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Intel Fireface 800 User's Manual

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1. fi x typical configuration dia Tu log of a stereo wave e Tempo Time code amp Audio Database CD Burning Sync editor After selecting a m General f Audio Card fs Appearance D Editing E Display device audio data is sent Playback Recording to an analog or digital MME WDM Fieface 1 2 v MME WDM Fieface 1 2 ADAT SPDIF port Buffer Number 4 ME DM depending on which has UM iai Buffer Size 1024 5 344 been selected as play MME WDM Fireface Analog 5 6 MME B Latency 16bit 44 1kKHz stereo 23 ms MME WDM Fireface Analog 7 8 MME back device A ne MME WDM Fireface Analog 8 10 MME MME WDM Fireface SPDIF MME b Preferred Playback Resolution Auto Stop if drops ou MEM id e ul UME ncreasing the number C 16bit Threshold 20 VME WDM Fireface ADAT1 5 6 MME and or size of audio buf EN Rae AME ers may prevent the au A i Playback cursor MME WDM Fireface ADAT 2 3 4 MME de MME WDM Fireface ADAT2 5 6 MME dio signal from breaking Tae WEE et postion from audi uu WDM Fireface ADAT 2 7 8 MME up but also increases stating playback samel S WDM Fyelace Analog 8 6 latency 1 6 output is de Transport settings are global to FE tte Ber layed For synchronized andone MME WDM Fresco SPDIF i MEME MME DM Fieface ADATI 14 i MME WD
2. 55 27 3 Instrument AE 56 28 Analog Outputs AMENS I E 57 28 2 CDI 57 29 Digital Connections 29 1 ADAM iie nt ordei faded terii ee a rs 58 29 2 SPDIF 58 29 3 etie citer e OR exis 59 30 Word Clock 30 1 Word Clock Input and 60 30 2 Technical Description and Background 61 30 3 Cables and 62 30 4 General 62 31 TotalMix Routing and Monitoring 31 1 OVETVIOW Mm 63 31 2 The User Interface 65 31 3 Elements of a 66 31 4 Tour de TotalMix essere 66 31 5 Submix View esses 68 31 6 Mute and Solo 68 31 7 Quick Access Panel 69 31 8 d TEIL D D 69 31 9 Monitor 71 31 10 Preferences ni nerit enitn 71 31 11 Editing the Names 72 91 12 HOIKOyS rre rode aai ns 73 31 13 Menu Options 74 31 14 Level Meter 75 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 32 The Matrix 321 76 32 2 Elements of the Matrix View 76 32 3 Usa89g6 iude r aani 76 32 4 Advantages of the Matrix 77 33 TotalMix Super Features 33 1 ASIO Direct Mon
3. 14 ADAT 2 1 144 _ lt E 3 ADAT1 15 3 1 15 _ d gt 16 4 1 16 H __ J 1 mE 17 ADAT 5 1 1 4 _ 18 ADAT 6 1 4 _ 3 4 N E ADAT2 I O 19 ADAT 7 1 lt 3 ah TEE 20 ADAT 8 1 20 96 kHz Routing Fireface 800 ASIO 36 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 18 2 Channel Routing at 96 kHz This diagram shows the signal paths in MME double speed mode 88 2 96 kHz The devices available via the MME wave driver have been designed to avoid conflicts in normal operation which is why the second ADAT device has been omitted Record and playback are identical Device SR Routing SR Interface Fireface Analog 1 2 Fireface Analog 3 4 000 Fireface Analog 5 6 Analog 1 0 6 6 gt 5 Fireface Analog 7 8 Fireface Analog 9 10 10 10 N T m 8 11 L Fireface SPDIF SPDIF 12 R gt 1 2 Fireface ADAT1 1 2 3 14 1 lt 4 B 5 E ADAT1 1 0 gt Fireface ADAT1 3 4 gt 0 4 8 E 2 Fireface ADAT1 546 3 lt 4 B 5 ADAT2 1 0 19 2 gt Fireface ADAT1 7 8 7 Fireface ADAF244 2 20 _ nie n e 800 8 FrefaceABAR HE Fireface ADAF247 8 96 kHz Routing Fireface 800 MME User s Guide Fi
4. Set input 1 to 0 dB BO 66 40 Set input 17 to maximum attenuation B1 66 0 Set playback 1 to maximum B4 66 7F Set Output 16 to 0 dB setzen B8 75 40 Note Sending MIDI strings might require to use programmer s logic for the MIDI channel start ing with 0 for channel 1 and ending with 15 for channel 16 34 6 Loopback Detection The Mackie Control protocol requires feedback of the received commands back to the hard ware controller So usually TotalMix will be set up with both a MIDI input and MIDI output Un fortunately any small error in wiring and setup will cause a MIDI feedback loop here which then completely blocks the computer the CPU To prevent the computer from freezing TotalMix sends a special MIDI note every 0 5 seconds to its MIDI output As soon as it detects this special note at the input the MIDI functionality is disabled After fixing the loopback check Enable MIDI Control under Options to reactivate the TotalMix MIDI User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 85 34 7 Stand Alone MIDI Control When not connected to a computer the Fireface 800 can be controlled directly via MIDI To unlock the special stand alone MIDI control mode first activate MIDI control in TotalMix En able MIDI control then transfer this state via Flash current mixer state into the unit Turning this mode off is done in the same way but with MIDI control deactivated Note When not needed the stand alone MIDI operation should not be
5. QU D S socket and all digital inputs 8 TA a te 4 3 2 ae ADAT1 VO TOSLINK BALANCED LINE LEVEL OUTPUTS SPDIF pin ADAT2 I O TOSLINK Can also be used as optical SPDIF input and output if set up accord ingly in the Settings dialog The Settings dialog is started by clicking on the fire symbol in the Task Bar s system tray SPDIF I O coaxial RCA Fully AES EBU compatible by transformer coupling and level adjust ment The Fireface 800 accepts the commonly used digital audio formats SPDIF as well as AES EBU Word Clock O BNC A push switch allows to activate internal termination 75 Ohms When termination is activated the yellow LED besides the switch lights up IEC receptacle for mains power connection The specially developed internal hi performance switch mode power supply makes the Fireface operate in the range of 100V to 240V AC It is short circuit proof has an integrated line filter is fully regulated against voltage fluctuations and suppresses mains interference User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 9 5 2 Quick Start After the driver installation chapter 10 20 connect the TRS jacks or the XLR connectors with the analog signal source The input sensitivity of the rear inputs can be changed in the Settings dialog Input Level assuring the highest signal to noise ratio will be achieved Try to achieve an optimum input level by adjusting the source itself Raise the source s
6. gt Installation and Operation Windows User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 9 Hardware Installation Desktop Computer e Use the power cord to connect the Fireface with any suitable power outlet e Connect computer and Fireface using the supplied 6 pin FireWire cable IEEE1394a In case your computer does not have any FireWire port PCl cards providing multiple FireWire ports can be added easily FireWire cards are available in your local computer shop e Power on the computer Switch on the Fireface when Windows shows the desktop Notebook e Use the power cord to connect the Fireface with any suitable power outlet e Connect computer and Fireface using the supplied 6 pin FireWire cable IEEE1394a In case your notebook does not have any FireWire port CardBus cards can be used to add them In case your notebook does not have a 6 pin jack or did not include a 6 pin to 4 pin adapter such adapters are available in your local computer store also as complete cable 4 pin to 6 pin e Power on the notebook Switch on the Fireface when Windows shows the desktop 10 Driver and Firmware 10 1 Driver Installation After the Fireface has been switched on see 9 Hardware Installation the green arrow symbol appears in the task bar dialog Remove hardware z Wu 11 13 because Windows has detected an external hardware Insert the RME Driver CD into your CD ROM drive and follow further instructions which appear on your computer sc
7. synchronized to a master Whenever several devices are linked within a system there must always be a single master clock The Fireface s intelligent clock control is very user friendly being able to switch between clock modes automatically Selecting AutoSync will activate this mode In AutoSync mode the system constantly scans all digital inputs for a valid signal If any valid signal is found the Fireface switches from the internal quartz System Clock Mode displays to a clock extracted from the input signal System Clock Mode displays Slave The difference to a usual slave mode is that whenever the clock reference fails the system will automatically use its internal clock and operate in Master mode AutoSync guarantees that record and record while play will always work correctly In certain cases however e g when the inputs and outputs of a DAT machine are connected directly to the Fireface 800 AutoSync may cause feedback in the digital carrier so synchronization breaks down To remedy this switch the Fireface s clock mode over to Master Remember that a digital system can only have one master If the Fireface s clock mode is d set to Master all other devices must be set to Slave The Fireface s ADAT optical and SPDIF inputs operate simultaneously Because there is no input selector however the Fireface 800 has to be told which of the signals is the sync refer ence a digital device can only be
8. Power supply Internal switching PSU 100 240 V AC 30 Watt Typical power consumption 22 Watt Dimensions including rack ears WxHxD 483 x 44 x 242 mm 19 x 1 73 x 9 5 Dimensions without rack ears handles WxHxD 436 x 44 x 235 mm 17 2 x 1 73 x 9 3 Weight 3 kg 6 6 Ibs Temperature range 45 up to 450 Celsius 41 F up to 122 F Relative humidity 7596 non condensing 94 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 37 Technical Background 37 1 Lock and SyncCheck Digital signals consist of a carrier and the data If a digital signal is applied to an input the re ceiver has to synchronize to the carrier clock in order to read the data correctly To achieve this the receiver uses a PLL Phase Locked Loop As soon as the receiver meets the exact fre quency of the incoming signal it is locked This Lock state remains even with small changes of the frequency because the PLL tracks the receiver s frequency If an ADAT or SPDIF signal is applied to the Fireface 800 the corresponding input LED starts flashing The unit indicates LOCK i e a valid input signal in case the signal is also in sync the LED is constantly lit see below Unfortunately LOCK does not necessarily mean that the received signal is correct with respect to the clock which processes the read out of the embedded data Example 1 The Fireface is set to 44 1 kHz internally clock mode Master and a mixing desk with ADAT output is con nected to input ADA
9. Pref Sync Ref Inputs Level In Level Out Used to pre select the desired clock Few M pede ten source If the selected source isn t avail En 7 Rear B 4dBu 4 able the system will change to the next available one The current clock source and sample rate is displayed in the AutoSync Ref display O 10 O 10 8 Front Rear n Instrument Options __ 1 Drive M Lim Speaker Emulation Phantom Power C1 Mic 8 Mic 10 The automatic clock selection checks and changes between the clock sources Clock Mode Word Clock ADAT1 ADAT2 SPDIF roue rave aie using Coaxial 69 Master Freq 44 1 kHz SPDIF Out Pref Sync Ref SyncCheck SyncCheck ADAT2 O Word Clock Word No Lock SyncCheck indicates whether there is a C Professional In Sync valid signal Lock No Lock for each Emphasis ADAT2 In ADAT2 Sync input Word clock ADAT1 ADAT2 Non Audio 2 SPDIF In SPDIF Lock SPDIF or if there is a valid and syn SPDIF Freq Clock System Clock __ chronous signal Sync The AutoSync 48 kHz B Single Speed Mode Master Ref display shows the input and fre quency of the current sync source Limit Bandwidth Analog 1 8 B Freq 44100 Hz Read Af Store System Clock Shows the current clock state of the Fireface 800 The unit is either Master using its own clock or Slave Aut
10. menu Options or F2 and direct keyboard entry hotkeys make various options available Display range 40 or 60 dB hotkey 4 or 6 Release time of the Peak display Fast Medium Slow Numerical display selectable either Peak or RMS Hotkey E or H Number of consecutive samples for Overload display 1 to 15 RMS display absolute or relative to O dBFS Hotkey 3 or 0 The latter is a point often overlooked but nonetheless important A RMS measurement shows 3 dB less for sine signals While this is mathematically correct it is not very reasonable for a level meter Therefore the RMS readout is usually corrected by 3 dB so that a full scale sine signal shows 0 dBFS on both Peak and RMS me ters This setting also yields directly readable signal to noise values Otherwise the value shown with noise is 3 dB better than it actually is because the reference is not 0 dB but 3 dB For example in WaveLab The value displayed in the text field is independent of the setting 40 60 dB it represents the full 24 bit range of the RMS measurement thus making possible a SNR meas urement RMS unweighted which you would otherwise need extremely expensive measurement devices for An example An RME ADI 8 DS connected to the Fireface s ADAT port will show around 113 dBFS on all eight channel s input level meters AN 745 AN 745 Phones Phones SPDIF SPDIF This level display will constantly bring the reduced dy lt un gt namic
11. 44 1 kHz 0 1 dB 5 Hz 20 6 kHz Frequency response 96 kHz 0 5 dB 5 Hz 45 3 kHz Frequency response 192 kHz 1 dB 5 Hz 90 kHz THD 110 dB 0 00032 96 THD N 104 dB lt 0 00063 Channel separation 110 dB Maximum input level 19 dBu Input 6 3 mm TRS jack electronically balanced Input impedance 10 kOhm Input sensitivity switchable to Lo Gain 4 dBu 10 dBV Input level for 0 dBFS 9 Lo Gain 19 dBu Input level for 0 dBFS 9 4 dBu 13 dBu Input level for 0 dBFS 10 dBV 2 dBV Mute 100 dB Line In 7 10 Front as AD but Gain range via pot 50 dB Maximum input level Gain 10 dB 22 dBu Maximum input level Gain 60 dB 28 dBu CLIP LED 2 dBFS SIG LED 45 dBFS Mute gt 130 dB Microphone as AD but Input XLR electronically balanced Input impedance 2 kOhm Gain range via pot 50 dB Maximum input level Gain 10 dB 11 dBu Maximum input level Gain 60 dB 39 dBu CLIP LED 2 dBFS SIG LED 45 dBFS Mute gt 130 dB Instrument as AD but Input 6 3 mm TS jack unbalanced Input impedance 470 kOhm Signal to Noise ratio SNR 108 dB RMS unweighted 111 dBA Gain range via pot 52 dB Drive Gain 23 dB Maximum input level Gain 1 10 dBFS 10 dBu Maximum input level Gain 9 10 dBFS 42 dBu LIM LED 10 dBFS SIG LED 40 dBFS Mute gt 120 dB User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 91 DA Line Out 1 8 rear Resolution 24 bit Dynamic ran
12. selected in Windows under Control Sounds and Multimedia Audio Such software often requires the special functions provided by WDM and therefore will operate better when using a WDM device Please note that selecting the Fireface to be used as system playback device is against our recommendations as professional interfaces should not be disturbed by system events The program Sonar from Cakewalk is unique in many ways Sonar uses the so called WDM Kernel Streaming bypassing the WDM mixer thus achieves a similar performance as ASIO and our MME driver see below Because of the driver s multichannel streaming ability option Interleaved see chapter 12 5 Sonar not only finds the stereo device mentioned above but also the 8 channel interleaved devices and adds the channel number at the end Fireface Analog 1 2 is the first stereo device Fireface Analog 3 4 is the next stereo device Fireface Analog 1 2 3 4 are the channels 3 4 of the first 8 channel interleaved device We recommend to not use these special interleaved devices Also note that it is not possible to use one stereo channel twice the basic and the interleaved device even with different applica tions Information on multichannel WDM is found in chapter 12 5 Fireface Analog 1 2 MME The devices with the MME suffix bypass the Windows Kernel Mixer This way they achieve nearly the same performance as RME s previous true MME drivers Also their behavio
13. 102 38 2 Connector Pinouts TRS jacks of analog input output The stereo 1 4 TRS jacks of the analog inputs and outputs are wired according to international standards Tip hot Ring cold Sleeve GND The servo balanced input and output circuitry allows to use monaural TS jacks unbalanced with no loss in level This is the same as when using a TRS jack with ring connected to ground XLR jacks of analog inputs The XLR jacks are wired according to international standards 1 GND shield 2 hot cold TRS Phones jack The analog monitor output on Left the front is accessible through a stereo 1 4 TRS jack This Right allows a direct connection of headphones In case the output should operate as Line output an adapter TRS plug to RCA phono plugs or TRS plug to TS plugs is required Shield The pin assignment follows international standards The left channel is connected to the tip the right channel to the ring of the TRS jack plug User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 103
14. Panel Sounds and Multimedia Audio lt Also check preferred device some cases MME is not supported The DVD software s audio properties now show the options SPDIF Out Use SPDIF or acti vate SPDIF output When selecting these the software will transfer the non decoded digital multichannel data stream to the Fireface This SPDIF signal sounds like chopped noise at highest level Therefore the Fireface 800 automatically sets the non audio bit within the digital data stream to prevent most SPDIF re ceivers from accepting the signal and to prevent any attached equipment from being damaged Multichannel PowerDVD and WinDVD can also operate as software decoder sending a DVD s multichannel data stream directly to the analog outputs of the Fireface All modes are supported from 2 to 8 channels at 16 bit resolution and up to 192 kHz sample rate Up to 48 kHz playback is also possible via the ADAT outputs of the Fireface For multichannel playback WDM streaming device or the correct MME playback device of the Fireface 800 has to be selected in gt Panel Sounds and Multimedia Audio lt Also check use preferred device only Additionally the loudspeaker setup found under gt Volume Speaker Settings Advanced has to be changed from Stereo to 5 1 Surround PowerDVD s and WinDVD s audio properties now list several multichannel modes If one of these is selected the software sends the
15. RME 36 4 Digital Inputs AES EBU SPDIF e 1 x RCA transformer balanced galvanically isolated according to AES3 1992 e High sensitivity input stage lt 0 3 Vpp e SPDIF compatible IEC 60958 e Accepts Consumer and Professional format copy protection will be ignored Lock Range 27 kHz 200 kHz e Jitter when synced to input signal 1 ns e Jitter suppression 30 dB 2 4 kHz ADAT Optical e 2x TOSLINK Standard 16 channels 24 bit up to 48 kHz Sample Split S MUX 2 x 8 channels 24 bit 48 kHz equalling 8 channels 24 bit 96 kHz e Bitclock PLL ensures perfect synchronisation even in varispeed operation Lock Range 31 5 kHz 50 kHz e Jitter when synced to input signal 1 ns e Jitter suppression gt 30 dB 2 4 kHz Word Clock BNC not terminated 10 kOhm e Switch for internal termination 75 Ohm Automatic Double Quad Speed detection and internal conversion to Single Speed SteadyClock guarantees super low jitter synchronization even in varispeed operation e Transformer coupled galvanically isolated input Not affected by DC offsets within the network e Signal Adaptation Circuit signal refresh through auto center and hysteresis Overvoltage protection e Level range 1 0 Vpp 5 6 Lock Range 27 kHz 200 kHz e Jitter when synced to input signal 1 ns e Jitter suppression gt 30 dB 2 4 kHz User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 93 36 5 Digi
16. System Library Extensions Its name is FirefaceAudioDriver kext It is visible in the Finder allow ing you to verify date and driver version Yet in fact this again is a folder containing subdirecto ries and files Nonetheless this driver file can be removed by simply dragging it to the trash bin This can be helpful in case a driver installation fails An incomplete installation can currently 10 3 2 only be detected indirectly The installation routine does not open a message window with a note about a restart of the computer This indicates that the driver file was not copied and the driver was not installed Several users have observed that the installation routine occasionally stops and no longer works correctly This can be fixed by removing the corresponding extension file prior to installa tion In some cases also or only a repair of the disk permission will help We have also received reports saying the driver update could not be installed on the system disk shown red crossed during the installation Repairing permission may also help here If not we re sorry but have to recommend to contact Apple Our driver has no knowledge of fold ers disks etc the installation is handled completely by the OS X installer 23 2 MIDI doesn t work In some cases MIDI does not work after the installation of the Fireface driver To be precise applications do not show an installed MIDI port The reason for this is usually visible with
17. always concerns all channels and is thus perceived much clearer Apart from this RME s PCI audio cards establish a direct connection with the applica tion under ASIO Zero CPU load which is principally not possible with FireWire because communication has to be established by the operating system s FireWire driver Compared to our PCI cards the FireWire subsystem creates an additional CPU load at lower latencies One FireFace 800 can achieve a performance similar to a PCI card with an optimal PC An optimal PC has an undisturbed PCI bus Intel s motherboard D875PBZ e g has network PATA and SATA connected directly to the chipset No matter what you do with the computer FireWire audio is not being disturbed The same holds true for the ASUS P4C800 as long as you leave the additional SATA controller PCI unused 429 r Pref Sync Ref 3 Due to insufficient buffering within FireWire controllers single peak Ward Clock loads on the PCI bus can already cause loss of one or more data C In packets This is independent of the manufacturer and RME 5 C ADAT2 In problem The FireFace 800 features a unique data checking de SPDIF In tecting errors during transmission via PCI FireWire and displaying lation C them in the Settings dialog Additionally the Fireface provides 4 special mechanism which allows to continue record and playback in spite of drop outs and to correct the sample position in real time 1
18. amp utoSync Ref Detailed information on this topic can be found in the Tech Info Lock Input NoLock FireWire Audio by RME Technical Background on our website Lock Freg No Lock lark TR http www rme audio com english techinfo fwaudio rme htm User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 97 37 4 Number of Channels and Bus Load As explained in chapter 37 3 FireWire Audio does not reach the same performance as PCI audio On a standard computer with modern single PCI bus about 100 audio channels can be transmitted per direction record playback Exceeding this limit any system acitivity even outside the PCI bus causes drop outs Transferring these experiences to FireWire and the Fireface 800 means that besides the num ber of channels the bus load has to be taken into account too One channel at 96 kHz causes the same load to the system as two channels at 48 kHz To use FireWire as efficiently as possible the Fireface allows to reduce the number of trans ferred channels Limit Bandwidth provides four options limiting the transmission internally to 28 20 12 or 8 channels This limitation is independent from the sample rate which is why the op tion s descriptions are not fully correct at 96 kHz As can be seen in the following table in 96 kHz mode there is no difference between the setting All Channels and An SPDIF ADAT1 For a valid reduction of the bus load ADAT must be unselected completely As the Fireface offers only 12 channels
19. as master which sends the same clock signal to all the other slave devices RME s exclusive SyncCheck tech Fireface Settings nology first implemented in the Hammerfall enables an easy to use 77 Fieface 2 DDS About check and display of the current Buffer Size Latency r Input Level Options clock status SyncCheck indicates 48 Samples LoGain M Check Input whether there is a valid signal Lock 4 dBu Sync lian No Lock for each input Word pem Val 5 dur a Clock ADAT1 ADAT2 SPDIF or if STATS there is a valid and synchronous ART signal Sync The AutoSync Ref 8 FrntRea 49 apy E zs aster display shows the input and fre Limit Bandwidth Phantom Power quency of the current sync source Alchames __ Mic p Pref Sync Ref see chapter 37 1 lv Mic8 Mic10 Word Clock ADATI In In Instrument Options ADAT2 In In practice SyncCheck provides the ADAT2 Drive Lim SPDIF In user with an easy way of checking f Coaxial Speaker Emulation whether all digital devices con SPDIF Out Word Clock Out C nected to the system are properly ADAT2 Single Speed configured With SyncCheck finally m pieleen SyncCheck AutoSync Ref anyone can master this common Emphasis Word Clock Sync Input Word source of error previously
20. automatically as soon as a Fireface is detected They stay in the dock when exited and remove themselves automatically from the dock when the Fireface is removed Reboot the computer when installation is done Possible reasons why a Fireface is not found after driver installation e FireWire port is not active in the system drivers of the FireWire PCI or CardBus card have not been installed e FireWire cable is or not correctly inserted into the socket e No power After switching the Fireface on at least the red Host error LED has to be lit 40 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 20 2 Driver Update In case of a driver update it s not necessary to remove the old driver first it will be overwritten during the installation Exception driver update from version 1 0 Remove the former Settings dialog and To talMix from the Login Items and delete both files from your hard drive This driver version did not have the features AutoLoad Dock Lock and AutoRemove Therefore one has to make sure that both programs have been removed from the system to prevent the old Settings dialog and TotalMix from being loaded 21 Firmware Update The Flash Update Tool updates the firmware of the Fireface 800 to the latest version It requires an already installed driver Start the program Fireface Flash The Flash Update Tool displays the current revision of the Fireface s firmware and whether it needs an update or not If so
21. but a playback or record is not possible e While recognition and control of the device are low bandwidth applications playback record needs the full FireWire transmission performance Therefore defective FireWire cables with limited transmission bandwidth can cause such an error scheme 50 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 25 Diagram Channel Routing at 96 kHz This diagram shows the signal paths in double speed mode 88 2 96 kHz The channels of the second ADAT port have no function anymore in Core Audio but are used by the hardware to transmit data at double sample rate Signal routing is identical for record and playback Device SR Routing SR Interface 1 Analog 1 ju 2 Analog 1 2 e 3 Analog 1 3 3 4 Analog 1 4 4 5 Analog 1 lt Analog I O 6 Analog 1 6 6 INE 7 Analog 1 7 5 8 Analog 1 8 8 9 Analog 1 9 9 10 Analog 1 10 10 we 11 SPDIF 11 L e lt SPDIF 12 SPDIF R 12 R gt 13 ADAT 1 1 14 2 1 14 _ ADAT1 15 3 1 18 1 gt 7 16 ADAT 4 1 16 H 1 17 5 1 18 ADAT 6 1 ADAT2 I O 3 19 1 e gt 7 20 ADAT 8 1 f 24 28 96 kHz Routing Fireface 800 Core Audio User
