add this. I'm sure the promised 64-bit driver is just a re-compile of the old driver and won't change a thing otherwise.

[travis.funk]

Same with the Mac Pro in September.

If you want to buy me one, Mike, I'd be glad to test it out and let you know!

[mikehalloran]

I've been watching this subject for years without really contributing to any threads. From what I can tell (in layman's terms), the PCIe via TB spec is supposed to be 'transparent' (and is on Windows), but MacOS has an added requirement that the driver be "thunderbolt aware". Which, I'm assuming must prevent Kernel Panic when unplugging the device. MOTU seems completely uninterested in re-writing the driver to add this...

hmmm... we were told that MOTU spent a lot of effort on this and that it was a firmware issue, not a driver. AVID and UAD were of the same opinion and eventually released cards that worked but, with the exception I mentioned with upgradable firmware, they released new cards.

It’s still complicated as far as AVID is concerned.
https://www.pro-tools-expert.com/home-p ... e-computer

Otherwise, I have this sense of dejá vu.
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=49947&p=422792&hili ... Ie#p422792

[mikehalloran]

Same with the Mac Pro in September.

If you want to buy me one, Mike, I'd be glad to test it out and let you know!

Damn, I thought you were going to buy one for me!

I’m not expecting to need one to replace my iMP but I’m open to gifts, trades ... As much use as I got out of my 2408, its day is in the past for me.

[bayswater]

Intel has something in the firmware that prevented those PCIe over Thunderbolt cards from working with any audio card except a UAD Quad that had upgradable firmware (and then it was a long time before UAD got those working).

Do we know that the new MP is running PCIe over TB, rather than just PCIe as per the earlier machines? If not, is there much of a question? Why build a Mac with PCIe slots that won't work?

[mikehalloran]

Do we know that the new MP is running PCIe over TB

All Thunderbolt Macs can run PCIe over TB with the right chassis. The issue was whether the MOTU 424e could run in those boxes. The answer to that was No—same with AVID and UAD until the later two came out with new cards.

That new Sonnet TB3 chassis might not have the firmware issue. No one will know till it's been tried. Since I would have to buy the box and a 424e card to test it with my 2408, not interested.

Perhaps someone with a 424e card and a TB3 Mac could order one up the Sonnet from Amazon, test it and return if it doesn't work.

Why build a Mac with PCIe slots that won't work?

Again, that's not the issue—those 64 bit slots will certainly work. The question is whether or not the 424e card will have firmware that's compatible with the 7.1 Mac Pro (will there be a 32 bit issue, for example?) Only one way anybody's going to find out.

[travis.funk]

I think Bayswater is asking whether the internal PCI slots are communicating through the thunderbolt controller, possibly rendering them also useless for the 424.

This would be a horrible, thing to do, but wouldn't surprise me in the slightest.

[bayswater]

I think Bayswater is asking whether the internal PCI slots are communicating through the thunderbolt controller, possibly rendering them also useless for the 424.

This would be a horrible, thing to do, but wouldn't surprise me in the slightest.

Yes.

But as others pointed out, it would still render some older PCIe cards with 32 bit drivers useless where drivers could not be updated.

Of the 6 audio interfaces I've had, 3 of them I had to buy because it was not possible to update drivers.

[MarkA]

May I ask - was there ever a verdict on this? Did anyone ever try it?

i.e. will the MOTU PCI-424 card work in one of the new Mac Pros with internal PCI slots?

Further to that... will the PCI-424 work in an older Mac with Mojave (10.14) or Catalina (10.15)?

Catalina no longer supports 32-bit apps... are the PCI-424 drivers and firmware still compatible?

The MOTU website suggests compatibility "with Mac OS X 10.6.8 - 10.13.x:". Which is not encouraging!

Thanks!

Mark.

[floatingtrem]

May I ask - was there ever a verdict on this? Did anyone ever try it?

i.e. will the MOTU PCI-424 card work in one of the new Mac Pros with internal PCI slots?

Further to that... will the PCI-424 work in an older Mac with Mojave (10.14) or Catalina (10.15)?

Catalina no longer supports 32-bit apps... are the PCI-424 drivers and firmware still compatible?

The MOTU website suggests compatibility "with Mac OS X 10.6.8 - 10.13.x:". Which is not encouraging!

Thanks!

Mark.

I run my 424 on an older Mac Pro under Mojave with no issues. Catalina seems like it may be possible (but you would lose the ability to use the configuration apps, as they are 32-bit) although I have not seen anyone try it and it's possible those parts of the driver never made it to the 64-bit version.

Realistically to run a 424 on one of the new Mac Pros would require someone to downgrade it into Mojave (if that's possible) or transfer over a pre-existing installation with everything set up. Seems unlikely that someone dropping the cash on a new Mac Pro would go that far out of their way to continue using an unsupported interface that's nearly 20 years old.

[mikehalloran]

Maybe. Maybe not.

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