Connect two 896hd's with word clock?

landoblues · Post by **landoblues** » Fri Mar 09, 2007 7:54 am

Is it required or recommended to connect a pair of 896hd's, that are already connected via FW, via a bnc word clock cable?

For the most part our pair works fine in recording in all formats, but playback/mixing at 96 sometimes gives pops and clicks that can be alleviated by disabling the second 896hd, and I'm wondering if a word clock connection would help to alleviate this problem.

Thanks for any advice!

Dwetmaster · Post by **Dwetmaster** » Fri Mar 09, 2007 8:32 am

So you're saying that it works great to record with the two only via FW? I was looking into that also?

landoblues · Post by **landoblues** » Fri Mar 09, 2007 9:05 am

Yes, recording with the two at 24/96 seems to work great. The problem that I'm having seems to be limited to just playback of 24/96 projects that were recorded before we added the second 896hd.

So basically, if we recorded it in the past with only one 896hd, then it plays back fine if only one 896hd is enabled. But if it was recorded in the past with only one 896hd, and then played back while both 896hd's are enable, then the playback gives us pop-click noises.

My partner is further testing the recording playback with both connected today and I will report back further detail.

Btw, system is a PC, AMD 64 2.4Ghz, 4 MB Ram, Sata 7500 drives, Motu ASIO driver, and Samplitude 9.

zara_drummer · Post by **zara_drummer** » Fri Mar 09, 2007 10:20 am

I'd say add the BNC connector and set one of them as the main clock generator. Its possible they could be fighting one another...And I'm not sure if the 896HD can sync word clock on all channels like the new 8pre does.

The 8pre has no word clock connector because they tout that clock is being sent to all I/O. Not sure if thats the case with the 896HD.

When I used a second device with the 896HD I had to use the word clock or it would jitter badly.

lmoe · Post by **lmoe** » Sat Mar 10, 2007 8:59 pm

I used to have the same problem with my 2 896HD,s. I traced my problem to the firewire card bridged to my network. I disabled it off of the network and the pops stopped. It seemed that the computer polled the network and the second HD would lose it's clock. Another trick I came up with is I AES/EBU #2 into #1 and I can monitor all inputs through cuemix without losing any analog ins.

landoblues · Post by **landoblues** » Thu Mar 15, 2007 5:21 am

lmoe wrote:I used to have the same problem with my 2 896HD,s. I traced my problem to the firewire card bridged to my network. I disabled it off of the network and the pops stopped.

Can you describe where you saw that the 1394 was bridged to the network and where you disabled it?

We've tried a lot of things so far, but still having the same problem. At 44 or 48 it runs smooth as can be, but 96 is still losing sync during playback.

landoblues · Post by **landoblues** » Thu Apr 05, 2007 11:55 am

Our second 896HD finally stopped communicating with anything at all via FW, and after conversations with Motu support, they issued an RA and we have returned the unit for repair/replacement.

lmoe · Post by **lmoe** » Sun Apr 15, 2007 2:47 pm

Start>Control Panel>Network Connections. It will show that the FW (1394) is enabled as a network device. Right click and go to properties and disable the device. It will not shut off the FireWire just disable it from the network. Windows will poll the device to check for network activity. Those interrupts where the cause of my headaches. Now I have 2 896HD's running 24/96 into Sonar5.2 PE with no problems.