22. clock signals are usually distributed in the form of a network split with BNC T adapters and terminated with resistors We recommend using off the shelf BNC cables to connect all devices as this type of cable is used for most computer networks You will find all the neces sary components T adapters terminators cables in most electronics and or computer stores The latter usually carries 50 Ohms components The 75 Ohms components used for word clock are part of video techology RG59 Ideally the word clock signal is a 5 Volt square wave with the frequency of the sample rate of which the harmonics go up to far above 500 kHz To avoid voltage loss and reflections both the cable itself and the terminating resistor at the end of the chain should have an impedance of 75 Ohm If the voltage is too low synchronization will fail High frequency reflection effects can cause both jitter and sync failure Unfortunately there are still many devices on the market even newer digital mixing consoles which are supplied with a word clock output that can only be called unsatisfactory If the output breaks down to 3 Volts when terminating with 75 Ohms you have to take into account that a device of which the input only works from 2 8 Volts and above does not function correctly al ready after 3 meter cable length So it is not astonishing that because of the higher voltage word clock networks are in some cases more stable and reliable if cables are not termi
23. clocked from a single source Via Pref Sync Ref preferred synchronization reference a preferred input can be defined As long as the card sees a valid signal there this input will be designated as the sync source The Fireface has been equipped with an automatic clock source selection which adopts the first available input with a valid digital signal as the clock reference input If none of the inputs are receiving a valid signal the card automatically switches clock mode to Master The input currently used as sync reference is shown in the AutoSync Ref status field together with its sample frequency To cope with some situations which may arise in studio practice defining a sync reference is essential One example An ADAT recorder is connected to the ADAT input ADAT immediately becomes the AutoSync source and a CD player is connected to the SPDIF input Try recording a few samples from the CD and you will be disappointed Few CD players can be synchronized The samples will inevitably be corrupted because the signal from the CD player is read with the wrong clock from the ADAT i e out of sync In this case Pref Sync Hef should be temporarily set to SPDIF 22 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME If several digital devices are to be used simultaneously in a system they not only have to oper ate with the same sample frequency but also be synchronous with each other This is why digi tal systems always need a single device defined
24. dBA 3 DC dB 1 Let EENENEEEENENEENEEENEENEENNENEZH 1085 Low 2 Right EER SSSR 2 108 9 Low Bits 4 S 8 12 16 20 24 Press F1 for help SR 192kHz The reason for this behaviour is the noise shaping technology of the analog to digital convert ers They move all noise and distortion to the in audible higher frequency range above 24 kHz That s how they achieve their outstanding performance and sonic clarity Therefore the noise is slightly increased in the ultrasound area High frequent noise has a high energy Add the dou bled quadrupled bandwidth and a wideband measurement will show a siginificant drop in SNR while the human ear will notice absolutely no change in the audible noise floor 37 9 SteadyClock The SteadyClock technology of the Fireface 800 guarantees an excellent performance in all clock modes Thanks to a highly efficient jitter suppression the AD and DA conversion always operates on highest sonic level being completely independent from the quality of the incoming clock signal TERR Pos 4081 05 CURSOR SteadyClock has been originally de m veloped to gain a stable and clean zu Tr Time clock from the heavily jittery MADI data A signal the embedded MADI clock suf m fers from about 80 ns jitter Using the Fireface s input signals SPDIF and you ll most probably never perience such high jitter valu
25. eight analog channels User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 47 23 Mac OS X FAQ 23 1 Round about Driver Installation The driver with the file suffix gz provided by RME is a compressed TAR archive TAR bundles multiple files and folders into one file but does not save memory space nor download time Both TAR and gz are supported natively by OS X a double click on the file is all you need to do Older browsers do not recognize gz as an archive loading the file as a document This results in a cryptic looking text within the browser window Downloading the file can be done via the right mouse key Save Target as Despite this procedure some older browsers like Netscape 4 78 will not save the file correctly the archive will be corrupted The driver consists of a package file pkg which contains various folders and files similar to TAR A double click will start the OS X installer To save you the hassle of installing both audio and MIDI drivers separately the Fireface driver contains an additional meta package mpkg that points to the single packages Those single packages are not shown in the Finder as they reside within the invisible folder contained packages Only the mpkg is visible Important an installation can only be done with the complete folder If only the mpkg is copied to a different place it will not find the single driver packages The actual audio driver appears as a kernel extension file The installer copies it to gt
26. in Quad Speed mode the options A Channels 28 channels down to Ana log SPDIF 12 channels perform no change at all Logically as ADAT isn t available in this mode anyway Limit Bandwidth 48 kHz 28 96 kHz 20 192 kHz 12 FW Kan le Channels Analog SPDIF Analog 1 8 X o dl An SPDIF ADAT x 1 X The bus load is doubled at 96 kHz and quadrupled at 192 kHz Limit Bandwidth sets a constant number of channels but those channels cause a bigger load in 05 and QS mode because more data have to be transferred For example the 12 channels at 192 kHz equal a FireWire and PCI bus load of 48 channels at 48 kHz The following table shows the real bus load in all modes Limit Bandwidth 48 kHz max 28 DS max 20 QS max 12 All Channels Analog SPDIF Analog 1 8 Be o o e 132 The usage of multiple Firefaces in DS and QS operation can be problematic due to the in creased bus load Some examples e 2 Firefaces will most likely not run stable at 192 kHz at full track count 2 x 12 channels 192 kHz equal 2 x 48 channels at 48 kHz 96 channels per direction e 2 Firefaces at 96 kHz should operate reliable at full channel count 2 x 20 equals 2 x 40 80 channels per direction e 3 Firefaces at 96 kHz can t operate at full channel count 3 x 20 equals 3 x 40 120 chan nels per direction The Settings dialog will show Errors audio will sound distorted e To not exceed a maximum of 80 channels with 3 Firef
27. in steps of 1 Hz d The DDS dialog requires the Fireface to be in clock mode Master The frequency setting will only be applied this one specific Fireface audio or brings up warning messages of the audio software Therefore the desired sample d Changing the sample rate in bigger steps during record playback often results in a loss of rate should be set at least coarsely before starting the software DDS Activates all settings of this dialog 60 Fireface Settings Value eS Shows the sample rate as adjusted in this Unit 869 BDSM About dialog The sample rate is defined by the 005 Value Coarse Fine basic setting Frequency the multiplier Active 44143 4 404 X and the position of the activated fader docs 48 048 0 1 X Frequency x 48 000 Sets a fixed basic sample rate which can Cj 47 952 0 1 9 be modified by multiplier and fader 46 080 4 is 45 864 4 X Freq Multiplier 44 144 0 1 X Changes the basic sample rate into Sin 9 44 100 gle Double oder Quad Speed mode 44 056 0 1 O 32 000 Coarse TAM Frequency Multiplier tos Tee Fader for coarse modification of the basic Aci sample rate Click Active to activate it A MERE dis i Minimum step size 1 Hz Fine Fader for fine modification of the basic sample rate Click Active to activate it Minimum step size 1 Hz Notes on the faders A mouse click within the
28. operation A MIDI input signal can be received from several programs at the same time Additionally the GSIF 2 Low Latency MIDI port is available for use with Gigastudio 3 Even the MIDI output can be used by multiple programs simultaneously However due to the limited bandwidth of MIDI this kind of application will often show various problems Note The MIDI input LED displays any kind of MIDI activity including MIDI Clock MTC and Active Sensing The latter is sent by most keyboards every 0 3 seconds User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 59 30 Word Clock 30 1 Word Clock Input and Output SteadyClock guarantees an excellent performance in all clock modes Based on the highly effi cient jitter suppression the Fireface refreshes and cleans up any clock signal and provides it as reference clock at the BNC output see section 37 9 Input The Fireface s transformer isolated word clock input is active when Pref Sync Hef in the Set tings dialog has been switched to Word Clock the clock mode AutoSync has been activated and a valid word clock signal is present The signal at the BNC input can be Single Double or Quad Speed the Fireface 800 automatically adapts to it As soon as a valid signal is detected the WC LED is lit and the Settings dialog shows either Lock or Sync see chapter 37 1 Thanks to RME s Signal Adaptation Circuit the word clock input still works correctly even with heavily mis shaped dc prone too small or overshoot pr
29. output header is optimized for largest compatibility with other digital devices 32 kHz 44 1 kHz 48 kHz 88 2 kHz 96 kHz 176 4 kHz 192 kHz depending on the current sample rate Audio use Non Audio No Copyright Copy Permitted Format Consumer or Professional Category General Generation not indicated 2 channel No Emphasis or 50 15 us Aux bits Audio Use Professional AES EBU equipment can be connected to the Fireface 800 thanks to the trans former balanced coaxial outputs and the Professional format option with doubled output volt age Output cables should have the same pinout as those used for input see above but with a male XLR plug instead of a female one Note that most consumer HiFi equipment with optical or phono SPDIF inputs will only ac cept signals in Consumer format The audio bit in the header can be set to Non Audio This is often necessary when Dolby AC 3 encoded data is sent to external decoders surround sound receivers television sets etc with AC 3 digital inputs as these decoders would otherwise not recognize the data as AC 3 29 3 MIDI Fireface 800 offers one MIDI I O via two 5 pin DIN jacks The MIDI ports are added to the sys tem by the driver Using MIDI capable software these ports can be accessed under the name Fireface Midi Using more than one Fireface the operating system adds a consecutive number to the port name like Fireface MIDI 2 etc The MIDI ports support multi client
30. output level until the peak level meters in TotalMix reach about 3 dB The analog line inputs of the Fireface 800 can be used with 4 dBu and 10 dBV signals The electronic input stage can handle balanced XLR TRS jacks and unbalanced TS jacks input signals correctly The front s inputs signal level can be optimized using the Fireface s Gain pots A Signal LED and a Clip LED help to find the correct level adjustment The Fireface s digital outputs provide SPDIF AES EBU compatible and ADAT optical signals at the corresponding ports On the analog playback side the DA side a coarse adjustment of the analog output level at the rear jacks is available in the Settings dialog Output Level The output signal of channels 9 10 is available on the front Their output level can be set using the VOL pot This output is a very low impedance type which can also be used to connect headphones The function Store in Flash Memory Settings dialog and Flash current mixer state TotalMix allow to store the current settings into the Fireface 800 The unit then remembers all settings and loads these automatically when switched on With this the Fireface 800 can be used stand alone after setting it up accordingly replacing lots of dedicated devices see chapter 26 6 Accessories RME offers several optional components for the Fireface 400 Part Number Description Standard FireWire 400 cable both sides 6 pin male FWK660100BL FireWi
31. range of your equipment maybe of the whole studio in front of your eyes Nice to have everything 24 bit but still noise and hum everywhere in the range around 90 dB or worse sorry but this is the disappointing reality The up side about it is that TotalMix allows for constantly monitoring the signal quality without effort Thus it can be a valuable tool for sound optimization and error removal in the studio Measuring SNR Signal to Noise requires to press R for RMS and 0 for referring to 0 aBFS a full scale signal The text display will then show the same value as an expensive measurement system when measuring RMS unweighted User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 75 32 TotalMix The Matrix 32 1 Overview The mixer window of TotalMix looks and operates similar to mixing desks as it is based on a conventional stereo design The matrix display presents a different method of assigning and routing channels based on a single channel or monaural design The matrix view of the Fire face 800 looks and works like a conventional patchbay adding functionality way beyond com parable hardware and software soutions While most patchbays will allow you to connect inputs to outputs with just the original level 1 1 or 0 dB as known from mechanical patchbays To talMix allows you to use a freely definable gain value per crosspoint Matrix and TotalMix are different ways of displaying the same processes Because of this both views are a
32. stable reliable and robust leaving addi tional bandwidth for other devices At the same time the CPU and system load is reduced as less channels have to be processed and to be transferred In TotalMix the deactivated software playback channels will be replaced with empty plates More details are found in chapter 37 4 Available Settings All channels default activates all 28 input and output channels Analog SPDIF ADAT1 disables channels 21 28 ADAT2 Analog SPDIF activates all 10 analog channels plus SPDIF Analog 1 8 activates only the first eight analog channels User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 23 12 Operation and Usage 12 1 Playback The Fireface 800 can play back audio data in supported formats only sample rate bit resolu tion Otherwise an error message appears for example at 22 kHz and 8 bit In the audio application being used Fireface must be selected as output device This can often be found in the Options Preferences or Settings menus under Playback Device Audio Devices Audio etc We strongly recommend switching all system sounds off via Control Panel Sounds Also Fireface should not be the Preferred Device for playback as this could cause loss of synchroni zation and unwanted noises If you feel you cannot do without system sounds you should con sider buying a cheap Blaster clone and select this as Preferred Device in gt Control Panel Multimedia Audio The screenshot shows a
33. the Monitor panel can also be controlled by the standard Control Change Volume via MIDI channel 1 With this the main volume of the Fireface is controlable from nearly any MIDI equipped hardware device 34 2 Mapping TotalMix supports the following Mackie Control surface elements Element Channel faders 1 8 Master fader SEL 1 8 DYNAMICS V Pots 1 8 pressing V Pot knobs CHANNEL LEFT or REWIND CHANNEL RIGHT or FAST FORWARD BANK LEFT or ARROW LEFT BANK RIGHT or ARROW RIGHT ARROW UP or Assignable1 PAGE ARROW DOWN or Assignable2 PAGE EQ PLUGINS INSERT STOP PLAY PAN MUTE Ch 1 8 SOLO Ch 1 8 SELECT Ch 1 8 REC Ch 1 8 F1 F8 F9 F10 F12 Meaning in TotalMix volume Main Monitor channel s faders reset fader to Unity Gain pan pan center move one channel left move one channel right move eight channels left move eight channels right move one row up move one row down Master Mute Master Solo Dim Main Monitor Talkback Mono Main Monitor Mute Solo Select in Submix mode only select output bus load preset 1 8 select Main Monitor Monitor Phones 1 3 Tested with Behringer BCF2000 Firmware v1 07 in Mackie Control emulation for Steinberg mode and with Mackie Control under Mac OS X 82 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 34 3 Setup e Open the Preferences dialog menu Options or F3 Select the MIDI Input and MIDI Output port where your controller is connected to
34. the fader settings of all routings are memorized So when pulling the fader to the bottom maximum attenuation the individual settings are back when you right click the mouse and pull the fader up The individual settings get lost in m a position as soon as the fader is clicked with the left mouse button As long as no single level is at m a position the left mouse button can be used to change the current routing s gain The checkmarks are un checked by moving the fader to m a This setting deactivates the rout ing why route if there is no level Click onto AN 7 8 in the routing window pull the fader down open the routing window again the checkmark is gone The number of ADAT channels is reduced automatically when entering Double Speed mode 96 kHz The display is adjusted accordingly and all fader settings remain stored Changing into Quad Speed mode 192 kHz all ADAT channels vanish TotalMix then displayes a total of only 12 channels 31 5 Submix View Such a wide range of possibilities make it difficult to maintain the overview Because practically all hardware outputs can be used for different submixes as shown up to 14 completely inde pendent stereo submixes 7 4 channel submixes etc And when opening the routing windows you might see an army of checkmarks but you don t get an overwiev i e how the signals come together and where This problem is solved by Submix View mode In this mode all routing fileds jump to the r
35. the hardware displays of a Logic Mackie Control for use with controllers that can emulate a Logic Mackie Control but do not have a display Examples include the Behringer BCF2000 and Edirol PCR series Deactivate MIDI in Background menu Options disables the MIDI control as soon as another application is in the focus or in case TotalMix has been minimized This way the hardware con troller will control the main DAW application only except when TotalMix is in the foreground Often the DAW application can be set to become inactive in background too so that MIDI con trol is switched between TotalMix and the application automatically when switching between both applications TotalMix also supports the 9th fader of the Mackie Control This fader labeled Master will con trol the stereo output faders lowest row which are set up as Main Monitor outputs in the Moni tor panel Always and only User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 83 34 5 Simple MIDI Control The stereo output faders lowest row which are set up as Monitor Main outputs in the Monitor panel can also be controlled by the standard Control Change Volume via MIDI channel 1 With this the main volume of the Fireface is controlable from nearly any MIDI equipped hard ware device Even if you don t want to control all faders and pans some buttons are highly desired to be available in hardware These are mainly the Talkback and the Dim button and the new moni toring options list
36. the state of all clocks is decoded and shown as simple text No Lock Lock Sync User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 95 37 2 Latency and Monitoring The term Zero Latency Monitoring has been introduced by RME in 1998 for the DIGI96 series of audio cards It stands for the ability to pass through the computer s input signal at the inter face directly to the output Since then the idea behind has become one of the most important features of modern hard disk recording In the year 2000 RME published two ground breaking Tech Infos on the topics Low Latency Background which are still up to date Monitoring ZLM and ASIO and Buffer and Latency Jitter both found on the RME Driver CD and the RME web site How much Zero is Zero From a technical view there is no zero Even the analog pass through is subject to phase er rors equalling a delay between input and output However delays below certain values can subjectively be claimed to be a zero latency This applies to analog routing and mixing and in our opinion also to RME s Zero Latency Monitoring The term describes the digital path of the audio data from the input of the interface to its output The digital receiver of the Fireface 800 can t operate un buffered and together with TotalMix and the output via the transmitter it causes a typical delay of 3 samples At 44 1 kHz this equals about 68 us 0 000068 s at 192 kHz only 15 us The delay is valid for ADAT and SPDIF in the same way Ove
37. via the outputs AN1 2 The pano rama can be changed too Click into the area above the fader and drag the green bar in order to set the panorama between left and right The level meters of the third row display the level changes in real time You see it is very easy to set up a specific submix for whatever output select output channel set up fader and pans of inputs and playbacks ready For advanced users sometimes it makes sense to work without Submix View Example you want to see and set up some channels of different submixes simultaneously without the need to change between them all the time Switch off the Submix View by a click on the green button Now the black routing fields below the faders no longer show the same entry AN1 2 but com pletely different ones The fader and pan position is the one of the individually shown routing destination In playback channel 1 middle row labeled Out 1 click onto the routing field below the label A list pops up showing a checkmark in front of AN 1 2 and Phones So currently playback channel 1 is sent to these two routing destinations Click onto AN 7 8 The list disappears the routing field no longer shows 1 2 but AN 7 8 Now move the fader with the mouse As soon as the fader value is unequal m a the present state is being stored and rout ing is activated Move the fader button to around 0 dB The pre sent gain value is displayed below the fader in green letters
38. 1 2 AN 1 2 AN 142 Al After a mouse click TotalMix sets gains and pans correctly Of course these settings can also be performed manually Repeat the last step to remove all routings menu Options Off The M S Processing automatically operates as M S encoder or decoder depending on the source signal format When processing a usual stereo signal all monaural information will be shifted into the left channel all stereo information into the right channel Thus the stereo signal is M S encoded This yields some interesting insights into the mono stereo contents of modern music productions Additionally some very interesting methods of manipulating the stereo base and generating stereo effects come up as it is then very easy to process the side channel with Low Cut Expander Compressor or Delay The most basic application is already available di rectly in TotalMix Changing the level of the side channel allows to manipulate the stereo width from mono to stereo up to extended stepless and in real time User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 81 34 MIDI Remote Control 34 1 Overview TotalMix can be remote controlled via MIDI It is compatible to the widely spread Mackie Control protocol so TotalMix can be controlled with all hardware controllers supporting this standard Examples are the Mackie Control Tascam US 2400 or Behringer BCF 2000 Additionally the stereo output faders lowest row which are set up as Monitor Main outputs in
39. 1 Configuring the Fireface 11 1 Settings dialog 18 11 2 Settings dialog 005 21 11 3 Clock Modes Synchronization 22 11 4 Limit Bandwidth sesesssesesese 23 12 Operation and Usage 1221 Playback ie tete dies 24 12 2 DVD Playback 3 25 12 3 Low Latency under 26 12 4 Notes on 27 12 5 Multi client Operation 28 12 6 Digital Recording 29 12 7 Analog Recording 30 13 Operation under ASIO 2 0 13 1 General sicot 30 13 2 Known Problems sess 31 14 Operation under 31 15 Using more than one Fireface 32 16 DIGICheck 33 17 Hotline Troubleshooting 171 General enenatis 34 17 2 Installation rennene nnne 35 18 Diagrams 18 1 Channel Routing ASIO 96 kHz 36 18 2 Channel Routing MME 96 2 37 gt Installation and Operation Mac OS X 19 Hardware Installation 40 20 Driver 20 1 Driver Installation e
40. 1 In ADATl Sync quencies C Emphasis 2 In ADAT2 No Lock Non Audio O SPDIF In SPDIF Lock Phantom Power Phantom power 48V can be selected SPDIF Freq WordClock System Clock for each microphone input separately 48 kHz M Single Speed Mode Slave Al i Freq 44 1 kHz Limit Bandwidth SPDIF In a channel Defines the input for the SPDIF signal Allchannels _____ 9 Read Store Coaxial relates to the RCA socket 2 to the second optical TOSLINK input SPDIF Out The SPDIF output signal is constantly available at the phono plug After selecting 2 it is also routed to the second optical TOSLINK output For further details about the settings Pro fessional Emphasis and Non Audio please refer to chapter 29 2 SPDIF Freq Displays the sample rate of the SPDIF or AES input signal Word Clock The word clock output signal usually equals the current sample rate Selecting Single Speed causes the output signal to always stay within the range of 32 kHz to 48 kHz So at 96 kHz and 192 kHz sample rate the output word clock is 48 kHz User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 43 Clock Mode The unit can be configured to use its internal clock source Master or the clock source pre defined via Pref Sync Ref AutoSync AutoSync Ref Displays the current clock source and Fireface Settings sample rate of the clock source Unit 227 DDS About
41. 40 20 2 Driver Update 41 2 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 21 Firmware 41 22 Configuring the Fireface 22 1 Settings Dialog 42 22 2 Settings Dialog 09 45 22 3 Clock Modes Synchronization 46 22 4 Limit Bandwidth 47 23 Mac OS X FAQ 23 1 Round about Driver Installation 48 23 2 MIDI 48 23 3 Supported Sample 49 23 4 Repairing Disk Permissions 49 23 5 FireWire Compatibility sess 49 23 6 Various Information 47 24 Hotline Troubleshooting 50 25 Diagram Channel Routing at 96 kHz 51 gt Stand Alone Operation Connections and TotalMix 26 Stand alone Operation 26 1 10 channel AD DA Converter 54 26 2 4 channel Mic 54 26 3 Monitor Mixer 54 26 4 Digital Format Converter 54 26 5 Analog digital Routing Matrix 54 27 Analog Inputs 271 Line Bears raa Pere de 55 27 2 Microphone Line
