Logic Delta / Audiophile 2496, Logic crashes on Quit, general problems with Audiophile Options

G4/466, OS 9.1, 384 MB RAM, Logic Delta 4.6.2 (dedicated 40MB RAM), M-Audio Delta Audiophile 2496, latest beta drivers (v1.5.6b)

I am able to select the ASIO driver in hardware preferences, however if I try to record I get an 'ASIO hardware malfunction error -999' whether I select the analog or the S/PDIF source. While the rest of the app seems to work after that, when I quit Logic hangs up without any error message (mouse pointer is not frozen though), requiring a hard reboot.

Generally, I haven't been very successful to get the Audiophile to work AT ALL... Their drivers (especially the Control Panel) is a nightmare, preferences don't stick, the sound (through Sound Manager) is mostly awful and distorted. But I couldn't find out any pattern what causes the Audiophile work sometimes and what doesn't, it just looks like it has its 'moods' on its own.
I have reinstalled the card and the drivers many times, trashing prefs, to no avail.

This week I took it back to the store, they installed the Audiophile on their G4/400 (OS 9.1) and suprisingly (well, not really as a G4/400 is *not* the same as a G4/466, unfortunately) they were able to make the card's analog I/O work with MicroLogic 4.7.3 even by using the original beta driver and the ASIO driver that comes on the CD.
But then I have demonstrated the problems using the card with Sound Manager, and the symptoms were the same as on my G4, i.e. clicks, noises and a kind of short 'fade-in' effect if you play *any* sound. Finally, after my demonstration their Logic started to crash on launch with error 3 (illegal instruction), freezing the G4.
Nevertheless, the guys in the store tell me that the card *itself* appears to be working (which it actually really did, at least for a while) and therefore they can't take it back.

Has anybody ever been successful in using the Audiophile with a G4 (133 MHz bus)? If so, what's your secret?

Thanks for any help or advice

[bobson]

Hi Lou Kash
I am also using Mac G4 466mHz OS 9.1, 256 MEG RAM
I have had the same problems. I've had my system for a month still not up and running. Have you got yours going yet. Do you know what the ASIO hardware malfunction (-999) is, I get that.
I have managed to recieve and record analogue instruments and to register that i am getting communication with midi devices as I see the notes come up in the transport, no sound though. I have not been able to get any satisfaction with my DAT (Sony TCD D7)

I have followed the manual closely and appear to have done it all correctly but not working.

Regards Matthew Robertson

I found a couple of solutions/workarounds and explanations in a german forum, however until now I didn't look into it any further yet (I've been concentrating on the graphic design part of my work recently, you know...).

As far as I remember, the -999 error is related to the settings in the Sound control panel; I think you need to bypass the card *completely* in there, that means to set the I/O to 'built-in', if you want to use ASIO. ASIO2 works best with Logic, by the way.
The bad thing is that if you are using the internal QuickTime Synth, its sound will then go to the internal speaker. The workaround would be to use the built-in audio output and mix the QT Synth with the rest of your tracks on an external mixing console. (In theory, as I said I didn't try it yet.)

An important point in using M-Audio/Midiman devices seems to be checking their website very often for driver updates. Usually they simply post a new version without telling anyone. Sometimes the German site posts a new driver and they don't even tell the US division for 6 weeks.
They must be smoking some very heavy stuff those guys, I suppose... ;)

Actually as for now, with the latest drivers, if I go through the SoundManager it seems to work okay. But I have been only digitalizing some old vinyl records, recording with SoundStudio from the SPDIF input, nothing more (turntable --> amplifier --> DAT --> Audiophile).

As for the SPDIF out, now I suspect that the card must have *done* something to the coaxial input of the DAT, because recently I wanted to record digitally from a professional CD player and I coudn't get any signal from there either. The last time I've done something like that a couple of years ago it *did* work; and the only device I have connected to the DAT in the meantime was the Audiophile. And in the beginning the Audiophile at least 'tried' to work before it stopped completely. So I don't know...

I bought an Audiophile 2496 card about three weeks ago. I've got a blue and white G3, 256MB RAM, 350MHz, OS9.0.4.  I've found pretty much the same thing as you guys: preferences won't stick, and, worst of all, it's totally moody and unpredictable. I  changed the PCI slot, I downloaded the latest driver, I fiddled around with settings restarting the computer every time, but the best I've managed so far is to get the system sounds output - but very clickily and fuzzily. There is only one buffer size it will handle: 128. Anything else and it sounds like an alien in labor pains or just freezes the whole system.

Even when it worked it was liable to suddenly stop working and cause a freeze. At the moment I can't get any sound out of it except hissing, pops, clicks, and the odd weird rumble.

Another thing, when it was working (just a couple of days ago), I tried to use it with Toast Deluxe 4.1.2, but could get it to input into Toast.

For an outlay of US$300 I'm feeling pretty frustrated! Perhaps I should have gone for the more expensive REM?

dj, try the following setup:

Monitor Mixer: all channels open
Patchbay Router: set to Monitor Mixer
HW Settings: DMA Buffer 1K, Sample rates 44.1KHz, 'Rate Locked' and 'Reset Rate' are checked (unless you need to work with another rate of course).

Important: do not launch the DeltaPanel from within the Sound control panel, it won't work properly. Just set up the Sound c.p., close it. Launch DeltaPanel, make your setup, save it, close it. Once again launch Sound c.p. and check if evereything is 'still there'.

With the latest driver (v2.0) and control panel (v1.7) this seems to work quite well in my case.
(Still the same G4/466 with OS 9.1 here, except that now I have 896MB RAM, but that doesn't really make a difference, I suppose.)

Also, I can report that I have been quite succesful in setting up a small studio running Logic, a Roland XP-10 synth and an R8 drum machine. The only failure so far seem to be the missing SPDIF output with the ASIO driver, wheras SPDIF Out with SoundManager finally works after purchasing yet another VERY thick RCA cable...

[links]

Lou Kash,
you seem to be the man with the answers. I just got a 2496 and I can't figure it out. I'm inputing from turntables and sometimes I can hear the turntables through the soundcard but sometimes I can't.

I know the sound card s receiving the input because in the control panel the lights light up indicating the signal.

When I open Cubasis to record, it doesn't pick up anything. do you have any advice for me or know if I'm doing something wrong? I tried your setup advice above but it doesn't seem to work.

you seem to be the man with the answers.

Hmm, well, I don't know But I'll try...

I'm inputing from turntables

I'm sure you know that you can't plug a turntable directly into a line input, except if the input is labeled 'phono' on an amplifier or a mixer. (But one never knows, that's why I'm mentioning it anyway.)

I'm not familiar with any flavor of Cubase at all, so I can't tell you exactly where to go and what to do. But since it most likely uses the ASIO drivers, in this regard it should work like Logic.
Make sure that the Delta ASIO driver is present in the ASIO Drivers folder on the same level as the Cubasis app lives. If there's no such folder, create one. Most likely the correct driver is ASIO2 DeltaAP, at least that's what Logic Delta wants.
Then make sure that the I/O in the Sound control pamel (SoundManager) is set to Internal (CD).
In Logic you can open the Delta control panel from within the Logic Audio Hardware Preferences, I assume in Cubases it will work the same way.

You might also want to install Logic Delta that came with the card just for testing purposes. Check out the included PDF manual how to set it up.