audiofire 2/4 + mbp user ? please read this

robin · Post by **robin** » Fri Jul 27, 2007 12:54 pm

dru wrote:Really? From what I've read, I was under the impression that it simply won't work well with any MBP. It's just that it's the perfect interface for me at the moment, has exactly what I need and the price is right. I'm worried if I buy it that I'll run into the same problems as the users in this thread. Major dilemma.. heh.

Oh absolutely, I understand your situation and there is nothing more infuriating than a bit of hardware that's not working as expected. I'm not saying there are no problems only that they are not always behaving like this.

I'm on a macbook btw. so my hardware is different but I do know of people on MBPs that have no trouble too.

At the end of the day there isn't an audio interface that doesn't have any trouble at all. Even the Ultralite has some issues on a small minority of systems.

dru · Post by **dru** » Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:10 pm

Hmm, your words are giving me more hope.

I'll wait (and wait) to see if Echo replies my email and decide from that. I'm really hoping for a good answer from them. Who knows, I might bite the bullet and buy it anyway..

robin · Post by **robin** » Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:12 pm

dru wrote:Hmm, your words are giving me more hope. I'll wait (and wait) to see if Echo replies my email and decide from that. I'm really hoping for a good answer from them. Who knows, I might bite the bullet and buy it anyway..

Echo support don't have the best reputation for replying promptly, but I guess you knew that already.

nonnus · Post by **nonnus** » Fri Jul 27, 2007 3:11 pm

maybe today i woke in a bad mood,
but my best advice would be:
stay away from echo audio
and probably stay away from apple products aswell

Zerobae · Post by **Zerobae** » Fri Jul 27, 2007 3:17 pm

nonnus, i thought you had luck using those special drivers? no more?

serotoninsteve · Post by **serotoninsteve** » Fri Jul 27, 2007 4:30 pm

Mine works well,
but I needed to install this sdk firewire driver.
The only thing you need to do perhaps,
the case it doesn't run well on your machine,
is to download and install the sdk driver.
It's not a big deal to install it,
and having a great sounding card!
As I've read the presonus doesn't power up on the newer MBP's,
as the voltage/current is limited on the models with fw400 and 800.
So you would need to run it on the power adaptor to power up,
wich isn't handy at all to do everytime.

nonnus · Post by **nonnus** » Fri Jul 27, 2007 7:37 pm

i think maybe i am not in so bad mood so ill try to explain...

both companies, echo and apple are really disapointing me regarding credibility and professionalism

as we all figured out some very serious issues have been crippling professional use with most firewire cards, and it is not a recent issue, i have been experiencing prblems since december and i am sure i was not the 1st...

apparently there was an obscure solution (the sdk driver) but it was info you really needed to digg if you weren´t lucky to notice on a forum like this, and this is not appropriate at all

we are almost in august and apple has still not resolved the issue and implemented a corrected driver on some os update, so if you do not go the sdk route you will have a buggy fw audio driver on your system... shamelessly behaviour...

maybe echo does not have that much fault in the issue but they should inform their customers that some steps are necessary for their products to work, and they definatelly should reply to support tech !
i suppose this is a no brainer, until they do they are not worthy of any kind of trust from consumers...

also there is still development to be made on the drivers,
i still have problems whenever my system goes to sleep or if i have a daisychained hd, and they should be solved...
until then i will always think if i would probably be better with an ultralite, or maybe i would be posting about it...

i must say in their defense (echo audio) that they were the ones who pointed me the solution, stating that they could not distribute the sdk driver because of some legalities, i can understand everything about that...
but not that several months after there isn´t any kind of info regarding the issue nor the solution, i find it ridiculous to see a known issues section on their documentation that misses on this info...

p.s.: zerobae, the reason i am feeling a bit bitter again is because out of nothin i am getting pops and crackes in the sound,
it has happened before but after testing that it was not present on a clean install i solved it by reinstalling the dev driver, but now this does not work anymore...

just this week i was trying to record some stuff and it really got on my nerves...

i know i should be reinstalling my whole system, but i just just fear reinstalling all my plugins and facing lost presets or configs... it always happens to me, after reinstalling the systems there is always one plug in that loses its configuration on complete tracks (sfx machine pro is a notable master doing this...):(

serotoninsteve · Post by **serotoninsteve** » Fri Jul 27, 2007 10:09 pm

I completely agree on the non professionalism/bad support from both companies,
and I'm not pleased that it doesn't work anymore for you.

dru · Post by **dru** » Sat Jul 28, 2007 2:30 am

Check out the replies I got (yes, replies and within 24hrs!):

We will definitely check this out next week!! Thanks for contacting us.

Ken Field
Echo Digital Audio
Testing Coordinator

And..

Yes, I am pretty sure this bug has been fixed.

So, has anyone tried the latest driver that was released on the 20th this month? Maybe the issue has been fixed?

timothyallan · Post by **timothyallan** » Sat Jul 28, 2007 3:09 am

I just bought 2 of these for a mate and myself for a live show. 1 is totally DOA on a MBP and a PC Laptop, the other one the headphone jack is wonky.

I bought them from the states so now I've got to pay for restocking+shipping fees again. fuck.

Also, Echo tech support has consisted of "Wierd, we'll try and replicate it here" and "do you have it plugged into an outlet".

This is with the brand new drivers for Mac and PC.

Edit>: these are both Audiofire 2's

dru · Post by **dru** » Sat Jul 28, 2007 10:39 am

Damn, that really sux. I might just go buy a Behringer FCA202.

nonnus · Post by **nonnus** » Sat Jul 28, 2007 1:40 pm

dru wrote:Check out the replies I got (yes, replies and within 24hrs!):

We will definitely check this out next week!! Thanks for contacting us.

Ken Field
Echo Digital Audio
Testing Coordinator

And..

Yes, I am pretty sure this bug has been fixed.

So, has anyone tried the latest driver that was released on the 20th this month? Maybe the issue has been fixed?

what do you mean ?
are you referring to the 4.2 echo driver ?
this driver ? :http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=69085

of course it was installed the day it was out...
no difference, alias, in my opinion things just got worse after...
now i have all sort of problems to get it to work after unplugging it and i am getting cracks and pops all the time....

so i am not really sure there was any kind of fix for audiofire 2 and 4...

if any bug was present it probably still is...
btw, what bug were you talking about, dru ?

at this time i am not focusing in any issue / bug in particular as the sdk workaround seems to work ok, although i currently just don t know for how long...

robbmasters · Post by **robbmasters** » Sun Aug 12, 2007 8:33 pm

So, did the SDK driver fix this for everyone? Did the problem only ever occur under OS X or did anyone get it under BootCamp (which wouldn't be affected by the OS X driver)?

I'm wondering if it's safe to buy an Audiofire 4 now...

Beezer · Post by **Beezer** » Wed Sep 05, 2007 7:43 pm

I am wondering the same thing! On paper the Audiofire 4 looks perfect for my needs but I'm too scared to buy one after reading this thread!

Can we get an update from owners of the Audiofire series?

Also, I'm still a bit confused about whether the problem is isolated to MBP. Are any MacBook owners having issues?

thanks.

robin · Post by **robin** » Wed Sep 05, 2007 7:52 pm

Beezer wrote:I am wondering the same thing! On paper the Audiofire 4 looks perfect for my needs but I'm too scared to buy one after reading this thread!

Can we get an update from owners of the Audiofire series?

Also, I'm still a bit confused about whether the problem is isolated to MBP. Are any MacBook owners having issues?

thanks.

No probs at all on my macbook (AF2). I'd buy another in a flash. The sound is lovely nice and full and they're nice and compact.