42. 94a FW400 4 m 13 ft Power cord Manual 1 optical cable TOSLINK 2 m 6 6 ft 3 System Requirements e Windows 2000 SP4 XP 64 Vista Vista 64 Mac OS X 210 3 PPC or Intel e 1 OHCI compatible FireWire Port 400 1394a or 800 1394b e Pentium Ill 866 MHz or better G4 Dual 867 or better Note Examples and detailed descriptions of suitable audio desktop systems can be found in the Tech Info RME Reference PCs Hardware recommendations Information on compatibility and performance of notebooks laptops is included in RMEs Tech Infos about notebooks HDSP System Notebook Basics and Tests report about incompatible FireWire 800 controllers is found in the Tech Info FireWire 800 Hardware Compatibility Problems A Brief Description and Characteristics Enhanced Mixed Mode Analog and SPDIF I O simultaneously usable 8 buffer sizes latencies available 1 0 1 5 2 1 3 6 12 17 23 ms All settings can be changed in real time 8 channels 96 kHz 24 bit Record Playback via ADAT optical S MUX Clock modes slave and master Automatic and intelligent master slave clock control Unsurpassed Bitclock PLL audio synchronization in ADAT mode Word clock input and output TotalMix for latency free submixes and perfect ASIO Direct Monitoring TotalMix 1568 channel mixer with 42 bit internal resolution SyncAlign guarantees sample aligned and never swapping channels SyncCheck tests and reports the synchronization status of
43. ADI 8 series of AD DA converters the Multiface and even in our Mic Preamps QuadMic and OctaMic Therefore all RME devices are fully compati ble to each other 28 2 Headphones Channels 9 10 of the Fireface are available on the front via one 1 4 unbalanced TRS jack ste reo output These channels use the same converters as the other Line outputs therefore offer the same technical data 119 dBA SNR Instead of using internal electronic switches their output level is changed step less with the VOL pot These outputs are special low impedance types ready to be used with headphones But they can also be used as high quality yet unbalanced Line outputs Like all other outputs channels 9 10 can also be controlled by TotalMix Left regarding level and monitoring of any input or playback channels Right submix like factory presets 1 and 2 Shield In case the output should operate as line output an adapter TRS plug to RCA phono plugs or TRS plug to TS plugs is required The pin assignment follows interna tional standards The left channel is connected to the tip the right chan nel to the ring of the TRS jack plug User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 57 29 Digital Connections 29 1 ADAT The ADAT optical inputs of the Fireface 800 are fully compatible with all ADAT optical outputs RME s unsurpassed Bitclock PLL prevents clicks and drop outs even in extreme varipitch op eration and guarantees a fast and low jitter
44. After activating this option a guitar completely distorted by LIM and Drive will sound excellent even when played directly into a mixing desk 56 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 28 Analog Outputs 28 1 Line The eight short circuit protected low impedance line outputs are available as 1 4 TRS jacks on the back of the unit The electronic output stage is built in a servo balanced design which han dles unbalanced mono jacks and balanced stereo jacks correctly To maintain an optimum level for devices connected to the analog outputs the Fireface 800 internally uses hi quality electronic switches which allow for a perfect adaptation of all outputs to the three most often used studio levels As with the analog inputs the analog output levels are defined to maintain a problem free op eration with most other devices The headroom of the Fireface 800 lies between 9 and 15 dB according to the chosen reference level Reference 0 dBFS Headroom Hi Gain 19 dBu 15 dB 4 dBu 13 dBu 9 dB 10 dBV 2 dBV 12dB With 4 dBu selected the according headroom meets the latest EBU recommendations for Broadcast usage At 10 dBV a headroom of 12 dB is common practice each mixing desk op erating at 10 dBV is able to send and receive much higher levels Lo Gain is best suited for professional users who prefer to work balanced and at highest levels Lo Gain provides 15 dB headroom at 4 dBu nominal level The above levels are also found in our
45. Bus Load 99 37 5 DS Double Speed 99 37 6 QS Quad 99 37 7 AES EBU SPDIF sse 100 37 8 Noise Level in DS QS Mode 101 37 9 101 38 Diagrams 38 1 Block Diagram 102 38 2 Connector Pinouts 103 4 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Important Safety Instructions ATTENTION Do not open chassis risk of electric shock The unit has unisolated live parts inside No user serviceable parts inside Refer service to qualified service personnel Mains The device must be earthed never use it without proper grounding Do not use defective power cords Operation of the device is limited to the manual Use same type of fuse only To reduce the risk of fire or electric shock do not expose this device to rain or moisture Prevent moisture and water from entering the device Never leave a pot with liquid on top of the device Do not use this product near water i e swimming pool bathtub or wet basement Danger of condensation inside don t turn on before the device has reached room temperature Installation Surface may become hot during operation ensure sufficient ventilation Avoid direct sun l
46. Fireface Settings Fireface a Fireface 2 DDS About DDS Value Coarse Active 44143 Hz 4 Frequency kH 48 048 40 1 2 48 000 47 952 0 1 2 46 080 4 2 45 937 4 2 44144 40 1 44 100 44 056 0 1 2 32 000 0 m Freq Multiplier A Active Fine 044 04 1 Active Abbrechen A mouse click within the fader area above or below the fader know will move the fader with the smallest step size up or down Holding the Ctrl key while clicking will cause the fader to jump to its center 0 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 21 Application examples DDS allows for a simultaneous change of speed and tune during record and playback From alignment to other sources up to creative effects everything is possible DDS allows to intentionally de tune the complete DAW This way the DAW can match instru ments which have a wrong or unchangeable tuning DDS allows to define a specific sample rate This feature can be is useful in case the system randomly changes the sample rate for unknown reasons It also prevents a change from Dou ble Speed 96 kHz to Single Speed 48 kHz which would cause configuration and routing problems by the changed amount of ADAT channels 11 3 Clock Modes Synchronization In the digital world all devices must be either Master clock source or Slave
47. Gain provides 15 dB headroom at 4 dBu nominal level The above levels are also found in our ADI 8 series of AD DA converters the Multiface and even in our Mic Preamps QuadMic and OctaMic Therefore all RME devices are fully compati ble to each other 27 2 Microphone Line Front The balanced microphone inputs of the Fireface 800 offer an adjustable gain of 10 to 60 dB The soft switching hi current Phantom power 48 Volt provides a professional handling of con densor mics The mic preamp s discreet Class A front end guarantees a superior sound quality With the balanced Line input which can be used alternatively or at the same time as the micro phone the Fireface 800 becomes even more flexible 10 kOhm input impedance stereo TRS jack and adjustable input sensitivity in a range of 50 dB this all guarantees that the front side Line inputs can be used perfectly with keyboards sampler active guitars and much more The Line inputs handle levels from 28 dBu up to 22 dBu Two LEDs display a present signal from 45 dBFS on and warn against overload 2 dBFS Channels 7 8 can be switched between Line rear microphone and Line microphone simultane ously in the Settings dialog The front Line input can be used simultaneously with the micro phone input This way up to three different sound sources Line rear Line front microphone may be recorded at the same time on one channel User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 55 27 3 Ins
48. In the lower row on channel 7 you can see the level of what you are hearing from output 7 The level meter of the hardware output shows the outgoing level Click into the area above the fader and drag the mouse in order to set the panorama in this case the rout ing between channels 7 and 8 The present pan value is also be ing displayed below the fader Please carry out the same steps for Out 2 now in order to route it to output 8 as well In short While editing the Submix AN7 AN8 you have direct ac cess to other submixes on other channels because their routing fields are set to different destinations And you get a direct view of how their faders and panoramas are set up This kind of visual presentation is a mighty one but for many d users it is hard to understand and it requires a deep under standing of complex routing visualizations Therefore we usu ally recommend to work in Submix View Often signals are stereo i e a pair of two channels It is therefore helpful to be able to make the routing settings for two channels at once Hold down the Ctrl key and click into the routing field of Out The routing list pops up with a checkmark at AN 3 4 Select AN 7 8 Now Out 4 has already been set to AN 7 8 as well When you want to set the fader to exactly 0 dB this can be difficult depending on the mouse configuration Move the fader close to the 0 position and now press the Shift key This activates the fine m
49. M Fireface ADAT1 3 4 playback of audio and XX Cancel Fireface ADAT1 5 6 MIDI or similar be sure MME WDM Fireface ADAT1 748 to activate the checkbox Get position from audio driver The Fireface s ADAT optical interfaces support sample rates of up to 96 kHz using a standard ADAT recorder Single channel data at this frequency requires two ADAT channels achieved using the Sample Multiplexing technique This reduces the number of available ADAT channels from 8 to 4 Under Windows MME channels are routed to ADAT devices in double speed mode as follows e Only the four stereo pairs of the device ADAT1 are available e The channels of the device ADAT2 are no longer available This kind of implementation allows a problem free usage of both ADAT ports in Single and Dou ble Speed as the routing for ADAT1 doesn t change However the hardware spreads the data differently e Channel 1 is transmitted via channels 1 and 2 channel 2 via 3 and 4 etc The ADAT2 port transmits channels 5 to 8 Please refer to the diagram in chapter 18 2 Routing for record and playback is identical 24 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 12 2 DVD Playback AC 3 DTS AC 3 DTS When using popular DVD software players like WinDVD and PowerDVD their audio data stream can be sent to any AC 3 DTS capable receiver using the Fireface s SPDIF output For this to work the WDM SPDIF device of the Fireface 800 has to be selected in gt Control
50. ME 69 Submix Mouse The original factory presets can be reloaded by holding down the Ctrl key and clicking on any preset button Alternatively the files described above can 8 renew be renamed moved to a different directory or being deleted z Submix DAT Keyboard Using Ctrl and any number between 1 and 8 not on the numeric keypad will load the corresponding factory default preset The key Alt will load the user presets instead When loading a preset file for example Main Monitor AN 1 2 plus headphone mix 3 4 fmx the file name will be displayed in the title bar of the TotalMix window Also when loading a preset by the preset buttons the name of the preset is displayed in the title bar This way it is always clear what the current TotalMix state is based on The eight factory presets offer a pretty good base to modify them to your personal needs In all factory presets Submix View is active by default Preset 1 Description All channels routed 1 1 monitoring of all playback channels via Phones Details All inputs maximum attenuation All playback channels 0 dB routet to the same output All outputs 0 dB Phones 6 dB Submix of all inputs and playbacks to channel 9 10 Phones Level display RMS 3 dB View Submix active Note This preset is Default offering the standard functionality of a l O system Preset 2 Description All channels routed 1 1 input and playback monitoring via Phones As Prese
51. No Lock This way configuring any suitable audio application for digital recording is simple After select ing the required input Fireface 800 displays the current sample frequency This parameter can then be changed in the application s audio attributes or similar dialog The screenshot on the right shows a typical dia log used for changing basic parameters such as Lus sample frequency and resolution in an audio Channels Sample Rate application Mono C 96 kHz a Stereo C 882kHz Any bit resolution can be selected providing it is C DuslMono supported by both the audio hardware and the software Even if the input signal is 24 bit the X Cancel application can still be set to record at 16 bit C 16bit ER resolution The lower 8 bits and therefore any C 20bit 9 signals about 96dB below maximum level are 24bit lost entirely On the other hand there is nothing C 32bit to gain from recording a 16 bit signal at 24 bit resolution this would only waste precious space on the hard disk It often makes sense to monitor the input signal or send it directly to the output This can be done at zero latency using TotalMix see chapter 31 An automated control of real time monitoring can be achieved by Steinberg s ASIO protocol with our ASIO 2 0 drivers and all ASIO 2 0 compatible programs When ASIO Direct Monitoring has been swi
52. Out 4 Ctrl C click on Out 6 Ctrl V same with 5 7 you re done The Matrix shows you the difference between both examples Example 1 means copying lines horizontally while example 2 means copying rows vertically Example 3 Let s say the guitarist finished his recording and you now need the same signal again on all headphones but this time it comes from the recording software playback row No problem you can even copy between rows 1 and 2 copying between row 3 and 1 2 isn t possi ble But how to select while a group is active De selecting the group first Not necessary TotalMix always updates the copy and paste process with the ast selection This way you don t have to de activate any group selections when desiring to perform a copy and paste action 33 4 Delete Routings The fastest way to delete complex routings select a channel in the mixer view click on the menu entry Edit and select Delete Or simply hit the Del key Attention there is no undo in To talMix so be careful with this function 78 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 33 5 Recording a Subgroup Loopback TotalMix supports a routing of the subgroup outputs hardware outputs bottom row to the recording software Instead of the signal at the hardware input the signal at the hardware out put is sent to the record software This way complete submixes can be recorded without an external loopback cable Also the playback of a software can be recorded by an
53. SPDIF or if there is a valid 7 Rear 4 d8u 4 dBu and synchronous signal Sync The AutoSync Ref display shows the input and frequency of the current sync source see chapter 37 1 In practice SyncCheck provides the 8 Front Rear HJ Instrument Options Drive JLim v Speaker Emulation 10 10 Phantom Power C1 Mic7 Mic9 Mic 8 2 Mic 10 user with an easy way of checking SPDIF In Clock AutoSyncRef whether all digital devices connected ADAT2 9 AutoSync Input Word to the system are properly configured Coaxial O Master Freq 44 1 kHz With SyncCheck finally anyone can SPDIF Out Pref Sync Ref SyncCheck master this common source of error gt ADAT2 B Word Clock Wi Sine previously one of the most complex E3 Professional ADATI in Sync issues in the digital studio world Exi Eel us ADAT2 In ADAT2 No Lock Non Audio SPDIF In SPDIF Lock Thanks to its AutoSync technique and lightning fast PLLs the Fireface 800 SPDIF Freq Word Clock System Clock is not only capable of handling stan 48 kHz M Single Speed Mode Slave dard frequencies but also any sam Freq 44 1 kHz ple rate between 28 and 200 kHz Limit Bandwidth Even the word clock input most often All channels 79 E nent Pe srore d used in varispeed operation allows orn any frequency between 28 kHz and 200 kHz At 88 2 or 96 kHz If th
54. Setting up such a submix is easy But how to check at a later time that all settings are still exactly the way you wanted them to be not sending audio to a different output The most effective method to check a routing in mixer view is the Submix View stepping through all existing software outputs and having a very concentrated look at the faders and displayed levels of each routing That doesn t sound comfortably nor error free right Here is where the Matrix shines In the Matrix view you simply see a line from upper left to lower right all fields marked as unity gain Plus two rows vertically all at the same level setting You just need 2 seconds to be sure no unwanted routing is active anywhere and that all levels match precisely Example 2 The Matrix allows you to set up routings which would be nearly impossible to achieve by fiddling around with level and pan Let s say you want to send input 1 to output 1 at 0 dB to output 2 at 3 dB to output 3 at 6 dB and to output 4 at 9 dB Each time you set up the right channel 2 4 the change in pan destroys the gain setting of the left channel 1 2 A real hassle In Matrix view you simply click on the corresponding routing point set the level via Ctrl mouse and move on You can see in TotalMix view how pan changes to achieve this special gain and routing when performing the second fourth setting 33 TotalMix Super Features 33 1 ASIO Direct Monitoring Windows only Start Sampl
55. Slave The status disp ays at the bottom 9 Read Flash Memory Store in Flash Memory Freg 44 1 kHz the dialog box give the user precise information about the current status of the system and the status of all digital signals SyncCheck indicates whether there is a valid signal Lock No Lock for each input Word Clock ADAT1 ADAT2 SPDIF or if there is a valid and synchronous signal Sync The AutoSync Ref display shows the input and frequency of the current sync source The string Errors is displayed only when transmission errors of PCI FireWire are detected The display will be reset on any start of a playback record i e set to zero and is thus no longer visi ble More information can be found in chapter 37 3 18 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Buffer Size The setting Buffer Size determines the latency between incoming and outgoing ASIO and GSIF data as well as affecting system stability see chapter 13 14 Under Windows MME this setting determines the DMA buffer size see chapter 12 3 GSIF and MME can be set from 48 to 256 samples Above 256 only ASIO is effected Inputs Input selection for the channels 1 7 and 8 Channel 1 can be the front instrument input or the rear TRS jack or both simultaneously Channel 7 8 can be the front microphone input or the rear TRS jack or both simultaneously Limit Bandwidth Allows to reduce the amount of bandwidth used on the FireWire bus See chapt
56. T1 The corresponding LED will show LOCK immediately but usually the mixing desk s sample rate is generated internally also Master and thus slightly higher or lower than the Fireface s internal sample rate Result When reading out the data there will frequently be read errors that cause clicks and drop outs Also when using multiple inputs a simple LOCK is not sufficient The above described problem can be solved elegantly by setting the Fireface from Master to AutoSync its internal clock will then be the clock delivered by the mixing desk But in case another un synchronous device is connected there will again be a slight difference in the sample rate and therefore clicks and drop outs In order to display those problems optically at the device the Fireface includes SyncCheck It checks all clocks used for synchronicity If they are not synchronous to each other i e abso lutely identical the SYNC LED of the asynchronous input flashes In case they are completely synchronous all LEDs are constantly lit In example 1 it would have been obvious that the LED ADAT 1 kept on flashing after connecting the mixing desk In practice SyncCheck allows for a quick overview of the correct configuration of all digital de vices So one of the most difficult and error prone topics of the digital studio world finally be comes easy to handle The same information is presented in the Fireface s Settings dialog In the status display Sync Check
57. User s Guide RME INTELLIGENT AUDIO SOLUTIONS Fireface SOO The most powerful FireWire audio interface ever 24 Bit 192 kHz wth hor SyncAlign ZLM SyncCheck 4 M adati SteadyClock FireWire 800 400 Digital I O System 10 16 2 Channels Analog ADAT SPDIF Interface 24 Bit 192 kHz Digital Audio 56 x 28 Matrix Router MIDI I O Stand Alone Operation MIDI Remote Control Stand Alone MIDI Controlled Operation gt Important Safety Instructions 5 gt General 1 Introduction 8 2 Package Contents 8 3 System Requirements 8 4 Brief Description and Characteristics 8 5 First Usage Quick Start 5 1 Connectors and Front 9 5 2 QUICICSIAFL cua donnes nerit qi dee revue vind 10 6 ACCRSSOTICS remises rinet tire Rex 10 7 Warranty ruine 11 8 Appendix roD 11 gt Installation and Operation Windows 9 Hardware 16 10 Driver and Firmware 10 1 Driver Installation 16 10 2 Driver Update tette 17 10 3 Deinstalling the 17 10 4 Firmware 17 1
58. aces at 96 kHz a setting like Ana log SPDIF is recommended to be used on all Firefaces This equals 3 x 24 72 channels per direction 98 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 37 5 DS Double Speed When activating the Double Speed mode the Fireface 800 operates at double sample rate The internal clock 44 1 kHz turns to 88 2 kHz 48 kHz to 96 kHz The internal resolution is still 24 bit Sample rates above 48 kHz were not always taken for granted and are still not widely used because of the CD format 44 1 kHz dominating everything Before 1998 there were no re ceiver transmitter circuits available that could receive or transmit more than 48 kHz Therefore a work around was used instead of two channels one AES line only carries one channel whose odd and even samples are being distributed to the former left and right channels By this you get the double amount of data i e also double sample rate Of course in order to transmit a stereo signal two AES EBU ports are necessary then This transmission mode is called Double Wire in the professional studio world and is also known as S MUX Sample Multiplexing in connection with the ADAT format Not before February 1998 Crystal shipped the first single wire receiver transmitters that could also work with double sample rate It was then possible to transmit two channels of 96 kHz data via one AES EBU port But Double Wire is still far from being dead On one hand there are still many d
59. active as the unit will react on MIDI notes after power on and will also send MIDI notes Control is performed via both the Mackie Control protocol and some standard MIDI functions see below In stand alone mode not all functions known from TotalMix are available because some of them aren t hardware but software routines Functions like Talkback DIM Mono Solo relative ganging of the faders Monitor Main and Monitor Phones are realized by complex soft ware code therefore not available in stand alone MIDI control operation Still many functions and especially the most important functions to control the Fireface 800 are implemented in hardware thus available also in stand alone mode All faders and pans of the first and third row Mute of the input signal per channel Ganging via Select Choice of the routing destination i e the current submix Sending of LED and display data to the MIDI controller The second row software playback is skipped in stand alone operation The Fireface 800 sends display data as brief information enabling an easy navigation through lines and rows Other data like PAN and miscellaneous status LEDs are supported as well In stand alone mode the unit always operates in View Submix mode Only this way the routing destination can be changed and several mixdowns submixes can be set up quickly and easily If the current TotalMix setup is transferred into the Fireface via Flash current mixer state the cu
60. air in such cases can only be carried out at the owner s expense Audio AG does not accept claims for damages of any kind especially consequential damage Liability is limited to the value of the Fireface 800 The general terms of business drawn up by Audio AG apply at all times 8 Appendix RME news driver updates and further product information are available on our website http www rme audio com Distributor Audio AG Am Pfanderling 60 D 85778 Haimhausen Tel 49 08133 91810 Manufacturer IMM Elektronik GmbH Leipziger Strasse 32 D 09648 Mittweida Trademarks All trademarks registered or otherwise are the property of their respective owners RME DIGI96 SyncAlign ZLM SyncCheck DIGICheck and Hammerfall are registered trademarks of RME Intelligent Audio Solutions TMS TotalMix and Fireface are trademarks of RME Intelligent Audio Solutions Alesis and ADAT are registered trademarks of Alesis Corp ADAT optical is a trademark of Alesis Corp Microsoft Windows 98 and Windows 2000 XP are registered trade marks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp Steinberg Cubase and VST are registered trademarks of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH ASIO is a trademark of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH FireWire the FireWire symbol and the FireWire logo are trademarks of Apple Computer Inc User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 11 Copyright Matthias Carstens 12 2007 Version 2 9 Current driver version W2k XP 2 79 Mac OS X 2 60a Fi
61. al against the settings in the record program When de activated a recording will always be allowed even with non valid input signals Check Input is valid for MME only SyncAlign guarantees synchronous channels when using MME multitrack software This option should only be switched off in case the used software does not work correctly with SyncAlign activated TMS activates the transmission of Channel Status data and Track Marker information of the SPDIF input With nterleaved activated WDM devices can be used as 8 channel devices see chapter 12 5 Clock Mode Fireface Settings The unit can be configured to use its internal clock source Master or the Fiteface 1 Fietace 2 DDS About clock source pre defined via Pref Buffer Size Latency Input Level r Options Sync Ref AutoSync 48 Samples Lo Gain Check Input 4dBu M Synclign Pref Sync Ref VELIS TMS Used to pre select the desired clock n Bw source If the selected source isn t 7 Ree Clock Mode available the unit will change to the 8 Front Rear I e 6e M sus next available one The current clock LIN Limit Bandwidth r Phantom Power source and sample rate is displayed __ IL Mie m Pref Sync Ref in the AutoSync Ref display z T Mic10 Word Clock e eaaa a e ADAT SPDIF In Instrument Options ADAT2 In The automat
