828 MKII & LEOPARD buggered

[alanstott]

Hi guys,

I've just spent almost an hour on tech support to MOTU and they've been no help really trying to get my Motu 828 MKII USB 2 up and running again.

I'm running a PowerMac G5 Dual 2GHz, and upgraded from os x 10.4 to 10.5 today. Everything was working fine in 10.4 this morning.

Since trying to load up things like Logic, Ableton etc... I noticed the drivers weren't being recognized anymore, and sound could not even be output in things like iTunes or Quicktime to the 828. Only now the internal/built in audio.

I went to the motu.com site, and noticed the driver needs updating. So I ran the download, and hoped everything would be fine.

However, it made no difference.

The hardware comes up listed in the System Output pane.

The Audio MIDI utility will recognize the hardware okay, and can interface with it changing the clock rate okay.

Cuemix however, when loaded, just locks the output to Disabled, and will not change whatsoever.

The guys at tech support thought it might be an issue that my ports were USB 1.0 on my PowerMac, but I've double checked all the specs, and it's all USB 2.0.

I've run the factory reset on the MKII.

I've tried uninstalling and reinstalling the drivers.

Disconnecting all other USB devices.

Yet Cuemix remains stuck with disabled on the output selection.


As an extra test, I tried the MKII on a brand new Macbook I got on Friday, and it works fine (on Leopard as well).


Have you guys got any ideas ?


Doing a wipe of my PowerMac computer is a real unwanted last resort that is all I can think of, and I'd much rather find the bug that is causing this.

[1nput0utput]

I think you are experiencing a bug that affects USB 828mkIIs with PPC Macs under OS X 10.5. Seriously, I'm not making this up. Someone at MOTU told me about it. You should ask them again.

[alanstott]

I think you are experiencing a bug that affects USB 828mkIIs with PPC Macs under OS X 10.5. Seriously, I'm not making this up. Someone at MOTU told me about it. You should ask them again.

so you think they'll be a fix to this ?

otherwise i'm just looking at downgrading back to 10.4

thanks,
alan

[pjcoop]

They won't fix it.
I had a 'technical request' in for ages and nothing happened.
I have to boot onto another partition on my Mac which is running 10.4 to do recording stuff, or even listen to iTunes.
It sucks but I'm pretty sure they have made up their minds that they won't be fixing this.
It explains why your new MacBook works OK (Being intel not PPC)
Paul

[alanstott]

They won't fix it.
I had a 'technical request' in for ages and nothing happened.
I have to boot onto another partition on my Mac which is running 10.4 to do recording stuff, or even listen to iTunes.
It sucks but I'm pretty sure they have made up their minds that they won't be fixing this.
It explains why your new MacBook works OK (Being intel not PPC)
Paul

yep it seems that way. i tried calling to the US for 3 days without any answering on their technical support line.

tried calling their sales department to see if they could connect me with anyone, and was told by a really rude and arrogant woman to just keep calling that tech support number, and when i said i've been calling for 3 days she just it wasn't her problem.

i've had a support request logged and they haven't even read it since i started this thread.

i find it really poor that they're not willing to support PPC when such a large number of studios still operate with PPC G5 Towers.

and if they aren't going to support it, they should at least state that you require and Intel Mac for OSX 10.5 to be compatible with their hardware.

i wasted almost a whole day upgrading to 10.5 and then doing the messy task of downgrading and repairing all sorts of permissions that were messed up, just because MOTU didn't display or have good knowledge of what platforms would be supported.

when i spoke on the phone the first and only time i've been able to get thru to their tech support department, the guy there seemed pretty advanced to know how the driver worked. so i'd guess that he's had some involvement in developing it. however he seemed quite intrigued that it didn't work for my PPC Mac. so maybe they just didn't thoroughly test it on all platforms before releasing this driver.

really think they need to step their customer service department up though when they're providing such an important piece of equipment and probably on a large customer scale as well.

[1nput0utput]

I strongly doubt that MOTU would completely end support for the 828mkII USB under OS X 10.5 on PPC Macs. They've never done anything like that before. There must be some plan to address this.

[pjcoop]

I hope so..
But I haven't personally seen any evidence that they are/will do so.

[RobinBoom]

Well, I guess its a good job I didn't dump my old firewire 410 as I can't get my 828Mk 2 to work. Another post suggested that a driver update may be on the way...I certainly hope so....Grrr

[alanstott]

Well, I guess its a good job I didn't dump my old firewire 410 as I can't get my 828Mk 2 to work. Another post suggested that a driver update may be on the way...I certainly hope so....Grrr

finally after almost 2 weeks, i've just had a reply from MOTU on their support request system

they asked me if i'm using a USB hub... *rolls eyes*

i replied and told them from chatting on this board, i'm aware what the problem is, and asked if they're aware at all... and if so, if they're going to fix it...

will let you guys know what happens

[RobinBoom]

Yay!

[pjcoop]

We live in hope.....
But I wouldn't hold your breath if I were you!!

[alanstott]

We live in hope.....
But I wouldn't hold your breath if I were you!!

Added by Joseph on 2008/05/22 16:04:30 GMT-5
Hi Alan,
The current drivers are absolutely compatible with Leopard.
Are you using a USB hub? Have you tried using a different USB port on your computer?

that's the support reply i got,
i'm still fairly certain the driver isn't fully compatible

[pjcoop]

Believe me.. I've tried every combination of connections including disconnecting every USB device except the keyboard/mouse and the 828. I then tried it on every USB port (front and back) with a restart and even a re-install of the driver on every port..
It's very simple.
The 1.4.7 driver does NOT work on PPC (G5) Macs running any version of Leopard.
It works perfectly well under 10.4.11
If you open /Utilities/Console and view the system logs while trying to play an iTunes track you will see there are errors with the kext (kernel extention).
This should be the start of MOTU's investigations! But I see no evidence that they are even looking!!!
Paul
[/b]

[alanstott]

Believe me.. I've tried every combination of connections including disconnecting every USB device except the keyboard/mouse and the 828. I then tried it on every USB port (front and back) with a restart and even a re-install of the driver on every port..
It's very simple.
The 1.4.7 driver does NOT work on PPC (G5) Macs running any version of Leopard.
It works perfectly well under 10.4.11
If you open /Utilities/Console and view the system logs while trying to play an iTunes track you will see there are errors with the kext (kernel extention).
This should be the start of MOTU's investigations! But I see no evidence that they are even looking!!!
Paul
[/b]

I've told the guy in reply to that support request, to come and check out this thread to see that I'm not the only person in the world with this issue.

And also asked if they've tried and tested the driver on a PPC G5 with 10.5

I'd be a very happy user if they manage to fix this driver as I really want to get on with 10.5

[RobinBoom]

Ok, now I'm worried. The chap at MOTU believes that it does work and seems to think it may be some 'user error'. Clearly Alan and everyone here has tried every permutation without success. I can only suggest that we all write to MOTU and hopefully with enough e-mails they will look again at the driver situation.
The irony is I only bought an 828 because of MOTU's reputation for quality and its supreme compatibility with Apple Mac computers. I shall be pointing this out to MOTU when I write to them.
Come on everyone, Lets get 'em....