62. al will both be freed from jitter and in case of loss or drop out be reset to a valid frequency 30 4 Operation The green Lock LED on the front DIGITAL STATE will light up as soon as a word clock signal is detected To change to word clock as clock source activate clock mode AutoSync and switch Pref Sync Hef to Word Clock within the Settings dialog The status display AutoSync changes to Word as soon as a valid signal is present at the BNC jack This message has the same meaning as the green Lock LED but appears on the monitor i e the user can check immediately whether a valid word clock signal is present and is currently being used AutoSync Ref also displays the frequency Freq of the reference signal here the frequency of the current word clock signal measured by the hardware 62 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 31 TotalMix Routing and Monitoring 31 1 Overview The Fireface 800 includes a powerful digital real time mixer the Fireface mixer based on RME s unique sample rate independent TotalMix technology It allows for practically unlimited mixing and routing operations with all inputs and playback channels simultaneously to any hardware outputs Here are some typical applications for TotalMix Setting up delay free submixes headphone mixes The Fireface allows for up to 14 fully independent stereo submixes On an analog mixing desk this would equal 28 Aux sends Unlimited routing of inputs a
63. an be seen in the table below AES EBU is the professional balanced connection using XLR plugs The standard is being set by the Audio Engineering Society based on the AES3 1992 For the home user SONY and Philips have omitted the balanced connection and use either Phono plugs or optical cables TOSLINK The format called S P DIF SONY Philips Digital Interface is described by IEC 60958 Type AES3 1992 IEC609588 amp Connection XLR RCA Optical Mode Balanced Un balanced Impedance 110 Ohm 75 Ohm Level 0 2 V up to 5 Vss 0 2 V up to 0 5 Vss Clock accuracy not specified 50ppm II 0 196 Ill Variable Pitch Jitter lt 0 025 Ul 4 4 ns 44 1 kHz not specified Besides the electrical differences both formats also have a slightly different setup The two formats are compatible in principle because the audio information is stored in the same place in the data stream However there are blocks of additional information which are different for both standards In the table the meaning of the first byte 0 is shown for both formats The first bit already determines whether the following bits should be read as Professional or Consumer information Biro 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 It becomes obvious that the meaning of the following bits differs quite substantially between the two formats If a device like a common DAT recorder only has an SPDIF input it usually under stands only this for
64. anel System Advanced Performance Options Change the default Applications to Back ground tasks The lowest usable latency will drop from 23 ms to around 3 ms Driver installation and Settings dialog TotalMix work but a playback or record is not possible e While recognition and control of the device are low bandwidth applications playback record needs the full FireWire transmission performance Therefore defective FireWire cables with limited transmission bandwidth can cause such an error scheme 34 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 17 2 Installation After the driver installation the Fireface 800 is found in the Device Manager Settings Control Panel System category Sound Video and Gamecontroller A double click on RME Fireface 800 starts the properties dialog The well known entry Resources does not exist because the Fireface is an external device connected to the FireWire Controller The latter can be used to check interrupt and memory range The newest information on hardware problems can always be found on our website www rme audio com section FAQ Hardware Alert about incompatible hardware In case the Hardware Wizard does not show up automatically after installation of the card do not attempt to install the drivers manually An installation of drivers for non recognized hardware will cause a blue screen when booting Windows Possible causes for a Fireface not found automatically e The FireWire port is not a
65. anging the level of the original signal causes a change of the effects level here the reverb too so that both always have the same ratio Tip Such a functionality is available in TotalMix via the right mouse button Dragging the faders by use of the right mouse button causes all routings of the current input or playback channel to be changed in a relative way This completely equals the function Aux post fader Example 2 Inserting an effects device can be done as above even within the record path Other than in the example above the reverb unit also sends the original signal and there is no routing of input 10 directly to outputs 9 10 To insert an effects device like a Compressor Limiter directly into the record path the input signal of channel 10 is sent by TotalMix to any output to the Compressor back from the Compressor to any input This input is now selected within the record software 80 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Unfortunately very often it is not possible within the record software to assign a different input channel to an existing track on the fly The loopback mode solves this problem elegantly The routing scheme stays the same with the input channel 10 sent to any output via TotalMix to the Compressor from the Compressor back to any input Now this input signal is routed directly to output 10 and output 10 is then switched into loopback mode via Ctrl mouse As explained in chapter 33 5 the hardware input of chann
66. ata Therefore a global mixer for all units is not possible 32 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 16 DIGICheck The DIGICheck software is a unique utility developed for testing measuring and analysing digi tal audio streams Although this Windows software is fairly self explanatory it still includes a comprehensive online help DIGICheck 4 52 operates as multi client ASIO host therefore can be used in parallel to any software be it WDM MME ASIO or GSIF with both inputs and out puts The following is a short summary of the currently available functions Level Meter High precision 24 bit resolution 2 10 28 channels Application examples Peak level measurement RMS level measurement over detection phase correlation measure ment dynamic range and signal to noise ratios RMS to peak difference loudness long term peak measurement input check Oversampling mode for levels higher than 0 dBFS Supports visualization according to the K System Hardware Level Meter for Input Playback and Output Reference Level Meter freely con figurable causing near zero CPU load because calculated from the Fireface hardware Vector Audio Scope World wide unique Goniometer showing the typical afterglow of a oscilloscope tube Includes Correlation meter and level meter Spectral Analyser World wide unique 10 20 or 30 band display in analog bandpass filter technology 192 kHz capable Bit Statistics amp Noise Shows the true resolution of a
67. ation As long as SyncCheck in the Settings dialog only displays Lock instead of Sync the devices have not been set up properly 14 Operation under GSIF Gigasampler Interface Windows 2000 XP The GSIF interface of the Fireface 800 allows direct operation with Gigastudio with up to 28 channels 96 kHz and 24 bit The new GSIF 2 0 is also supported with both audio and MIDI Gigastudio requires a lot of a computer s CPU performance Optimum performance is achieved with a stand alone GSIF PC The GSIF latency of the Fireface 800 can be set between 48 and 256 samples Above 256 only the ASIO latency will rise Such a setting can prevent perform ance problems on slower machines when using ASIO and GSIF at the same time Please note that the W2k XP driver fully supports multi client operation including the combina tion MME ASIO So for example Cubase Gigastudio and Sonar can be used simultaneously provided each of these programs use audio channels exclusively on the Fireface 800 For ex ample ASIO could use channels 1 2 and Gigastudio with GSIF channels 3 4 simultaneously and so on Simultaneous operation of GSIF and ASIO requires to use different channels For example if Cubase uses tracks 1 2 these tracks can not be used by Gigastudio Common Problems Please note that Gigastudio is running unexpectedly in the background thus blocking its as signed audio channels as soon as the Gigastudio MIDI ports are used even when Gigas
68. ation behaviour ue e State of input and output EE O Lo Gain Gain Current sample 7 4d8u 4 abu 8 Front Rear E 10 417 10 dBV Any changes performed in the Settings Instrument Options Phantom Power pan are applied Pilot Lio 7 irmation e g by exiting t e dialog is Fj Speaker amp Mic8 C Mic 10 not required However settings should not be changed during playback or SPDIF In Clock Mode AutoSync Ref record if it can be avoided as this can hoes cause unwanted noises HUE n Coaxial Master Freq 44 1 kHz The status displays at the bottom of SPDIF Out Pref Sync Ref _ SyncCheck _ the dialog box give the user precise C ADAT2 9 word Clock Word Sync information about the current status of Professional C ADAT1 In Sync the system and the status of all digital Emphasis ADAT In ADAT2 No Lock signals SyncCheck indicates whether tJ Non Audio S SPDIF in PIE rack there is a valid signal Lock No Lock SPDIF Freq WordClock Clock _ for each input Word Clock ADAT1 48 kHz M Single Speed Slave ADAT2 SPDIF or if there is a valid Freq 44 1 kHz and synchronous signal Sync The sce 8 AutoSync Ref display shows the input All channels B Friad Poor and frequency of the current sync ette scm uaa source The string Errors is displayed only when transmissio
69. be determined by turning the equipment off and on the user is encouraged to try to correct the interference by one or more of the following measures Reorient or relocate the receiving antenna Increase the separation between the equipment and receiver Connect the equipment into an outlet on a circuit different from that to which the receiver is connected Consult the dealer or an experienced radio TV technician for help RoHS This product has been soldered lead free and fulfils the requirements of the RoHS directive ISO 9001 This product has been manufactured under ISO 9001 quality management The manufacturer IMM Elektronik GmbH is also certified for ISO 14001 Environment and ISO 13485 medical devices Note on Disposal According to the guide line RL2002 96 EG WEEE Directive on Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment valid for all european countries this product has to be recycled at the end of its lifetime In case a disposal of electronic waste is not possible the recycling can also be done by IMM Elektronik GmbH the manufacturer of the Fireface For this the device has to be sent free to the door to IMM Elektronik GmbH Leipziger StraBe 32 D 09648 Mittweida Germany Shipments not prepaid will be rejected and returned on the original sender s costs User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 13 14 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME User s Guide amg INTELLIGENT AUDIO SOLUTIONS Fireface 800
70. ce Manager Sound Video and Game Controllers RME Fireface 800 Properties Driver you ll find the Update Driver button Select Install from a list or specific location advanced click Next select Don t search will choose the driver to install click Next then Have Disk Now point to the driver update s directory This method also allows to install older drivers than the currently installed ones 10 3 Deinstalling the Drivers A deinstallation of the Fireface s driver files is not necessary and not supported by Windows anyway Thanks to full Plug amp Play support the driver files will not be loaded after the hardware has been removed If desired these files can then be deleted manually Unfortunately Windows Plug amp Play methods do not cover the additional autorun entries of To talMix the Settings dialog and the registration of the ASIO driver These entries can be re moved from the registry by a software deinstallation request This request can be found like all deinstallation entries in Control Panel Software Click on the entry RME Fireface 10 4 Firmware Update The Flash Update Tool updates the firmware of the Fireface 800 to the latest version It requires an already installed driver Start the program fireface fut exe The Flash Update Tool displays the current revision of the Fireface s frimware and whether it needs an update or not If so then simply press the Update button A progress ba
71. ch follows the incoming clock signal User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 25 12 3 Low Latency under MME Buffer Size Adjustment Under Windows 95 or 98 the MME buffer size was nothing to worry about Latencies below 46 ms were not possible Meanwhile both computers and operating systems have become much more powerful and with Windows 2000 XP latencies far lower can be used SAWStudio and Sonar allowed to use such low settings from the start Sequoia was updated in version 5 91 WaveLab in version 3 04 In the Settings dialog the DMA buffer size is set using the list box Buffer Size Latency Val ues between 48 and 256 samples are available This setting is valid for MME ASIO and GSIF at the same time with values above 256 only effecting ASIO Our test computers allow to use even 48 samples without clicks but will show a higher basic CPU load then Therefore we rec ommend to use at least 64 samples Please note that this setting only defines the buffer size of the hardware The true and effective latency is configured within the MME application Attention the DMA buffers must not be larger than the application s buffers Playback will be stuttering and audio will be distorted Example when you set the Fireface to 256 you can t use 128 in any program But setting the MME buffer to 128 allows to use 128 and all higher values within the software Please also note that this is a you re welcome to try feature We can t guarantee that you wi
72. ctive in the system drivers of the FireWire PCI or CardBus card have not been installed e The FireWire cable is not or not correctly inserted into the socket No power After switching the Fireface on at least the red Host error LED has to be lit The PCI FireWire card is defective A report about incompatible FireWire 800 controllers is found in the Tech Info FireWire 800 Hardware Compatibility Problems The Tech Info FireWire 800 under Windows XP 5 2 in cludes detailed information about FireWire problems after the installation of Service Pack 2 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 35 18 Diagrams 18 1 Channel Routing ASIO at 96 kHz This diagram shows the signal paths in ASIO double speed mode 88 2 96 kHz The devices available via the ASIO driver have been designed to avoid conflicts in normal operation which is why the second ADAT device has been omitted Record and playback are identical Device SR Routing SR Interface E mmm 1 Analog 1 2 Analog 1 2 2 3 Analog 1 Ba 5 4 Analog 1 5 Analog 1 4 lt Analog I O 6 Analog 1 6 6 gt c 7 Analog 1 7 i e 8 Analog 1 8 8 9 Analog 1 9 9 10 Analog 1 10 10 Es HT 11 SPDIF L 11 L e a SPDIF 12 SPDIF 12 R gt 13 ADAT 1 1
73. data to be recorded exception loopback mode The hardware input signal can be passed on as often as desired even with different levels This is a big difference to conventional mixing desks where the channel fader always con trols the level for all routing destinations simultaneously The level meter of inputs and playback channels are connected pre fader to be able to visu ally monitor where a signal is currently present The level meters of the hardware s outputs are connected post fader thus displaying the actual output level User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 63 219 dino E c ISUuEuS s1empieH 0 eje pjeH 002 90 yo01g 008 dsa XIINIEYO L IWY 82 015 non 82 015 TOA Heed SIN em 82 Jo 19105 rua yseqheig x oipny 82 015 amp Luopiooou TOA TERME a A i xen TOA 8210 1 U e 4 eni Jeuueuo 1010 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 64 31 2 The User Interface The visual design of the TotalMix mixer is a result of its capability to route hardware inputs and software playback channels to any hardware output The Fireface 800 provides 28 input chan nels 28 software playback channels and 28 hardware out
74. decoded analog multichannel data to the Fireface The option nterleaved in the Settings dialog has to be activated Certain MME playback devices of the Fireface support multichannel playback Interleaved with 2 4 6 and 8 chan nels Fireface Analog 1 2 Up to 192 kHz playback on the analog outputs 1 8 Fireface ADAT1 142 Up to 48 kHz playback on channels 13 20 Fireface ADAT2 142 Up to 48 kHz playback on channels 21 28 Thanks to TotalMix the software s playback channels can be routed to any hardware outputs Therefore a playback at 96 kHz using the analog outputs can also be done via both ADAT ports This also removes a limitation in some software like PowerDVD 5 which always uses channel 1 as first channel of a multichannel playback The typical channel assignment for surround playback is 1 Left 2 Right 3 Center 4 LFE Low Frequency Effects 5 SL Surround Left 6 SR Surround Right Note 1 Selecting the Fireface to be used as system playback device is against our recommen dations on system optimization as professional cards are not specialized to play back system sounds and shouldn t be disturbed by system events To prevent this be sure to re assign the selection after usage or to disable any system sounds tab Sounds scheme No audio Note 2 The DVD player will be synced backwards from the Fireface This means when using AutoSync and or word clock the playback speed and pit
75. displays to a clock extracted from the input signal System Clock Mode displays Slave The difference to a usual slave mode is that whenever the clock reference fails the system will automatically use its internal clock and operate in Master mode AutoSync guarantees that record and record while play will always work correctly In certain cases however e g when the inputs and outputs of a DAT machine are connected directly to the Fireface 800 AutoSync may cause feedback in the digital carrier so synchronization breaks down To remedy this switch the Fireface s clock mode over to Master Remember that a digital system can only have one master If the Fireface s clock mode is d set to Master all other devices must be set to Slave The Fireface s ADAT optical and SPDIF inputs operate simultaneously Because there is no input selector however the Fireface 800 has to be told which of the signals is the sync refer ence a digital device can only be clocked from a single source Via Pref Sync Ref preferred synchronization reference a preferred input can be defined As long as the card sees a valid signal there this input will be designated as the sync source The Fireface has been equipped with an automatic clock source selection which adopts the first available input with a valid digital signal as the clock reference input If none of the inputs are receiving a valid signal the card automatically switches cl
76. e 800 interface does not provide any performance advantages especially does not help to achieve lower latency But connecting a hard drive to the Fireface hub func tionality FireWire 800 will immediately increase performance and reliablility The cabling of FireWire 800 units is critical In real world operation it is not unusual that all Firefaces have to be connected directly to the 1394b ports of the computer using cables of similar length A long cable from the computer to the first Fireface and a short one from the first to the second Fireface can cause problems More information about numbers of channels and bus load can be found in chapter 37 4 The driver takes care of the numbering of all Firefaces so that it doesn t change The unit with the lowest serial number is always Fireface 1 Please note e f the Fireface 1 is switched off Fireface 2 logically turns to the first and only Fireface If Fireface 1 is switched on later the numbering changes and the unit becomes Fireface 2 immediately e driver has no control on the numbering of the WDM devices Therefore it might happen that the WDM devices 2 are mapped to unit 1 especially when switching on more Fire faces during a Windows session A reboot with all Firefaces already operational should solve this problem Note TotalMix is part of the hardware of each Fireface Up to three mixers are available but these are separated and can t interchange d
77. e ADAT input has been selected in Pref Sync Hef the sample frequency shown in the SPDIF Freq field differs from the one shown in AutoSync Hef The unit automati cally switches to S MUX mode here because ADAT optical inputs and outputs are only speci fied up to 48 kHz Data from to a single input output is spread over two channels the internal frequency stays at 44 1 or 48 kHz In such cases the ADAT sample frequency is only half the SPDIF frequency 22 4 Limit Bandwidth This option allows to reduce the amount of bandwidth used on the FireWire bus A typical ex ample is the use of the Fireface with a laptop Only in rare cases both ADAT ports are needed in many cases even both stay unused The option Analog SPDIF will reduce the amount of constantly transferred data from around 5 MByte 10 in both directions to only 2 MByte 4 in both directions The FireWire connection will be more stable reliable and robust leaving addi tional bandwidth for other devices At the same time the CPU and system load is reduced as less channels have to be processed and to be transferred In TotalMix the deactivated software playback channels will be replaced with empty plates More details are found in chapter 37 4 Available Settings All channels default activates all 28 input and output channels Analog SPDIF ADAT1 disables channels 21 28 ADAT2 Analog SPDIF activates all 10 analog channels plus SPDIF Analog 1 8 activates only the first
78. e When no feedback is needed when using only standard MIDI commands instead of Mackie Control protocol select NONE as MIDI Output Check Enable MIDI Control in the Options menu 34 4 Operation The channels being under MIDI control are indicated by a colour change of the info field below the faders black turns to yellow The 8 fader block can be moved horizontally and vertically in steps of one or eight channels Faders can be selected to gang them In Submix View mode the current routing destination output bus can be selected via REC Ch 1 8 This equals the selection of a different output channel in the lowest row by a mouse click when in Submix View In MIDI operation it is not necessary to jump to the lowest row to perform this selection This way even the routing can be easily changed via MIDI Full LC Display Support This option in Preferences F3 activates complete Mackie Control LCD support with eight channel names and eight volume pan values Attention this feature causes heavy overload of the MIDI port when ganging more than 2 faders In such a case or when using the Behringer BCF2000 turn off this option When Full LC Display Support is turned off only a brief information about the first fader of the block channel and row is sent This brief information is also available on the LED display of the Behringer BCF2000 Tip for Mac OS X users LC Xview www opuslocus com provides an on screen display emulating
79. early any frequency with highest pre cision DDS has been implemented into the Fireface with regard to the needs of professional video applications as well as to maximum flexibility The dialog DDS includes both a list of typical video frequencies so called pull up pull down at 0 196 and 496 and two faders which allow to freely change the basic sample rate in steps of 1 Hz d The DDS dialog requires the Fireface to be in clock mode Master The frequency setting will only be applied to this one specific Fireface audio or brings up warning messages of the audio software Therefore the desired sample d Changing the sample rate in bigger steps during record playback often results in a loss of rate should be set at least coarsely before starting the software DDS Activates all settings of this dialog Value Shows the sample rate as adjusted in this dialog The sample rate is defined by the basic setting Frequency the multiplier and the position of the acti vated fader Frequency Sets a fixed basic sample rate which can be modified by multiplier and fader Freq Multiplier Changes the basic sample rate into Single Double oder Quad Speed mode Coarse Fader for coarse modification of the basic sample rate Click Active to acti vate it Minimum step size 1 Hz Fine Fader for fine modification of the basic sample rate Click Active to activate it Minimum step size 1 Hz Notes on the faders
80. ed to operate horizontally within one row If you usually don t need this you can at least gang the analog outputs The advan tage over holding the Alt key is that Alt sets both channels to the same level can be handy too while grouping via selection will retain any offset if you need one channel to be louder all the time etc Note The relative positions are memorized until the faders are pulled down so that they reach upper or lower maximum position and the group is changed select another channel or deselect one of the group 33 3 Copy Routings to other Channels TotalMix allows to copy complete routing schemes of inputs and outputs Example 1 You have input 1 guitar routed within several submixes hardware outputs headphones Now you ll get another input with keyboards that should appear in the same way on all headphones Select input 1 open the menu Edit It shows Copy In 1 Now select the desired new input for example In 8 The menu now shows Paste In 1 to In 8 Click on it done If you are familiar with this functionality just use Ctrl C and Ctrl V Else the self updating menu will always let you know what actually will happen Tip Have the Matrix window open as second window when doing this It will show the new rout ings immediately so copying is easier to understand and to follow Example 2 You have built a comprehensive submix on outputs 4 5 but now need the exact same signal also on the outputs 6 7 Click on
81. een switched to SPDIF As can be seen in the block dia gram all channels and their assignments still exist but the optical transmitter has been dis connected from ADAT2 and is now fed from the SPDIF output channels 11 12 The ADAT2 playback devices are still usable by routing and mixing them in TotalMix to other outputs Playback works but record doesn t Check that there is a valid signal at the input If so the current sample frequency is dis played in the Settings dialog e Check whether the Fireface 800 has been selected as recording device in the audio applica tion Check whether the sample frequency set in the audio application Recording properties similar matches the input signal Check that cables devices have not been connected in a closed loop If so set the systems s clock mode to Master Crackle during record or playback e Increase the number and size of buffers in the application e Try different cables coaxial or optical to rule out any defects here Check that cables devices have not been connected in a closed loop If so set the system s clock mode to Master e Check the Settings dialog for displayed Errors Possible causes for a Fireface not working e FireWire cable is not or not correctly inserted into the socket e No power After switching the Fireface on at least the red Host error LED has to be lit Driver installation and Settings dialog TotalMix work
82. el 10 now no longer feeds the record software but is still connected to TotalMix and thus to the Compressor The record software receives the signal of submix channel 10 instead the Compressor s return path 33 7 MS Processing The mid side principle is a special positioning technique for microphones which results in a mid signal on one channel and a side signal on the other channel These information can be trans formed back into a stereo signal quite easily The process sends the monaural mid channel to left and right the side channel too but phase inverted 180 to the right channel For a better understanding the mid channel represents the function L R while the side channel represents L R During record the monitoring needs to be done Mixer 1 TestBank1 in conventional stereo As TotalMix can invert Fie Edt view Options gt the phase it also offers the functionality of a EH aways Always On Top M S decoder The menu Options includes a Deactivate Screensaver macro to simplify the setup First select the two v Ignore Position input channels in the picture to the right Analog 8310 Direct Monitoring In 3 and 4 having the current routing destination Analog Out 1 2 Now the string MS Processing Emi In 3 4 to AN 1 2 On is shown in Options Level Meter Setup Preferences Flash current mixer state 8H Fireface Matrix 1 1 2 AN 1 2 AN 1 2 1 2 AN 1 2 AN 1 2 AN
83. en to Phones submixes Fortunately a Mackie Control compatible controller is not required to control these buttons as they are steered by simple Note On Off commands on MIDI channel 1 The notes are hex decimal keys Monitor Main 3E 62 D3 Dim 5D 93 A5 Mono 2A 42 1 Talkback 5E 94 A 5 Monitor Phones 1 3F 63 D 3 Monitor Phones 2 40 64 Monitor Phones 3 41 65 3 Preset 1 36 54 F 2 Preset 2 37 55 82 Preset 3 38 56 G 2 Preset 4 39 57 A2 Preset 5 58 2 Preset 6 38 59 B2 Preset 7 3C 60 C 3 Preset 8 3D 61 C An example of a small MIDI controller covering such MIDI functionality and even some more is the Behringer BCN44 This little box has 4 pots and 8 buttons for all the above functions for less than 60 Euros Furthermore TotalMix allows to control all faders of all three rows via simple Control Change commands The format for the Control Change commands is Bx yy zz X MIDI channel yy control number Zz value The first row in TotalMix is adressed by MIDI channels 0 up to 3 the middle row by channels 4 up to 7 and the bottom row by channels 8 up to 11 16 Controller numbers are used 102 up to 117 2 hex 66 bis 75 With these 16 Controllers faders and 4 MIDI channels each per row up to 64 faders can be controlled per row as required by the HDSPe MADI 84 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Examples for sending MIDI strings
84. er 11 4 All channels default activates all 28 input and output channels Analog SPDIF ADAT1 disables channels 21 28 ADAT2 Analog SPDIF activates all 10 analog channels plus SPDIF Analog 1 8 activates only the first eight analog channels SPDIF In a 3 2 Defines the input for the SPDIF sig Fireface Settings nal Coaxial relates to the RCA Fireface 1 Fireface 2 DDS About socket ADAT2 to the second optical TOSLINK input m Buffer Size Latency Input Level r Options put 48 Samples C LoGain M Check Input M Sync lign SPDIF Out opus Iv TMS The SPDIF output signal is constantly 1 Front 7 Output Level Interleaved available at the phono plug After 7 Rear Hi Gain Clock Mode selecting ADAT2 it is also routed to Frontier c 4 AutoSync the second optical TOSLINK output Master For further details about the settings ea esha Spes Professional Emphasis and Non canes A1 Mes Miedo Word Clock io l C ADATII Audio please refer to chapter 29 2 SPDIF In QUU NER M jb C ADAT2 T Dive M Lm sppipin SPDIF Freq f Coaxial M SpeakerEmulation Displays the sample rate of the signal SPDIF Dut ESSI Glonk DIU at the SPDIF input ADAT2 Iv Single Speed a SyncCheck r amp utoSync Ref Lu Emphasis Word Clock Sy
85. es But SteadyClock is not only ready for them it would handle them just on the fly Common interface jitter values in real world applications are below 10 ns a very good value is less than 2 ns W 10 0ns The screenshot shows an extremely jittery SPDIF signal of about 50 ns jitter top graph yellow SteadyClock turns this signal into a clock with less than 2 ns jitter lower graph blue The sig nal processed by SteadyClock is of course not only used internally but also used to clock the digital outputs Therefore the refreshed and jitter cleaned signal can be used as reference clock without hesitation User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 101 38 Diagrams 38 1 Block Diagram Fireface 800 ul IAIN a5 IAIN e d seuoug TERN OL OL t uie amp IH YT SH eur pe2uereg 2012 4ejcdnoz2 oado OL 6 Ova 8 L oor ueg E sul OL aax sul 6 HX ues ules sul 9 JIAAS 14 E 4 OL amp uI89 8 XINI830L OA 121151 vu 581 eur pe2ueieg Ej 5 lt 43 Os Lil ia b CH Zo mwa Ov ueg O 5 Oz2 E L EI OsO LJL adds ul Jv av User s Guide Fireface 800 RME
86. evices which can t handle more than 48 kHz e g digital tape recorders But also other common interfaces like ADAT or TDIF are still using this technique Because the ADAT interface does not allow for sampling frequencies above 48 kHz a limitation of the interface hardware the Fireface 800 automatically uses Sample Multiplexing in DS mode One channel s data is distributed to two channels according to the following table Analog In Analog In DS Signal gt MA _ _ Port ADAT1 ADAT1 ADAT1 ADAT1 ADAT2 ADAT2 As the transmission of double rate signals is done at standard sample rate Single Speed the ADAT outputs still deliver 44 1 kHz or 48 kHz 37 6 QS Quad Speed Due to the small number of available devices that use sample rates up to 192 kHz but even more due to a missing real world application CD Quad Speed has had no broad success so far An implementation of the ADAT format as double S MUX results in only two channels per optical output There are few devices using this method The Fireface 800 can not provide ADAT at 192 kHz because this would equal a channel count of 64 10424242 x 4 see chapter 37 4 Number of Channels and Bus load The Fireface is internally limited to 48 channels The SPDIF AES output of the Fireface 800 provides 192 kHz as Single Wire only User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 99 37 7 AES EBU SPDIF The most important electrical properties of AES and SPDIF c
87. f its channels are already in use The Kernel Mixer then automatically reverts to open a stereo device for a stereo playback Software which is capable of using more than one MME device usually uses the WDM MME devices A surround playback via Media Player should be possible without the need of recon figuration That s why the mode Interleaved is activated in the Settings dialog by default 28 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 12 6 Digital Recording Unlike analog soundcards which produce empty wave files or noise when no input signal is present digital interfaces always need a valid input signal to start recording Taking this into account RME have included three unique features in the Fireface 800 a com prehensive I O signal status display showing sample frequency lock and sync status in the Settings dialog status LEDs for each input and the protective Check Input function If a 48 kHz signal is fed to the input and the application is set to 44 1 kHz Check Input stops the system from recording This prevents faulty takes which often go unnoticed until later on in the production Such tracks appear to have the wrong playback rate the audio quality as such is not affected The sample frequency shown in the Settings dialog see chapter 11 1 screenshot Settings is useful as a quick display of the current configuration the board itself and all connected external equipment If no sample frequency is recognized it will read
88. fader area above or below the fader know will move the fader with the smallest step size up or down Holding the Ctrl key while clicking will cause the fader to jump to its center 0 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 45 Application examples DDS allows for a simultaneous change of speed and tune during record and playback From alignment to other sources up to creative effects everything is possible DDS allows to intentionally de tune the complete DAW This way the DAW can match instru ments which have a wrong or unchangeable tuning DDS allows to define a specific sample rate This feature can be is useful in case the system randomly changes the sample rate for unknown reasons It also prevents a change from Dou ble Speed 96 kHz to Single Speed 48 kHz which would cause configuration and routing problems by the changed amount of ADAT channels 22 3 Clock Modes Synchronization In the digital world all devices must be either Master clock source or Slave synchronized to a master Whenever several devices are linked within a system there must always be a single master clock The Fireface s intelligent clock control is very user friendly being able to switch between clock modes automatically Selecting AutoSync will activate this mode In AutoSync mode the system constantly scans all digital inputs for a valid signal If any valid signal is found the Fireface switches from the internal quartz System Clock Mode
89. fos can be found on our web site section News amp Infos or the directory rmeaudio web techinfo on the RME Driver CD These are some of the currently available Tech Infos FireWire Audio by RME Technical Background FireWire 800 Hardware Compatibility Problems FireWire 800 under Windows XP SP2 Driver updates Fireface 800 Lists all changes of the driver updates SteadyClock RME s new clock technology in theory and operation DIGICheck Analysis tests and measurements with RME audio hardware A description of DIGICheck including technical background information HDSP System TotalMix Hardware and Technology Background information on the digital mixer of the Hammerfall DSP Fireface Synchronization Il DIGI96 series Digital audio synchronization technical background and pitfalls Installation problems Problem descriptions and solutions ADI 8 Inside Technical information about the RME ADI 8 24 bit AD DA converter HDSP System Notebook Basics Notebook Hardware HDSP System Notebook Basics The Audio Notebook in Practice HDSP System Notebook Basics Background Knowledge and Tuning HDSP System Notebook Tests Compatibility and Performance Many background information on laptops Tests of notebooks 90 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 36 Technical Specifications 36 1 Analog AD Line In 1 8 rear Resolution AD 24 bit Signal to Noise ratio SNR 110 dB RMS unweighted 113 dBA Frequency response
90. ful because the ASIO host often supports different pan laws too Selecting the same value here and in the ASIO host ASIO Direct Moni toring works perfectly as both ASIO host and TotalMix use the same pan law Of course when not using ADM it can be changed to a setting different from the factory preset of 6 dB as well You will most probably find that 3 dB gives a much more stable loudness when moving an ob ject between left and right 31 11 Editing the Names The channel names shown in the white label area can be edited A right mouse click on the white name field brings up MB Fireface Mixer 1 Band the dialog box Enter Name Any name can be entered in this fie Ed dialog Enter Return closes the dialog box the white label p now shows the first letters of the new name ESC cancels the Enter Name process and closes the dialog box Moving the mouse above the label brings LE Ani LT Moni 12 Moni up a tool tip with the complete name 11 Floor Tom E Mid r Guitar A Chorfi2 Chori In 5 L Mains kamt L Mains 1 Main J Main R Main Wi Eh oror The hardware outputs third row can be edited in the same way In this case the names in the routing drop down AN 7 8 menus will change automatically Additionally the names in _ Phones the drop down menus of the Monitor section will change as MDATLEDATR No well 1 1 2 Al 3 4 Submix 1 5 6 The preset buttons can get meanin
91. g The cable shielding is only connected to pin 1 of the XLR not to the phono plug Shield The ground free design with transformers for coaxial digital inputs and outputs offers a trouble free connection of all devices along with perfect hum rejection and full AES EBU compatibility In SPDIF mode identical signals are available at both the optical and the coaxial output An obvious use for this would be to connect two devices i e using the Fireface 800 as a splitter distribution 1 on 2 58 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Special Characteristics of the SPDIF Output Apart from the audio data itself digital signals in SPDIF or AES EBU format have a header con taining channel status information False channel status is a common cause of malfunction The Fireface 800 ignores the received header and creates a totally new one for the output signal Note that in record or monitor modes set emphasis bits will disappear Recordings origi nally done with emphasis should always be played back with the emphasis bit set This can be done by selecting the Emphasis switch in the Settings dialog SPDIF Out This setting is updated immediately even during playback Note Recordings with pre emphasis show a treble boost 50 15 us which has to be com pensated at playback Therefore when selecting Emphasis all analog outputs will be processed by a treble filter based on 50 15us which sounds like a high cut The Fireface s new
92. g functions which are needed all the time in typical studio work Monitor Main Use the drop down menu to select the hardware outputs where your main monitors are con nected to Monitor Main W Phones Dim A click on this button will lower the volume of your main monitor output see above by an amount set up in the Preferences dialog see below This is the same as moving the third row faders down a bit but much more convenient as the old setting is back by a simple mouse click Dim Talkback Mono Sets the stereo output defined above to monaural playback Useful to check for mono compatibility and phase problems Monitor Phones Talkback A click on this button will dim the Main Monitor output see above by an amount set up in the Preferences dialog At the same time the control room s microphone signal source defined in Preferences is sent to the three destinations described below as Monitor Phones The mic level is adjusted with the channel s input fader Monitor Phones 1 2 3 Use the drop down menu to select the hardware outputs where the submixes are sent to These submixes are usually phones mixdowns for the musicians A click on the button allows to hear the specific submix via the Main Monitor outputs So when setting up or modifying the submix for the musician this process can be monitored easily and any time Or in other words you can easily check other hardware outputs submixes by using the Monit
93. ge DR 116 dB 119 dBA 9 44 1 kHz unmuted Frequency response 44 1 kHz 0 1 dB 1 Hz 20 1 kHz Frequency response 96 kHz 0 5 dB 1 Hz 43 5 kHz Frequency response 192 kHz 1 dB 1 Hz 70 kHz THD 103 dB 0 0007 THD N 100 dB lt 0 001 96 Channel separation 110 dB Maximum output level 19 dBu Output 6 3 mm TRS jack servo balanced Output impedance 75 Ohm Output level switchable Hi Gain 4 dBu 10 dBV Output level at 0 dBFS 9 Hi Gain 19 dBu Output level at 0 dBFS 9 4 dBu 13 dBu Output level at 0 dBFS 9 10 dBV 2 dBV DA Stereo Monitor Output Phones as DA but Output 6 3 mm TRS jack unbalanced stereo Maximum output level at 0 dBFS 17 dBu Output impedance 30 Ohm 36 2 MIDI 1 x MIDI I O via 5 pin DIN jacks Galvanically isolated by optocoupled input Hi speed mode Jitter and response time typically below 1 ms Separate 128 byte FIFOs for input and output 36 3 Digital Clocks Internal ADAT In SPDIF In word clock in Optional LTC Video in Low Jitter Design 1 ns in PLL mode all inputs Internal clock 800 ps Jitter Random Spread Spectrum Jitter suppression of external clocks 30 dB 2 4 kHz Effective clock jitter influence on AD and DA conversion near zero PLL ensures zero dropout even at more than 100 ns jitter Digital Bitclock PLL for trouble free varispeed ADAT operation Supported sample rates 28 kHz up to 200 kHz 92 User s Guide Fireface 800
94. gful A1748 names in the same way Move the mouse ee ES above a preset button a right mouse 1234 click will bring up the dialog box Note zi 78 Ac 3 4 that the name shows up as tool tip only A2 5 6 as soon as the mouse stays above the preset button L Mains L hint L Mains L L Lht The preset button names are not stored in the preset files but globally in the registry so won t change when loading any file or saving any state as preset But loading a preset bank see chapter 31 8 the names will be updated 72 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 31 12 Hotkeys In many situations TotalMix can be controlled quickly and comfortably by the keyboard making the mixer setup considerably easier and faster The Shift key for the fine mode for faders and panpots has already been mentioned The Ctrl key can do far more than changing the routing pairwise Clicking anywhere into the fader area with the Ctrl key pressed sets the fader to 0 dB e Clicking anywhere into the pan area with the Ctrl key pressed sets the panorama to lt C gt meaning Center e Clicking a preset button while holding down Ctrl the original factory preset will be loaded e Using Ctrl and any number between 1 and 8 not on the numeric keypad will load the cor responding factory default preset Alt plus number loads the user preset e Using multiple Firefaces clicking the button Unit 2 while holding down Ctrl opens a second TotalMix window for t
95. he clock of all participating devices has to be syn chronous This is often impossible with devices limited to playback for example CD players as these have no SPDIF input thus can t use the self clocking technique as clock reference In a digital studio synchronisation is maintained by connecting all devices to a central sync source For example the mixing desk works as master and sends a reference signal the word clock to all other devices Of course this will only work as long as all other devices are equipped with a word clock or sync input thus being able to work as slave some professional CD players indeed have a word clock input Then all devices get the same clock and will work in every possible combination with each other Remember that a digital system can only have one master If the Fireface s clock mode is set to Master all other devices must be set to Slave But word clock is not only the great problem solver it also has some disadvantages The word clock is based on a fraction of the really needed clock For example SPDIF 44 1 kHz word clock a simple square wave signal has to be multiplied by 256 inside the device using a spe cial PLL to about 11 2 MHz This signal then replaces the one from the quartz crystal Big disadvantage because of the high multiplication factor the reconstructed clock will have great deviations called jitter The jitter of a word clock is typically 15 times higher as when using a
96. he hardware output to the software input A software monitor ing on the subgroup record channels is only allowed as long as the monitoring is routed in both software and TotalMix to a different channel than the active subgroup recording one User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 79 Recording a Software s playback In real world application recording a software s output with another software will show the fol lowing problem The record software tries to open the same playback channel as the playback software already active or the playback one has already opened the input channel which should be used by the record software This problem can easily be solved First make sure that all rules for proper multi client operation are met not using the same record playback channels in both programs Then route the play back signal via TotalMix to a hardware output in the range of the record software and activate it via Ctrl mouse for recording Mixing several input signals into one record channel In some cases it is useful to record several sources in only one track For example when using two microphones when recording instruments and loudspeakers TotalMix Loopback mode saves an external mixing desk Simply route mix the input signals to the same output third row then re define this output into a record channel via Ctrl mouse that s it This way any number of input channels from different sources can be recorded into one single track 33 6 Usi
97. he second Fireface 800 instead of replacing the window contents The faders can also be moved pairwise corresponding to the stereo routing settings This is achieved by pressing the Alt key and is especially comfortable when setting the SPDIF and Phones output level Even the panoramas can be operated with Alt from stereo through mono to inversed channels and also the Mute and Solo buttons ganged or inversed switching At the same time TotalMix also supports combinations of these keys If you press Ctrl and Alt at the same time clicking with the mouse makes the faders jump to 0 dB pairwise and they can be set pairwise by Shift Alt in fine mode Also very useful the faders have two mouse areas The first area is the fader button which can be grabbed at any place without changing the current position This avoids unwanted changes when clicking onto it The second area is the whole fader setting area Clicking into this area makes the fader jump to the mouse at once If for instance you want to set several faders to m a it is sufficient to click onto the lower end of the fader path Which happens pairwise with the Alt key pressed Using the hotkeys and P the complete row of Input Playback and Output channels each can be toggled between visible and invisible Hotkey S switches Submix view on off Those four hotkeys have the same functionality as the buttons in the View section of the Quick Access Panel The Level Meter Setup dialog ca
98. he word clock out put With this the usual T adapter can be avoided and the Fireface 800 operates as Signal Refresher This kind of operation is highly recommended because e input and output are phase locked and in phase 0 to each other SteadyClock removes nearly all jitter from the input signal the exceptional input 1 Vpp sensitivity instead of the usual 2 5 Vpp dc cut Signal Adapta tion Circuit plus SteadyClock guarantee a secure function even with highly critical word clock signals Thanks to a low impedance but short circuit proof output the Fireface delivers 4 Vpp to 75 Ohms For wrong termination with 2 x 75 Ohms 37 5 Ohms there are still 8 3 Vpp at the out put 60 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 30 2 Technical Description and Usage In the analog domain one can connect any device to another device a synchronization is not necessary Digital audio is different It uses a clock the sample frequency The signal can only be processed and transmitted when all participating devices share the same clock If not the signal will suffer from wrong samples distortion crackle sounds and drop outs AES EBU SPDIF and ADAT are self clocking an additional word clock connection in principle isn t necessary But when using more than one device simultaneously problems are likely to happen For example any self clocking will not work in a loop cabling when there is no master main clock inside the loop Additionally t
99. here is the panpot realized as indicator bar L R in order to save space In the field below the present level is displayed in RMS or Peak being updated about every half a second Overs overload are indicated here by an additional red dot Next is the fader with a level meter The meter shows both peak values zero attack 1 sample is enough for a full scale display by means of a yellow line and mathematically correct RMS values by means of a green bar The RMS display has a relatively slow time constant so that it shows the average loudness quite well Below the fader the current gain and panorama values are shown The white area shows the channel name Selecting one or more channels is done by clicking on the white label which turns orange then A click in the third row with pressed Ctrl key activates internal loopback mode the label turns red A right mouse click opens a dialog to type in a new name The black area routing field shows the current routing target A mouse click opens the routing window to select a routing target The list shows all currently activated routings by checkmarks in front of the routing targets 31 4 Tour de TotalMix This chapter is a practical guide and introduction on how to use TotalMix and on how TotalMix works Starting up TotalMix the last settings are recalled automatically When executing the application for the first time a default file is loaded sending all playback tracks 1 1 to the c
100. ic clock selection checks C ADAT2 Drive Lim C SPDIF In and changes between the clock f Coawial J Speaker Emulation sources Word Clock SPDIF Qut Word Clock Qut vi ADAT2 SPDIF LTC and Video ADAT2 Single Speed es LTC Video when using the optional Professional SyncCheck AutoSync Ref TCO module _ Emphasis Word Clock NoLock Input Non Audio ADATIIn Sync Freq 44 1 kHz System Clock p SPDIF Freq System Clock Shows the current clock state of the LESE AE Lo Fireface 800 The system is either Read Flash Memory Store in Flash Memory Freq 44 1 kHz Master using its own clock or Slave see AutoSync Ref eR Read Flash Memory A click on this button causes all settings to change to the ones stored in the flash memory of the Fireface Store in Flash Memory A click on this button transmits all current settings into the flash memory of the Fireface Those settings then become active directly after power on and also in stand alone operation 20 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 11 2 Settings dialog DDS Usually soundcards and audio interfaces generate their internal clock master mode by a quartz Therefore the internal clock can be set to 44 1 kHz or 48 kHz but not to a value in be tween SteadyClock RME s sensational Low Jitter Clock System is based on a Direct Digital Synthesizer DDS This superior circuitry can generate n
101. ight and do not place it near other sources of heat like ra diators or stoves When mounting in a rack leave some space between this device and others for ventilation Unauthorized servicing repair voids warranty Only use accessories specified by the manufacturer Read the manual completely It includes all information necessary to use and operate this device User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 5 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME User s Guide RTE INTELLIGENT AUDIO SOLUTIONS Fireface gt General User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 1 Introduction Thank you for choosing the Fireface 800 This unique audio system is capable of transferring analog and digital audio data directly to a computer from practically any device The latest Plug and Play technology guarantees a simple installation even for the inexperienced user The numerous unique features and well thought out configuration dialog puts the Fireface 800 at the very top of the range of computer based audio interfaces The package contains drivers for Windows 2000 SP4 Windows XP XP 64 Windows Vista Windows Vista 64 Mac OS X and Mac OS X x86 Our high performance philosophy guarantees maximum system performance by executing as many functions as possible not in the driver i e the CPU but directly within the audio hard ware 2 Package Contents Please check that your Fireface 800 package contains each of the following RME Driver CD Cable IEEE13
102. in the Audio MIDI Setup It displays no RME MIDI device or the device is greyed out and therefore inactive Mostly removing the greyed out device and searching for MIDI devices again will solve the problem If this does not help we recommend manual removal of the MIDI driver and rein stallation of the complete driver Otherwise repairing permissions may help The Fireface MIDI driver is a plugin During installation it will be copied to gt Library Audio MIDI Drivers It s name is Fireface MIDI plugin The file can be displayed in the Finder and also be removed by simply dragging it to the trash bin 48 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 23 3 Supported Sample Rates RME s Mac OS X driver supports all sampling frequencies provided by the hardware This in cludes 32 kHz and 64 kHz and even 128 kHz 176 4 kHz and 192 kHz for the analog and SPDIF I Os But not every software will support all the hardware s sample rates For example Spark does not display 32 kHz and 64 kHz The hardware s capabilities can easily be verified in the Audio MIDI Setup Select Audio devices under Properties of and choose the Fireface A click on Format will list the supported sample frequencies If the unit is in clock mode Master selecting a sample rate will immediately set the device to this frequency which can be verified in the Fireface s settings dialog System Clock Format thus allows you to activate any sampling frequency quickly and easily but DDS i
103. input signal to output channels 1 2 Hold the Ctrl key down and click on the labels ANT and AN2 in the third row Their labels turn red the internal loop mode is active Result the desired input signal is now available at input channel 1 2 without further delay latency Since OS X 10 3 playback can be configured freely and to any of the available playback chan nels This is done via Speaker Setup Even multichannel playback Surround DVD Player can be set up easily User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 49 Multicard Operation OS X supports more than one audio device Since 10 4 Tiger Core Audio offers the function Aggregate Devices which allows to combine several devices into one so that a multi device operation is possible with any software The Fireface driver adds a number to each unit so they are fully accessible in any multicard capable software 24 Hotline Troubleshooting The newest information can always be found on our website www rme audio com section Sup port Macintosh OS A report about incompatible FireWire 800 controllers is found in the Tech Info FireWire 800 Hardware Compatibility Problems The unit and drivers have been installed correctly but playback does not work e sFireface 800 listed in the System Profiler Vendor ID 2613 800 MB s Has Fireface been selected as current playback device in the audio application The 8 ADAT channels don t seem to work The optical output ADAT2 has b
104. input signals 1 x MIDI I O 16 channels high speed MIDI 1 x Hi power headphone output DIGICheck DSP Level meter in hardware peak and RMS calculation 8 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 5 First Usage Quickstart 5 1 Connectors and Front Panel The front of the Fireface 800 features an instrument input microphone inputs and line inputs with gain pots a stereo headphone output with volume pot and several status LEDs indicates MIDI data received by the MIDI input MIDI O indicates MIDI data sent to the MIDI output The Digital State LEDs WC SPDIF ADAT TCO indicate a valid input signal separately for each digital input Additionally 27281 RME s exclusive SyncCheck indicates if one 37 of these inputs is locked but not synchro nous to the others in which case the LED will flash See also chapter 11 3 22 3 Clock Modes Synchronization ANALOG DIGITAL STATE The red HOST LED lights up when the Fireface 800 has been switched on thus signalling the presence of operating voltage At the same time it operates as error LED in case the FireWire connection hasn t been initialised yet or has been interrupted error cable not connected etc Phones is a low impedance line output of highest quality It provides a sufficient and undis torted volume when used with headphones The rear panel of the Fireface ADAT 2 ADAT 4 800 features eight analog inputs and outputs the power e
105. isplay flashes in order to 2334 announce that something has been changed still showing which state the pre sent mix is based on 18 5 B If preset button is lit another preset had been loaded the File menu and Open file Mixer settings can of course be saved the usual way and have long file names Instead of single presets a complete bank of 8 presets can be loaded at once Advantage The names defined for the preset buttons will be stored and loaded automatically Up to three Firefaces can be used simultaneously The Unit buttons switch between the de vices Holding down Ctrl while clicking on button Unit 2 or Unit 3 will open another TotalMix window 31 8 Presets TotalMix includes eight factory presets stored within the program The user presets can be changed at any time because TotalMix stores and reads the changed presets from the files preset11 fmx to preset81 fmx located in Windows hidden directory Documents and Settings Username Local Settings Application Data RME TotalMix On the Mac the location is in the folder User Username Library Preferences Fireface The first number indicates the cur rent preset the second number the current unit This method offers two major advantages e Presets modified by the user will not be overwritten when reinstalling or updating the driver e The factory presets remain unchanged and can be reloaded any time User s Guide Fireface 800 R
106. itoring Windows only 77 33 2 Selection and Group based Operation 78 33 3 Routings to other Channels 78 33 4 Delete 5 78 33 5 Recording a Subgroup Loopback 79 33 6 Using external Effects Devices 80 33 7 MS Processing 81 34 TotalMix MIDI Remote Control insi receta ennt terrd v pe daa e eda nare 82 34 2 82 94 3 dites de ri 83 34 4 Operation sssssseenen 83 34 5 Simple MIDI Control 84 34 6 Loopback Detection 85 34 7 Stand Alone MIDI 86 gt Technical Reference 35 Lechinfo noinine eias 90 36 Technical Specifications 36 1 Analog e tete a pe HARE anse 91 36 2 ume 92 36 3 Digital entere ee nen ene 92 36 4 Digital 9 36 5 Digital 94 36 6 Transfer Modes Resolution Bits per Sample 94 36 7 General stet e ER Irae ix 94 37 Technical Background 37 1 Lock and 95 37 2 Latency and Monitoring 96 37 3 FireWire Audio 97 37 4 Number of Channels and
107. itude Sequoia Cubase or Nuendo and TotalMix Activate ADM ASIO Direct Moni toring and move a fader in the ASIO host Now watch the corresponding fader in TotalMix magically move too TotalMix reflects all ADM gain and pan changes in realtime Please note that faders only move when the currently activated routing currently visible routing corre sponds to the one in the ASIO host Also note that the Matrix will show any change as it shows all possible routings in one view With this TotalMix has become a wonderful debugging tool for ADM Just move the host s fader and pan and see what kind of ADM commands TotalMix receives The hardware output row faders are included in all gain calculations in every possible way Example you have lowered the output level of a submix or just a specific channel by some dB The audio signal passed through via ADM will be attenuated by the value set in the third row User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 77 33 2 Selection and Group based Operation Click on the white name label of channel 1 and 2 in TotalMix Be sure to have channel 3 5 fader set to a different position and click on its label too All three labels have changed to the colour orange which means they are selected Now moving any of these faders will make the other faders move too This is called building a group of faders or ganging faders maintaining their relative position Building groups or ganging can be done in any row but is limit
108. ll be able to use 3 or 6 ms with MME Simply check out by yourself which lowest setting your system and software allows Some motherboards with insufficient PCI bandwidth especially VIA based suffer from crackling at settings below 512 Be sure to set the buffer size to 512 or higher in such a case or get yourself a new motherboard 26 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 12 4 Notes on WDM The driver offers two devices per stereo pair like Fireface Analog 1 2 and Fireface Analog 1 2 MME Fireface Analog 1 2 The devices having no MME at the end are WDM Streaming Devices WDM Streaming is Mi crosoft s current driver and audio system directly embedded into the operating system WDM Streaming is nearly unusable for professional music purposes as all data is processed by the so called Kernel Mixer causing a latency of at least 30 ms Additionally WDM can perform sample rate conversions unnoticed cause offsets between record and playback data block channels unintentionally and much more Therefore for general operation RME recommend not to useWDM devices WDM Streaming also replaces the former DirectSound Synthesizers and Samplers which achieved latencies below 10 ms using DirectSound are forced to use WDM in Windows XP And now operate at high latency Meanwhile most of these programs support ASIO as low la tency driver interface Several programs do not offer any direct device selection Instead they use the playback device
109. lock to the digital input signal A usual TOSLINK cable is sufficient for connection More information on Double Speed S MUX can be found in chapter 37 5 In Interface for the first or only device sending an ADAT signal to the Fireface 800 Carries the channels 1 to 8 When receiving a Double Speed signal this input carries the channels 1 to 4 ADAT 2 In Interface for the second device sending an ADAT signal to the Fireface 800 Carries the chan nels 9 to 16 When receiving a Double Speed signal this input carries the channels 5 to 8 Can also be used as SPDIF optical input Out Interface for the first or only device receiving an ADAT signal from the Fireface 800 Transmits channels 1 to 8 When sending a Double Speed signal this port carries channels 1 to 4 ADAT2 Out Interface for the second device receiving an ADAT signal from the Fireface 800 Transmits channels 9 to 16 When sending a Double Speed signal this port carries channels 5 to 8 Can also be used as SPDIF optical output 29 2 SPDIF The SPDIF input is configured in the Settings dialog available by a click on the fire symbol in the Task Bar s system tray The Fireface 800 accepts all commonly used digital sources as well as SPDIF and AES EBU Channel status and copy protection are ignored To receive signals in AES EBU format an adapter cable is required Pins 2 and 3 of a female XLR plug are connected individually to the two pins of a phono plu
110. logy access is not possible here To be able to transmit audio reliably at lower latencies FireWire requires a new concept the Safety Buffer The Fireface 800 uses a fixed additional buffer of 64 samples on the playback side only which is added to the current buffer size The main advantage is the ability to use lowest latency at highest CPU loads Furthermore the fixed buffer does not add to the latency jitter see Tech Info the subjective timing is extraordinary Core Audio s Safety Offset Under OS X every audio interface has to use a so called satety offset otherwise Core Audio won t operate click free The Fireface uses a safety offset of 64 samples This offset is signalled to the system and the software can calculate and display the total latency of buffer size plus AD DA offset plus safety offset for the current sample rate 37 3 FireWire Audio FireWire audio is in several ways different from RME s earlier PCI audio interfaces First of all our cards have a PCI interface which has been developed by RME and optimized for audio FireWire on the other hand uses OHCI compatible controllers that have not been optimized for audio no matter from which manufacturer they are Our PCI data transmission is per channel while FireWire is working interleaved i e it transmits all channels simultaneously With the Hammerfall drop outs thus occur only on the last channels which is not always noticeable while a drop out with FireWire
111. lways fully synchronized Each change in one view is immediately reflected in the other view as well 32 2 Elements of the Matrix View The visual design of the TotalMix Matrix is mainly determined by the architecture of the Fireface 800 e Horizontal labels All hardware outputs Bil Fireface Matrix 1 e Vertical labels All hardware inputs Below are all play back channels software playback channels Green 0 0 dB field Standard 1 1 routing a rcgis Black gain field Shows the current gain value as dB e Orange gain field This routing is muted e Blue field Phase 180 inverted To maintain overview when the window size has been reduced the left and upper labels are floating They won t left the visible area when scrolling 32 3 Operation Using the Matrix is a breeze It is very easy to indentify the current crosspoint because the outer labels light up in orange according to the mouse position If input 1 is to be routed to output 1 use the mouse and click one time on crosspoint In 1 AN 1 The green 0 0 dB field pops in another click removes it To change the gain equals the use of a different fader position see simultaneous display of the mixer view hold Ctrl down and drag the mouse up or down starting from the gain field The value within the field changes accord ingly The corresponding fader in the mixer view is moving simultaneously in case the currentl
112. mat In most cases it will switch off when being fed Professional coded data The table shows that a Professional coded signal would lead to malfunctions for copy prohibi tion and emphasis if being read as Consumer coded data Nowadays many devices with SPDIF input can handle Professional subcode Devices with AES3 input almost always accept Consumer SPDIF passive cable adapter necessary 100 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 37 8 Noise level in DS QS Mode The outstanding signal to noise ratio of the Fireface s AD converters can be verified even with out expensive test equipment by using record level meters of various software But when acti vating the DS and QS mode the displayed noise level will rise from 109 dB to 104 dB at 96 kHz and 82 dB at 192 kHz This is not a failure The software measures the noise of the whole frequency range at 96 kHz from 0 Hz to 48 kHz RMS unweighted at 192 kHz from 0 Hz to 96 kHz When limiting the measurement s frequency range to 22 kHz audio bandpass weighted the value would be 110 dB again This can be verified even with RME s Windows tool D G Check Although a dBA weighted value does not include such a strong bandwidth limitation as audio bandpass does the displayed value of 108 dB is nearly identical to the one at 48 kHz im DIGICheck Bit Statistic amp Noise Jo Eg File Function Options Help Subfram MSB Audio Data LSB AUX RMS dB 3 RMS
113. n be opened via F2 as in DIGICheck The dialog box Preferences is opened via F3 Hotkey M toggles Mute Master on off and with this performs a global mute on off Hotkey X toggles the Matrix view on off see chapter 32 hotkey T the mixer view Hotkey L links all fad ers as stereo pairs Further hotkeys are available to control the configuration of the Level Meter see chapter 31 14 Key 4 or 6 Display range 40 or 60 dB Key E or R Numerical display showing Peak or RMS Key 0 or 3 RMS display absolute or relative to 0 dBFS User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 73 31 13 Menu Options Always on Top When active checked the TotalMix window will always be on top of the Win dows desktop Note This function may result in problems with windows containing help text as the TotalMix window will even be on top of those windows so the help text isn t readable Deactivate Screensaver When active checked any activated Windows screensaver will be disabled temporarily Ignore Position When active the windows size and position stored in a file or preset will not be used The routing will be activated but the window will not change ASIO Direct Monitoring Windows only When de activated any ADM commands will be ignored by TotalMix In other words ASIO Direct Monitoring is globally de activated Link Faders Selecting this option all faders will be treated as stereo pairs and moved pair wise Hotkey L MS Processing Macro for a q
114. n errors of PCI FireWire are detected The display will be reset on any start of a playback record i e set to zero and is thus no longer visi ble More information can be found in chapter 37 3 42 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Inputs Input selection for the channels 1 7 and 8 Channel 1 can be the front instrument input or the rear TRS jack or both simultaneously Channel 7 8 can be the front microphone input or the rear TRS jack or both simultaneously Level In Defines the reference level for the rear O Fireface Settings 2 analog inputs 1 8 EE eaux f Unit 869 Unit F27 DDS About Level Out Inputs 005 NN Levelin __ Level Out Defines the reference level for the rear Front oe analog outputs 1 8 mof Lo Gain Hi Gain 7 19 4 dBu Instrument Options Front Rear bA TEO UBV Drive activates 25 dB additional gain PAE ODORE E 0 for maximum sustain and brute eus TE cS pe m distortion lait EE don Speaker Emulation _ Mic 8 Mic 10 Lim activates a soft limiter with a threshold of 10 dBFS Note The ct abi esu nr ed Limiter can only be switched off with O ADAT2 9 AutoSync Input Word input selection Front Coaxial O Master Freq 44 1 kHz SPDIF Out SyncCheck ___ Speaker Emulation removes low fre ADAT2 Word Clock Word Sync quency noise and cuts off higher fre A Professional ADAT
115. nated at all Ideally all outputs of word clock delivering devices are designed as low impedance types but all word clock inputs as high impedance types in order to not weaken the signal on the chain But there are also negative examples when the 75 Ohms are built into the device and cannot be switched off In this case the network load is often 2 x 75 Ohms and the user is forced to buy a special word clock distributor Note that such a device is generally recommended for bigger studios The Fireface s word clock input can be high impedance or terminated internally ensuring maxi mum flexibility If termination is necessary e g because the Fireface is the last device in the chain push the switch at the back beside the BNC socket see chapter 30 1 In case the Fireface 800 resides within a chain of devices receiving word clock plug a T adapter into its BNC input jack and the cable supplying the word clock signal to one end of the adapter Connect the free end to the next device in the chain via a further BNC cable The last device in the chain should be terminated using another T adapter and a 75 Ohm resistor avail able as short BNC plug Of course devices with internal termination do not need T adaptor and terminator plug Due to the outstanding SteadyClock technology of the Fireface 800 we recommend not to pass the input signal via T adapter but to use the Fireface s word clock output instead Thanks to SteadyClock the input sign
116. nc Input Input Level Non Audio ADATIIn Sync 441 kHz Defines the reference level for the SPDIF ADAT2In NoLock 441kH SPDIFIn Lock rear analog inputs 1 8 LRO Mode Slave Read Flash Memory Store in Flash Memory Freg 44 1 2 Defines the reference level for the DK Abbrechen rear analog outputs 1 8 Phantom Power Phantom power 48V can be selected for each microphone input seperately Instrument Options Drive activates 25 dB additional gain for maximum sustain and brute distortion Lim activates a soft limiter with a threshold of 10 dBFS Note The Limiter can only switched off with input selection Front Speaker Emulation removes low frequency noise and cuts off higher frequencies User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Word Clock Out The word clock output signal usually equals the current sample rate Selecting Single Speed causes the output signal to always stay within the range of 32 kHz to 48 kHz So at 96 kHz and 192 kHz sample rate the output word clock is 48 kHz SyncCheck SyncCheck indicates whether there is a valid signal Lock No Lock for each input Word clock ADAT1 ADAT2 SPDIF or if there is a valid and synchronous signal Sync The AutoSync Ref display shows the input and frequency of the current sync source Options Check Input verifies the current digital input sign
117. nd the activation of the option Use System Timestamp 30 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 13 2 Known Problems If computer does not provide sufficient CPU power and or sufficient PCl bus transfer rates then drop outs crackling and noise will appear We recommend to deactivate all Plugins to verify that these are not the reason for such effects Additional hard disk controllers both on board and PCI based aften violate the PCI specs To achieve the highest throughput they hog the PCI bus even in their default setting Thus when working with low latencies heavy drop outs clicks are heard Try to solve this problem by changing the default setting of the controller for example by reducing the PCI Bus Utilization The above note on PCI is not an error in this manual so far all FireWire controllers are con nected to the PCI bus Therefore the same problems known from PCI audio cards can occur with FireWire audio interfaces as well Further information is found in chapter 37 3 When using more than one Fireface 800 all Firefaces have to be in sync see chapter 15 Else a periodicly repeated noise will be heared Another common source of trouble is incorrect synchronization ASIO does not support asyn chronous operation which means that the input and output signals not only have to use the same sample frequency but also have to be in sync All devices connected to the Fireface 800 must be properly configured for Full Duplex oper
118. nd outputs free utilisation patchbay functionality Distributing signals to several outputs at a time TotalMix offers state of the art splitter and distributor functions Simultaneous playback of different programs using only one stereo output The ASIO multi client driver allows to use several programs at the same time but only on different playback channels TotalMix provides the means to mix and monitor these on a single stereo output Mixing of the input signal to the playback signal complete ASIO Direct Monitoring RME not only is the pioneer of ADM but also offers the most complete implementation of the ADM functions Integration of external devices Use TotalMix to insert external effects devices be it in the playback or in the record path Depending on the current application the functionality equals insert or effects send and effects return for example as used during real time monitoring when adding some reverb to the vocals Every single input channel playback channel and hardware output features a Peak and RMS level meter calculated in hardware These level displays are very useful to determine the pres ence and routing destinations of the audio signals For a better understanding of the TotalMix mixer you should know the following As shown in the block diagram next page the record signal usually stays un altered To talMix does not reside within the record path and does not change the record level or the audio
119. ng external Effects Devices With TotalMix a usage of external hardware like effects devices is easy and flexible Example 1 The singer microphone input channel 10 shall have some reverb on his head phones outputs 9 10 A direct routing In 10 to Out 9 10 for monitoring had been set up already The external reverb is connected to a free output for example channel 8 In active mode Sub mix View click on channel 8 in the bottom row Drag the fader of input 10 to about 0 dB and the panorama fully to the right Adjust the input level at the reverb unit to an optimal setting Next the output of the reverb unit is connected to a free stereo input for example 5 6 Use the To talMix level meters to adjust a matching output level at the reverb unit Now click on channels 9 10 in the bottom row and move the fader of inputs 5 6 until the reverb effect gets a bit too loud in the headphones Now click on channel 8 in the bottom row again and drag fader 10 down bit until the mix of original signal and reverb is perfect for the singer The described procedure is completely identical to the one when using an analog mixing desk There the signal of the singer is sent to an output usually labeled Aux from there to a reverb unit sent back from the reverb unit as stereo wet signal no original sound back in through a stereo input e g Effect return and mixed to the monitoring signal The only difference The Aux sends on mixing desks are post fader Ch
120. not recording at fullest level nothing is lost At higher gain distortion of the input using a guitar switching off the Limiter causes digital distortion which adds nicely to the analog dis tortion of the input Just give it a try The Line inputs of the microphone channels can also be used as instrument inputs Active in struments can be connected directly and be level adjusted perfectly with the Gain pots Passive e guitars require an additional impedance buffer Most guitarrists have one but don t know that they do Modern floor effects devices are active even in bypass mode and then operate as impedance buffer Drive Drive is an additional clipper for 25 dB more gain sustain plus substantially higher distortion It will simply blow you away Also well suited for bass guitar Speaker Emulation The basic idea of the Fireface 800 instrument input is not to alter the sound in a specific way but to pre condition the sound so that it gets much easier recorded and processed within the DAW application This is accomplished by an optimization of the input record signal via light pre clipping see above removing low frequency noise removing high frequency noise a small bass and presence boost All frequency corrections are part of the Speaker Emulation option The name is originated by the fact that guitar cabinets typically show a big level attenuation in the high frequency range making distortion sound less brilliant and harsh
121. oSync Ref Limit Bandwidth Allows to reduce the amount of bandwidth used on the FireWire bus See chapter 22 4 All channels default activates all 28 input and output channels Analog SPDIF ADAT1 disables channels 21 28 ADAT2 Analog SPDIF activates all 10 analog channels plus SPDIF Analog 1 8 activates only the first eight analog channels Read Flash Memory A click on this button causes all settings to change to the ones stored in the flash memory of the Fireface Store in Flash Memory A click on this button transmits all current settings into the flash memory of the Fireface Those settings then become active directly after power on and also in stand alone operation 44 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 22 2 Settings dialog DDS Usually soundcards and audio interfaces generate their internal clock master mode by a quartz Therefore the internal clock can be set to 44 1 kHz or 48 kHz but not to a value in be tween SteadyClock RME s sensational Low Jitter Clock System is based on a Direct Digital Synthesizer DDS This superior circuitry can generate nearly any frequency with highest pre cision DDS has been implemented into the Fireface with regard to the needs of professional video applications as well as to maximum flexibility The dialog DDS includes both a list of typical video frequencies so called pull up pull down at 0 196 and 496 and two faders which allow to freely change the basic sample rate
122. ock mode to Master The input currently used as sync reference is shown in the AutoSync Ref status field together with its sample frequency To cope with some situations which may arise in studio practice defining a preferred sync ref erence is essential One example An ADAT recorder is connected to the ADAT input ADAT immediately becomes the AutoSync source and a CD player is connected to the SPDIF input Try recording a few samples from the CD and you will be disappointed Few CD players can be synchronized The samples will inevitably be corrupted because the signal from the CD player is read with the wrong clock from the ADAT i e out of sync In this case Pref Sync Ref should be temporarily set to SPDIF 46 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME If several digital devices to be used simultaneously in a system they not only have to oper ate with the same sample frequency but also be synchronous with each other This is why digi tal systems always need a single device defined as master which sends the same clock signal to all the other slave devices RME s exclusive SyncCheck tech eoo nology enables an easy to use check and display of the current clock status SyncCheck indicates whether Fireface Settings f Unit 869 Unit 4F27 DDS About Inputs Level In Level Out there is a valid signal Lock No Lock 2 for each input Word Clock ADAT1 4 C to Gain O Hi Gain ADAT2
123. ode which stretches the mouse movements by a factor of 8 In this mode a gain setting accurate to 0 1 dB is no problem at all User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 67 Please set 4 to a gain of around 20 dB and the pan close to center Now click onto the routing field You ll now see two checkmarks one at AN 3 4 the other one at AN 7 8 Click onto SPDIF The window disappears fader and pan jump to their initial values the signal can now be routed to the SPDIF output You can continue like this until all entries have got a i e you can send the signal to all outputs simultaneously You will certainly have noticed that the signal at the outputs 7 8 did not change while you were routing channel 4 to other outputs and setting different gain values for those With all analog and most digital mixing desks the fader setting would affect the level for every routed bus not so for TotalMix TotalMix allows for setting all fader values individually Therefore the faders and the panpots jump to the appropriate setting as soon as another routing is chosen Sometimes you will want the routings not to be independent Let s say you have sent a signal to several submixes and now want to change the signal s volume a bit on a these submixes Dragging the faders by use of the right mouse button activates Post Send mode and causes all routings of the current input or playback channel to be changed in a relative way Please note that
124. one of Non amp udio ADATiIn Sync Freq 44 1 kHz the most complex issues in the digi oi ne Pid SWINE tal studio world US ES Read Flash Memory Store in Flash Memory Freg 44 1 kHz Thanks to its AutoSync technique and lightning fast PLLs the Fireface Abbrech 800 is not only capable of handling ok abbrechen standard frequencies but also any sample rate between 28 and 200 kHz Even the word clock input most often used in varispeed operation allows any frequency between 28 kHz and 200 kHz At 88 2 or 96 kHz If the ADAT input has been selected in Pref Sync Hef the sample frequency shown in the SPDIF Freq field differs from the one shown in AutoSync Hef The unit automati cally switches to S MUX mode here because ADAT optical inputs and outputs are only speci fied up to 48 kHz Data from to a single input output is spread over two channels the internal frequency stays at 44 1 or 48 kHz In such cases the ADAT sample frequency is only half the SPDIF frequency 11 4 Limit Bandwidth This option allows to reduce the amount of bandwidth used on the FireWire bus A typical ex ample is the use of the Fireface with a laptop Only in rare cases both ADAT ports are needed in many cases even both stay unused The option Analog SPDIF will reduce the amount of constantly transferred data from around 5 MByte 10 in both directions to only 2 MByte 4 in both directions The FireWire connection will be more
125. one signals Thanks to automatic signal centering 300 mV 0 3V input level are sufficient in principle An additional hysteresis reduces sensitivity to 1 0 V so that over and undershoots and high frequency disturbances don t cause a wrong trigger The Fireface s word clock input is shipped as high imped ance type not terminated A push switch allows to acti vate internal termination 75 Ohms The switch is found on the back beside the word clock input socket Use a small pencil or similar and carefully push the blue switch so that it snaps into its lock position The yellow LED will be lit when termination is active Another push will release it again and de activate the termination Output The word clock output of the Fireface is constantly active providing the current sample fre quency as word clock signal As a result in Master mode the provided word clock is defined by the currently used software In Slave mode the provided frequency is identical to the one pre sent at the currently chosen clock input When the current clock signal fails the Fireface 800 switches to Master mode and adjusts itself to the next best matching frequency 44 1 kHz 48 kHz etc Selecting Single Speed in the Settings dialog causes the output signal to always stay within the range of 32 kHz to 48 kHz So at 96 kHz and 192 kHz sample rate the output word clock is 48 kHz The received word clock signal can be distributed to other devices by using t
126. or Phones function without the need to copy paste routings back and forth or to reconfigure the cabling at the hardware 31 10 Preferences m Talkback The dialog box Preferences is available via the menu nee Options or directly F3 5 o ke 25 7 dB Talkback M Input Select the input channel of the Talkback signal Listenback microphone in control room o Input Ic hd Dim Amount of attenuation of the Monitor Main output in dB Listenback Input Select the input channel of the Listenback sig nal microphone in recording room ey Dim Amount of attenuation of the Monitor Phones ERE m outputs in dB HESS 18034 9 A MIDI Input Fieface MIDI Note The Mute button of the Talkback and Listenback fi channel is still active Therefore it is not necessary to 7 Die NONE in case one of both shall be deacti T Ful LC Display Support vated oem a DO UP RET NS Stereo Pan Law 3 MIDI Controller Full LC Display Support ses See chapter 34 4 for details 5d Em User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 71 Main Monitor Dim Amount of attenuation of the Monitor Main output in dB Activated by the Dim button in the Monitor panel Stereo Pan Law The Pan Law can be set to 6 dB 4 5 dB 3 dB and 0 dB The value chosen defines the level attenuation in pan center position This setting is use
127. or group based working with these functions In the View section the single mixer rows can be made visible or invisible If the inputs are not needed for a pristine playback mix the whole upper row falls out of the picture after a click on the Input button If the hardware outputs don t interest you either the window can thus be re duced to the playback channels to save space All combinations are possible and allowed As described earlier Submix sets all routing windows to the same selection Deactivating Sub mix automatically recalls the previous view The mixer can be made smaller horizontally and vertically This way TotalMix can be made substantially smaller and space saving on the desk top screen if you have to monitor or set only a few channels or level meters The Presets are one of the mightiest and most useful features of TotalMix Be hind the eight buttons eight files are hidden see next chapter These contain the complete mixer state All faders and other settings follow the changing of preset s in real time just by a single mouse click The Save button allows for storing the present settings in any preset You can change back and forth be Playback tween a signal distribution complete input monitoring a stereo and mono mix and various submixes without any problem Submix Also here RME s love for details can be seen If any parameter is being altered after loading a preset e g moving a fader the preset d
128. orresponding hardware outputs with O dB gain and activating phones monitoring Hold down Ctrl and click on preset button 1 to make sure that factory preset 1 is loaded The faders in the top row are set to maximum attenuation called m a in the following so there is no monitoring of the input channels The Submix View is active therefore for improved over view all outputs except Phones are greyed out Additionally all faders are set to the routing tar get Phones All faders of the middle row are set to 0 dB so no matter on which channels a playback happens the audio will be audible via the Phones output Just try it We will now create a submix on analog outputs 1 2 Please start a multitrack playback In the third row click on the channels of hardware output AN1 or AN2 The Submix View changes from Phones to AN1 AN2 Both the fader settings and the output levels of all other channels are still visible but greyed out for improved orientation As soon as AN1 AN2 became active all faders of the second row jumped to their bottom posi tion except those of playback channel 1 2 This is correct because as mentioned above the factory preset includes a 1 1 routing Click on AN 3 4 and the faders above are the only active ones same for AN5 6 and so on 66 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Back to AN1 2 Now you can change all the faders of all inputs and playback channels just as you like thus making any input and playback signals audible
129. other software To activate this function click on the white label in the third row while holding down the Ctrl key The label s colour changes to red In case the channel has already been part of a group the colour will change from yellow to orange signalling that the group functionality is still active for this channel In loopback mode the signal at the hardware input of the corresponding channel is no longer sent to the recording software but still passed through to TotalMix Therefore TotalMix can be used to route this input signal to any hardware output Using the subgroup recording the input can still be recorded on a different channel a 3to 28 RME TotalMix Fireface 800 HDSP Mixer Loopback Mode Block Diagram 06 2004 Hardware Input Channel 1 1 of 28 Solo Mute a 3 to 28 Loopback Record Ch 1 Audio Software Playback Ch 1 1 of 28 Hardware Output Channel 1 As each of the 28 hardware outputs can be routed to the record software and none of these hardware inputs get lost TotalMix offers an overall flexibility and performance not rivaled by any other solution Additionally the risk of feedbacks a basic problem of loopback methods is highly reduced be cause the feedback can not happen within the mixer but only when the audio software is switched into monitoring mode The block diagram shows how the software s input signal is played back and fed back from t
130. oute the four microphone inputs directly to the analog outputs This turns the Fireface 800 into a 4 channel microphone preamp The AD and DA conversion will cause a small delay of the signals of around 0 4 ms at 192 kHz see chapter 37 2 But this is not really relevant as it is the same delay that would be caused by changing the microphone s position by about 14 centimeter 5 6 inches 26 3 Monitor Mixer TotalMix allows ANY configuration of all I Os of the Fireface For example set the device as monitor mixer for 10 analog signals 16 digital via ADAT and 2 via SPDIF Additionally TotalMix lets you set up ANY submixes so all existing outputs can be used for different and independent monitorings of the input signals The perfect headphone monitor mixer 26 4 Digital Format Converter As TotalMix allows for any routing of the input signals the Fireface 800 can be used as ADAT to SPDIF converter ADAT to two ADAT splitter and SPDIF to ADAT converter 26 5 Analog digital Routing Matrix The Matrix in TotalMix enables you to route and link all inputs and outputs completely freely the above functionalities are even available simultaneously can be mixed and combined in many ways Simply said the Fireface 800 is a perfect analog digital routing matrix 54 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 27 Analog Inputs 27 1 Line Rear The Fireface has eight balanced Line inputs as 1 4 TRS jacks on the back of the unit The elec tronic inp
131. outing pair just being selected You can then see immediately which chan nels which fader and pan settings make a submix for example AN 7 8 At the same time the Submix View simplifies setting up the mixer as all channels can be set simultaneously to the same routing destination with just one click Changing to a different destination output channel is done in any routing field or by a click on the desired output pair in the bottom row 31 6 Mute and Solo Mute operates pre fader thus mutes all currently active routings of the channel As soon as any Mute button is pressed the Mute Master button lights up in the Quick Access area It allows to switch all selected mutes off and on again You can comfortably make mute groups or activate and deactivate several Mutes simultaneously The same holds true for the Solo and the Solo Master buttons As with conventional mixing desks Solo operates only for the output defined as Monitor Main as a solo in place post fader As soon as one Solo button is pressed the Solo Master button lights up in the Quick Access area It allows to switch all selected Solos off and on again You can comfortably make solo groups or activate and deactivate several Solos simultaneously 68 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 31 7 The Quick Access Panel This section includes additional options further improving the handling of TotalMix The Master buttons for Mute and Solo have already been described they allow f
132. pletely or ORION Ausgangslatenz 2 585 ms error free VST System Link Settings Clock Quelle When the sample fre sis Einstellungen i Eing nge quency is set to 88 2 or Video Player M 510 Traiber im Hintergrund deaktivieren 96 kHz the number of Windows MIDI Des uta ASIO channels is Zeitanzeige MENOS reduced to 4 per ADAT port At a sample rate of 176 4 or 192 kHz Quad Speed Mode the ADAT Hilfe E Zur cksetzen l Os are no longer available Nevertheless Alle zur cksetzen 3 4 Abbrechen they will send out a synchronized ADAT signal at a quarter of the sample rate The ASIO driver corrects the number of channels when changing from Single to Double or Quad Speed The channel routing of both ADAT ports is shown in chapter 18 1 and 37 5 Experte Ubernehmen Some programs do not recognize the dynamic change of the number of ADAT channels there fore not operate correctly in Double and Quad Speed mode workaround is to use DDS After having set the desired sample rate the ASIO software recognizes the correct number of channels directly when started In case of a drift between audio and MIDI or in case of a fixed deviation MIDI notes placed close before or behind the correct position the settings in Cubase Nuendo have to be changed At the time of print the best settings are the use of emulated MIDI driver ports a
133. put channels jum 3 TETTE HARDWARE OUTPUTS 56 channels don t fit on the screen side by side neither does such an arrangement provide a useful overview The input channel should be placed above the corresponding output channel Therefore the channels have been arranged as known from an nline desk so that the row Software Playback equals the Tape Heturn of a real mixing desk HARDWARE INPUTS Mil fl ttt HARDWARE OUTPUTS e Top row Hardware inputs The level shown is that of the input signal i e fader independ ent Via fader and routing field any input channel can be routed and mixed to any hardware output bottom row e Middle row Playback channels playback tracks of the audio software Via fader and routing field any playback channel can be routed and mixed to any hardware output third row e Bottom row third row Hardware outputs Here the total level of the output can be adjusted This may be the level of connected loudspeakers or the necessity to reduce the level of an overloaded submix The following chapters explain step by step all functions of the user interface User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 65 31 3 Elements of a Channel A single channel consists of various elements Input channels and playback channels each have a mute and solo button Below t
134. quartz based clock The end of these problems should have been the so called Superclock which uses 256 times the word clock frequency This equals the internal quartz frequency so no PLL for multiplying is needed and the clock can be used directly But reality was different the Superclock proved to be much more critical than word clock A square wave signal of 11 MHz distributed to several devices this simply means to fight with high frequency technology Reflections cable quality capacitive loads at 44 1 kHz these factors may be ignored at 11 MHz they are the end of the clock network Additionally it was found that a PLL not only generates jitter but also rejects disturbances The slow PLL works like a filter for induced and modulated frequencies above several kHz As the Superclock is used without any filtering such a kind of jitter and noise sup pression is missing No wonder Superclock did not become a commonly accepted standard The actual end of these problems is offered by the SteadyClock technology of the Fireface 800 Combining the advantages of modern and fastest digital technology with analog filter tech niques re gaining a low jitter clock signal of 11 MHz from a slow word clock of 44 1 kHz is no problem anymore Additionally jitter on the input signal is highly rejected so that even in real world usage the re gained clock signal is of highest quality User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 61 30 3 Cabling and Termination Word
135. r will indicate when the flash process is finished Verify Ok If more than one Fireface is installed all units can be flashed by changing to the next tab and repeating the process After the update the unit needs to be reset This is done by powering down the Fireface for a few seconds Attention the Fireface should not be switched off for less than 5 seconds be cause Windows completely unloads the driver which takes some time to finish A reboot of the computer is not necessary When the update fails status failure the unit s second BIOS will be used from the next cold boot on Secure BIOS Technology Therefore the unit stays fully functional The flash process should then be tried again on a different computer User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 17 11 Configuring the Fireface 11 1 Settings dialog General Configuration of the Fireface 800 is done via its own settings dialog The panel Settings can be opened e by clicking on the fire symbol in the Task Bar s system tray The mixer of the Fireface 800 TotalMix can be opened v 5 11 13 e clicking on the mixer icon in the Task Bar s system tray The hardware of the Fireface 800 offers a number of helpful well thought of practical functions and options which affect how the card operates it can be configured to suit many different requirements The following is available in the Settings dialog e Input selection lc n Level of analog I Os m
136. re cable IEEE1394a 6M 6M 1 m 3 3 ft FWK660300BL FireWire cable IEEE1394a 6M 6M 3 m 9 9 ft FWK660400BL FireWire cable IEEE1394a 6M 6M 4 m 13 ft FireWire 400 cable 4 pin male to 6 pin male 4 pin sockets are found on most laptops FWK460100BL FireWire cable IEEE1394a 4M 6M 1 m 3 3 ft FWK460300BL FireWire cable IEEE 1394a 4M 6M m 9 9 ft FWK460400BL FireWire cable IEEE1394a 4M 6M 4 m 13 ft Note Cable longer than 15 ft 4 5m is not specified for FireWire 10 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Optical cable SPDIF and operation OK0050 Optical cable TOSLINK 0 5 m 1 6 ft OK0100 Optical cable TOSLINK 1 m 3 3 1 OK0200 Optical cable TOSLINK 2 m 6 6 ft OK0300 Optical cable TOSLINK 3 m 9 9 ft OK0500 Optical cable TOSLINK 5 m 16 4 ft OK1000 Optical cable TOSLINK 10 m 33 ft Time Code Option to be inserted in the rear slot adding LTC and Video synchronization inputs to the Fireface plus a LTC output TCOFF Time Code Option Fireface 7 Warranty Each individual Fireface 800 undergoes comprehensive quality control and a complete test at IMM before shipping The usage of high grade components allow us to offer a full two year war ranty We accept a copy of the sales receipt as valid warranty legitimation If you suspect that your product is faulty please contact your local retailer The warranty does not cover damage caused by improper installation or maltreatment replacement or rep
137. reen The driver files are located in the directory Fireface W2k on the RME Driver CD Windows now installs the driver of the Fireface 800 and registers it as a new audio device in the system After a reboot the symbols of mixer and Settings dialog will appear in the task bar see above The red Host error LED extinguishes In case the warning messages Digital signature not found not install driver certified driver or similar come up Don t listen to Microsoft listen to us and continue with the installation In case the Hardware Wizard does not show up automatically after installation of the card do not attempt to install the drivers manually An installation of drivers for non recognized hardware will cause a blue screen when booting Windows Possible reasons why a Fireface is not found automatically e The FireWire port is not active in the system drivers of the FireWire PCI or CardBus card have not been installed e FireWire cable is not or not correctly inserted into the socket e No power After switching the Fireface on at least the red Host error LED has to be lit 16 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 10 2 Driver Update RME driver updates often include a new fireface inf file To prevent Windows 2000 XP from using an old fireface inf or to copy some of the old driver files be sure NOT to let Windows search for the driver Instead tell Windows what to do Under Control Panel System Devi
138. reface 800 RME 37 38 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME User s Guide RTE INTELLIGENT AUDIO SOLUTIONS Fireface gt Mac OS X Installation and Operation User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 39 19 Hardware Installation Desktop Computer e Use the power cord to connect the Fireface with any suitable power outlet e Connect computer and Fireface using the supplied 6 pin FireWire cable IEEE 1394a Poweron the computer then switch on the Fireface Notebook e Use the power cord to connect the Fireface with any suitable power outlet e Connect computer and Fireface using the supplied 6 pin FireWire cable IEEE 1394a e Power on the notebook then switch on the Fireface 800 20 Driver 20 1 Driver Installation After the Fireface has been switched on see 19 Hardware Installation install the drivers from the RME Driver CD The driver files are located in the folder Fireface Installation works auto matically by a double click on the file fireface mpkg RME recommends to download the latest driver version from the RME website If done the procedure is as follows Double click onto fireface_xx gz to expand the archive file to fireface_xx tar and the folder Fireface which includes the driver file fireface mpkg Installation works automatically by a double click on this file During driver installation the programs Settings dialog and Fireface mixer TotalMix will also be installed Both programs start
139. rmware 2 66 Although the contents of this User s Guide have been thoroughly checked for errors RME can not guarantee that it is correct throughout RME does not accept responsibility for any mislead ing or incorrect information within this guide Lending or copying any part of the guide or the RME Driver CD or any commercial exploitation of these media without express written permis sion from RME Intelligent Audio Solutions is prohibited RME reserves the right to change specifications at any time without notice 12 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME CE FCC Compliance This device has been tested and found to comply with the limits of the European Council Direc tive on the approximation of the laws of the member states relating to electromagnetic compati bility according to RL89 336 EWG and RL73 23 EWG FCC This equipment has been tested and found to comply with the limits for a Class B digital device pursuant to Part 15 of the FCC Rules These limits are designed to provide reasonable protec tion against harmful interference in a residential installation This equipment generates uses and can radiate radio frequency energy and if not installed and used in accordance with the instructions may cause harmful interference to radio communications However there is no guarantee that interference will not occur in a particular installation If this equipment does cause harmful interference to radio or television reception which can
140. rrently selected submix output is also pre configured in the hardware for stand alone MIDI remote operation Mackie Control Protocol The stand alone operation supports the following Mackie Control surface elements Tested with Behringer BCF2000 Firmware v1 07 in Mackie Control emulation for Steinberg mode Element Channel faders 1 8 SEL 1 8 DYNAMICS V Pots 1 8 pressing V Pot knobs CHANNEL LEFT or REWIND CHANNEL RIGHT or FAST FORWARD BANK LEFT or ARROW LEFT BANK RIGHT or ARROW RIGHT ARROW UP or Assignable1 PAGE ARROW DOWN or Assignable2 PAGE EQ MUTE Ch 1 8 SELECT Ch 1 8 REC Ch 1 8 Meaning in Fireface volume reset fader to Unity Gain pan pan center move one channel left move one channel right move eight channels left move eight channels right move one row Up move one row down Master Mute Mute Select select output bus current submix 86 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME In stand alone MIDI mode the Mackie Control protocol also gives access to some settings of the Settings dialog Element Meaning in Fireface SOLO Ch 1 Input Level Lo Gain SOLO Ch 2 Input Level 4 dBu SOLO Ch 3 Input Level 10 dBV SOLO Ch 4 Output Level Hi Gain SOLO Ch 5 Output Level 4 dBu SOLO Ch 6 Output Level 10 SOLO Ch 7 Clock Mode AutoSync SOLO Ch 8 Clock Mode Master F9 Phantom Power Mic 7 F10 Phantom Power Mic 8 F11 Phantom Power Mic 9 F12 Phantom Power Mic 10 F13 Instrument Option
141. rsampling While the delays of digital interfaces can be disregarded altogether the analog inputs and out puts do cause a significant delay Modern converter chips operate with 64 or 128 times over sampling plus digital filtering in order to move the error prone analog filters away from the au dible frequency range as far as possible This typically generates a delay of one millisecond A playback and re record of the same signal via DA and AD loopback then causes an offset of the newly recorded track of about 2 ms The exact delays of the Fireface 800 are Sample Fequency kiz asi Jas 66296 i764 102 meza CE os peje _ pe 228 LE 099 fos OAS OAs 025 078 DR GES ms The second DA values are valid for units built since around march 2005 AK4396 instead of AK4395 The driver detects the version automatically and transmits the correct offsets Buffer Size Latency Windows This option found in the Settings dialog defines the size of the buffers for the audio data used in ASIO and GSIF see chapter 13 and 14 Mac OS X The buffer size is defined within the application Only some do not offer any setting For example iTunes is fixed to 512 samples General A setting of 64 samples at 44 1 kHz causes a latency of 1 5 ms for record and play back each But when performing a digital loopback test no latency offset can be detected The reason is that the software naturally knows the size of the buffer
142. s Again the inputs can be used simultaneously RME s sophisticated tool DIGICheck is an exception to this rule It operates like an ASIO host using a special technique to access playback channels already occupied Therefore DIGICheck is able to analyse and display playback data from any software no matter which format the software uses Multi Client and Multi Channel using WDM The WDM Streaming devices of our driver can operate as usual stereo devices or as 8 channel devices The option Interleaved in the Settings dialog determines the current mode Interleaved not active The WDM devices operate as usual stereo devices The multi client op eration works as described above with WDM ASIO MME and GSIF Interleaved active The WDM devices can also be used as 8 channel devices Unfortunately the Kernel Mixer active with any WDM playback then always occupies and blocks 8 channels at once even when WaveLab or the Media Player perform just a stereo playback 2 channels So If any stereo pair within an 8 channel group is used the whole 8 channel group is blocked As a result no second stereo pair of this group can be used neither with ASIO MME nor GSIF The Fireface provides three 8 channel groups the analog inputs 1 to 8 and the two ADAT ports Starting MME ASIO or GSIF playback on any of the stereo pairs of an 8 channel group prior to starting a WDM playback will prevent the Kernel Mixer from opening the 8 channel device as two o
143. s therefore is able to position the newly recorded data at a place equalling a latency free system AD DA Offset under ASIO and OS X ASIO Windows and Core Audio Mac OS X allow for the signalling of an offset value to correct buffer independent delays like AD and DA conversion or the Safety Buffer described below An analog loopback test will then show no offset because the application shifts the recorded data accordingly Because in real world operation analog record and playback is unavoidable the drivers include an offset value matching the Fireface s converter delays 96 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME Therefore in a digital loopback test negative offset of about 3 ms occurs This is no real problem because this way of working is more than seldom and usually the offset can be com pensated manually within the application Additionally keep in mind that even when using the digital l Os usually at some place an AD and DA conversion is involved no sound without Note Cubase and Nuendo display the latency values signalled from the driver separately for record and playback While with our former cards these values equalled exactly the buffer size for example 3 ms at 128 samples the Fireface displays an additional millisecond the time needed for the AD DA conversion Playback even shows another millisecond added see Safety Buffer Safety Buffer FireWire audio differs significantly from RME s previous techno
144. s Drive F14 Instrument Options Limiter F15 Instrument Options Speaker Emulation Simple MIDI Control Several important faders can be controlled in stand alone MIDI mode using the standard Con trol Change Volume CC 07 and Control Change Pan CC 10 With this the most important volume settings of the Fireface are controlable from nearly any MIDI equipped hardware device The faders are controlled via differrent MIDI channels Hardware Output equals third row volume only Analog Out 9 10 Phones MIDI channel 1 Analog Out 1 2 MIDI channel 16 Hardware Input equals first row volume and pan Input channel 1 MIDI channel 2 Input channel 2 MIDI channel 3 Input channel 3 MIDI channel 4 Input channel 4 MIDI channel 5 Input channel 5 MIDI channel 6 Input channel 6 MIDI channel 7 Input channel 7 MIDI channel 8 Input channel 8 MIDI channel 9 Input channel 9 MIDI channel 10 Input channel 10 Input channel 11 Input channel 12 Input channel 13 Input channel 14 MIDI channel 11 MIDI channel 12 MIDI channel 13 MIDI channel 14 MIDI channel 15 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 87 88 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME User s Guide amg INTELLIGENT AUDIO SOLUTIONS Fireface 800 gt Technical Reference User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 89 35 TECH INFO Not all information to and around our products fit in a manual Therefore RME offers a lot more and detailed information in the Tech Infos The very latest Tech In
145. s Guide Fireface 800 RME 51 52 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME User s Guide ETE INTELLIGENT AUDIO SOLUTIONS Fireface SOO gt Stand Alone Operation Connections and TotalMix User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 53 26 Stand alone Operation The Fireface 800 has an internal memory to permanently store all configuration data These are Settings dialog Sample rate clock mode Master Slave configuration of the channels and the digital I Os TotalMix The complete mixer state The Fireface loads those settings directly after power on A simple yet useful application is to store the correct clock mode avoiding wrong clocking and noise disturbances in a complex setup caused by wrong synchronization Usually the unit will be configured by the Windows driver so for the time between power on of the computer up to the loading of the Windows driver its state might be wrong This total configuration feature in stand alone operation without any connected computer turns the Fireface into lots of dedicated devices Here are some ideas 26 1 10 Channel AD DA Converter When loading TotalMix factory default 1 into the unit the Fireface becomes a high quality 10 channel AD DA converter which also provides a monitoring of all 8 DA channels via channels 9 10 Preset 2 also monitoring all 10 inputs A small modification allows for a monitoring of all I Os via the SPDIF I O 26 2 4 Channel Mic Preamp Use TotalMix to r
146. s even faster see chapter 22 2 23 4 Repairing Disk Permissions Repairing permission can solve problems with the installation process plus many others To do this launch Disk Utility located in Utilities Select your system drive in the drive volume list to the left The First Aid tab to the right now allows you to check and repair disk permissions 23 5 FireWire Compatibility RME s Fireface 800 should be fully compatible to any FireWire port found on Apple Mac com puters This is not true for older models like the G3 Pismo as their FireWire controller is not OHCI compatible Although we tested compatibility with lots of models total compatibility can not be guaranteed In case of trouble please contact RME 23 6 Various Information The driver has been tested under 10 3 only Older versions of OS X are not and will not be sup ported Via System Preferences Audio MIDI Setup the hardware can be configured for the system wide usage Programs that don t support card or channel selection will use the device selected as Standard Input and Standard Output Soundstudio Mplayer Amplitube etc In the lower part of the window the audio hardware s capabilities are shown and can be changed in some cases On the record side no changes are possible Programs that don t sup port channel selection will always use channels 1 2 the first stereo pair To access other inputs use the following workaround with TotalMix route the desired
147. simply press the Update but ton A progress bar will indicate when the flash process is finished Verify Ok If more than one Fireface is installed all units can be flashed by changing to the next tab and repeating the process After the update the unit needs to be reset This is done by powering down the Fireface for a few seconds A reboot of the computer is not necessary When the update fails status failure the unit s second BIOS will be used from the next cold boot on Secure BIOS Technology Therefore the unit stays fully functional The flash process should then be tried again on a different computer User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 41 22 Configuring the Fireface 22 1 Settings Dialog General Configuring the Fireface is done via its own settings dialog The panel Settings can be opened by clicking on the fire icon in the dock The mixer of the Fireface TotalMix can be opened by clicking on the mixer icon in the dock The Fireface s hardware offers a number of helpful well thought of practical functions and op tions which affect how the card operates it can be configured to suit many different require ments The following is available in the Settings dialog r Input selection eoo Fireface Settings e A MA Go ON DM ICH Rd e Level of analog I Os unit 869 Unit 4F27 DDS About Configuration of digital VOs e Synchroniz
148. t e Configuration of digital I Os Fireface 1 2 DDS About R Synchronization behaviour m Buffer Size Latency r Input Level m Options e State of input and output 128 Samples Lo Gain Check Input Current sample rate remet M Sync lign Latency ron C 09 v TMS 1 Front Y Dutput Level M Interleaved Any changes made in the Settings Rear AI Clock Mode 4 dBu v AutoS dialog are applied immediately 8 FrntRea e 45 apy confirmation e g by clicking OK TET ae Master ul m Limit Bandwidth Phantom Power M or exiting the dialog is not required Mic Pref Sync Ref However settings should not be cames Mes I Word Clock j M M C ADATTI changed during playback or record FERE Instrument Options C p if it can be avoided as this can C ADAT2 mice TM FE n cause unwanted noises Also Coaxial Speaker Emulation please note that even in Stop SPDIF Qut Word Clock Qut C y mode several programs keep the ADAT2 Single Speed Enors 47 recording and playback devices Professional Sunc Rack AutoSync Ref open which means that any new Emphasis Word Clock Sync settings might not be applied imme Non Audio ADAT1 In Sync 44 1 kHz diately ESPDIFEmq ADAT2Im Nolo 48 kHz SPDIFIn Lock System Loc h f TEE ELT REET Mode
149. t 1 plus submix of all inputs 0 dB to channels 9 10 Phones Preset 3 Description All channels routed 1 1 input and playback monitoring via Phones and outputs As Preset 2 but all inputs set to 0 dB 1 1 monitoring Preset 4 Description All channels routed 1 1 input and playback monitoring via Phones and outputs As Preset 3 but all inputs muted Preset 5 Description Playback monitoring to Phones As Preset 1 but all outputs except channels 9 10 Phones set to maximum attenuation Preset 6 Description All channels routed 1 1 monitoring of all playback channels via Phones and SPDIF As Preset 1 plus submix of all playbacks to SPDIF Preset 7 Description Monitoring of all playback channels via Phones and of all input and playback chan nels via SPDIF As Preset 2 plus submix of all inputs to SPDIF Preset 8 Description Panic As Preset 4 but playback channels muted too no output signal Preset Banks Instead of a single preset all eight presets can be stored and loaded at once This is done via Menu File Save All Presets as and Open Presets file suffix After the loading the presets can be activated by the preset buttons In case the presets have been renamed see chapter 31 11 these names will be stored and loaded too 70 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 31 9 The Monitor Panel The Monitor panel provides several options usually found on analog mixing desks offers quick access to monitorin
150. tal Outputs AES EBU SPDIF e 1 x RCA transformer balanced galvanically isolated according to AES3 1992 Output level Professional 2 6 Vpp Consumer 1 2 Vpp Format Professional according to AES3 1992 Amendment 4 Format Consumer SPDIF according to IEC 60958 Single Wire mode sample rate 28 kHz up to 200 kHz ADAT e 2x TOSLINK Standard 16 channels 24 bit up to 48 kHz Sample Split S MUX 2 x 8 channels 24 bit 48 kHz equalling 8 channels 24 bit 96 kHz e n Quad Speed mode output of Single Speed sync frame Word Clock BNC Max output voltage 5 Vpp Output voltage 75 Ohm termination 4 0 Output impedance 10 Ohm Frequency range 27 kHz 200 kHz 36 6 Transfer Modes Resolution Bits per Sample Windows only ASIO e 24 32 bit 4 byte stereo 8 byte This format is compatible with 16 bit and 20 bit Resolutions below 24 bit are handled by the audio application MME e 16 bit 2 byte e 16 bit 4 byte MSB 24 bit 4 byte MSB e 32 bit 4 byte stereo 4 bytes stereo 8 bytes stereo 8 bytes stereo 8 bytes MME interleaved supports 2 channel 4 channel 6 channel and 8 channel playback in the above formats The modes 4 6 8 channel playback are limited to the devices Fireface Analog 1 2 Up to 192 kHz playback on the analog outputs 1 8 Fireface ADAT1 1 2 Up to 48 kHz playback on channels 13 20 Fireface ADAT2 1 2 Up to 48 kHz playback on channels 21 28 36 7 General
151. tched on the input signal is routed in real time to the output whenever a recording is started punch in User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 29 12 7 Analog Recording For recordings via the analog inputs the corresponding record device has to be chosen Fire face Analog x x Apart from the three reference levels the Fireface has no means to change the input level This would make no sense for the digital inputs but also for the analog inputs one can do without it It doesn t matter if the Fireface is operated at a mixing desk or a mul tichannel mic preamp in either case the level can be controlled directly at the source to match the Fireface s sensitivity perfectly The input sensitivity of the frontside analog inputs can be adjusted using their Gain pots to match any external source perfectly see chapter 27 2 13 Operation under ASIO 2 0 13 1 General Start the ASIO software and select ASIO Fireface as the audio I O device The ASIO system control button opens the Fireface s Settings dialog see chapter 11 22 Configuration Fireface 800 supports ASIO Direct Monitoring ADM Please note that EE Einstellungen Hinzufiigen Entfernen Ableton Live es Re currently Nuendo L All MIDI Inputs ASIO Treiber ubase and Logic Cl default MIDI Ports ther do not support Eingangslatenz 1 134 ms le Ger te konfigurieren ASIO Fireface DirectMusic ADM com
152. them in TotalMix to other outputs Playback works but record doesn t Check that there is a valid signal at the input If so the current sample frequency is dis played in the Settings dialog e Check whether the Fireface 800 has been selected as recording device in the audio applica tion Check whether the sample frequency set in the audio application Recording properties similar matches the input signal Check that cables devices have not been connected in a closed loop If so set the systems s clock mode to Master Crackle during record or playback e Increase the number and size of buffers in the Settings dialog or in the application e Try different cables coaxial or optical to rule out any defects here Check that cables devices have not been connected in a closed loop If so set the system s clock mode to Master e Increase the buffer size of the hard disk cache e Activate Busmaster mode for the hard disks e n case of a recently done BIOS update of the motherboard Propably Load BIOS Defaults was loaded instead of Load Setup Defaults This sets the PCI Latency Timer to 0 default 32 e Check the Settings dialog for displayed Errors Low Latency ASIO operation under Windows 2000 XP on single CPU systems e To use ASIO at lowest latencies under Windows 2000 XP even when only having one CPU the system performance has to be optimized for background tasks Go to Control P
153. trument The instrument input of the Fireface 800 has been optimized especially for guitar and bass A soft clipping function limits the level from 10 dBFS on and offers tube like distortion at full overload The extra Drive stage adds even more distortion and also increased sustain The Speaker Emulator gently shapes the sound for an optimal recording experience LIM The distortion caused by the clipping function of the instrument input is audible Depending on use and application the new harmonics can be nice or disturbing The guitar s volume pot can blend from clean up to full distortion e Arhythm guitar s sound is enhanced by a popular tube like sound e All dynamic peaks of a slapped bass guitar are removed without audible artifacts e An accurately played clean acoustic guitar will sound crunchy e Steady tones sound distorted guitar keyboards bass Therefore the Limiter can be switched off in the Settings dialog nstrument Options Lim Tech nically this is done by applying a digital gain of 12 dB to the input signal This way the analog limiter does no longer reach its threshold of 10 dBFS But as this also changes the reference level of the rear input the Limiter can only be disabled with input channel Front selected The digital gain for the instrument input may sound unusual at first But the AD converters of the Fireface 800 are much better than the dynamic ratio of any instrument recording so when inten tionally
154. tu dio itself hasn t been started This causes a lot of confusion as the driver seems to behave completely buggy and the user does not recognize the simple reason for it for example simul taneous operation of ASIO and GSIF on the same channels If Gigastudio starts up properly loads gig files too but won t play at all even when using the virtual keyboard Go to Hardware Routing and select a valid MIDI input port Note that blank is not valid but none is User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 31 15 Using more than one Fireface 800 The current driver supports up to three Fireface 800 All units have to be in sync i e have to receive valid sync information either via word clock or by using AutoSync and feeding synchro nized signals e f one of the Firefaces is set to clock mode Master all others have to be set to clock mode AutoSync and have to be synced from the master for example by feeding word clock The clock modes of all units have to be set up correctly in the Fireface Settings dialog e If all units are fed with a synchronous clock i e all units show Sync in their Settings dialog all channels can be used at once This is especially easy to handle under ASIO as the ASIO driver presents all units as one When using all channels of more than one Fireface 800 a FireWire 800 interface is necessary FireWire 400 will usually not suffice for operating more than one Fireface When using only one Fireface 800 a FireWir
155. udio signals as well as errors and DC offset Includes Signal to Noise measurement in dB and dBA plus DC measurement Totalyser Spectral Analyser Level Meter and Vector Audio Scope in a single window Channel Status Display Detailled analyzis and display of SPDIF and AES EBU Channel Status data Global Record Long term recording of all channels at lowest system load Completely multi client Open as many measurement windows as you like on any chan nels and inputs or outputs To install DIGICheck go to the DIGICheck directory on the RME Driver CD and run setup exe Follow the instructions prompted on the screen DIGICheck is constantly updated The latest version is always available on our website www rme audio com section Downloads Add Ons User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 33 17 Hotline Troubleshooting 17 1 General The newest information can always be found on our website www rme audio com section FAQ Latest Additions The input signal cannot be monitored in real time ASIO Direct Monitoring has not been enabled and or monitoring has been disabled globally The 8 ADAT channels don t seem to work The optical output ADAT2 has been switched to SPDIF As can be seen in the block dia gram all channels and their assignments still exist but the optical transmitter has been dis connected from ADAT2 and is now fed from the SPDIF output channels 11 12 The ADAT2 playback devices are still usable by routing and mixing
156. uick configuration of routing and phase for Mid Side encoding and decoding See chapter 33 7 Level Meter Setup Configuration of the Level Meters Hotkey F2 See chapter 31 14 Preferences Opens a dialog box to configure several functions like Pan Law Dim Talkback Dim Listenback Dim See chapter 31 10 Flash current mixer state A click on this entry stores all current mixer settings into the flash memory of the Fireface See chapter 26 Stand alone Operation Enable MIDI Control Turns MIDI control on The channels which are currently under MIDI con trol are indicated by a colour change of the info field below the faders black turns to yellow Deactivate MIDI in Background Disables the MIDI control as soon as another application is in the focus or in case TotalMix has been minimized 74 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 31 14 Level Meter The Fireface 800 calculates all the display values Peak Over and RMS in hardware in order to be capable of using them independent of the software in use and to significantly reduce the CPU load Tip This feature the Hardware Level Meter is used by DIGICheck Windows only see chap ter 16 to display Peak RMS level meters of all channels nearly without any CPU load The level meters integrated in TotalMix considering their size cannot be compared with DIGICheck Nevertheless they already include many useful functions Peak and RMS is displayed for every channel Level Meter Setup
157. ur off sets start stop multi client is identical So when not using GSIF or ASIO MME should be your preferred choice A small note on ASIO and GSIF these drivers are completely independent from WDM Stream ing They work and perform the same as our previous just WDM drivers User s Guide Fireface 800 RME 27 12 5 Multi client Operation RME audio interfaces support multi client operation This means several programs can be used at the same time Also all formats like ASIO MME and GSIF can be used simultaneously The use of multi client operation requires to follow two simple rules Multi client operation requires identical sample rates Le itis not possible to use one software with 44 1 kHz and the other with 48 kHz e Different software can not use the same channels at the same time If for example Cubase uses channels 1 2 this playback pair can t be used in Gigasam pler Studio GSIF nor under MME WaveLab etc anymore This is no limitation at all because TotalMix allows any output routing and with this a playback of multiple software on the same hardware outputs Note that the inputs can be used at the same time as the driver sends the data to all applications simultaneously ASIO Multiclient RME audio interfaces support ASIO multi client operation It is possible to use more than one ASIO software at the same time Again the sample rate has to be identical and each software has to use its own playback channel
158. ut stage is built in a servo balanced design which handles unbalanced mono jacks and balanced stereo jacks correctly automatically adjusting the level reference When using unbalanced cables with TRS jacks be sure to connect the ring contact of the TRS jack to ground Otherwise noise may occur caused by the unconnected negative input of the balanced input One of the main issues when working with an AD converter is to maintain the full dynamic range within the best operating level Therefore the Fireface 800 internally uses hi quality elec tronic switches which allow for a perfect adaptation of all rear inputs to the three most often used studio levels The standardized studio levels do not result in a often desired full scale level but take some additional digital headroom into consideration The amount of headroom is different in different standards and again differently implemented by different manufacturers Because of this we decided to define the levels of the Fireface in the most compatible way Reference 0 dBFS Headroom Lo Gain 419 dBu 15 dB 4 dBu 13 dBu 9 dB 10 dBV 2 dBV 12 dB With 4 dBu selected the according headroom meets the latest EBU recommendations for Broadcast usage At 10 dBV a headroom of 12 dB is common practice each mixing desk op erating at 10 dBV is able to send and receive much higher levels Lo Gain is best suited for professional users who prefer to work balanced and at highest levels Lo
159. y modified routing is visible Note the difference between the left side representing the inputs and software playback chan nels and the upper side representing the hardware outputs Moving a fader in row 1 or 2 in TotalMix view only the specific levels max 2 of this routing will change within the Matrix But moving a fader in row 3 will make all vertically activated levels move at once for example 9 10 Phones output 76 User s Guide Fireface 800 RME A gain field marked orange indicates activated mute status Mute can only be changed in the mixer view A blue field indicates phase inversion This state is displayed in the Matrix only and can only be changed within the Matrix view Hold down the Shift key while clicking on an already activated field Mute overwrites the phase display blue becomes orange If mute is deactivated the phase inversion is indicated again 32 4 Advantages of the Matrix The Matrix not always replaces the mixer view but it significantly enhances the routing capabili ties and more important is a brilliant way to get a fast overview of all active routings It shows you in a glance what s going on And since the Matrix operates monaural it is very easy to set up specific routings with specific gains Example 1 You want TotalMix to route all software outputs to all corresponding hardware out puts and have a submix of all inputs and software outputs on the Phones output equals factory preset 2

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