1 (edited by ramses 2017-09-17 11:48:18)

Topic: UFX+ seems to work on USB3.1 Controller with ASMedia ASM2142 chipset

Hi,

ASMedia is according to the UFX+ handbook (p. 113) not compatible for UFX+.
At least the USB3 controllers/chipsets I assume, as with USB 3.1 this seems to be different.

I tested now this card since a while using music player and cubase 9:
https://www.startech.com/Cards-Adapters … XUSB311AC2 (Type-A and C plug)

I did also load tests with ASIO Buffer size of 32 and I can see no issue. No CRC errors in Driver settings dialogue.

What are your experiences using RME devices on USB3.1 ports especially ASMEDIA ?
Please tell RME product, driver and the USB3.1 chipset, many thanks.

Would be interesting whether USB3.1 controller could be a "plan b" shall the normal USB2 or USB3 controller not work because of "side effects". What I could not try is when you connect a 2nd device to this USB3.1 controller, i.e. 2nd UFX+ or an external disk.

I tested the card on Windows 7 SP1 Ultimate.
ASMedia driver version: 1.16.42.1
MADIface driver version: : 0.9612

There is also another card with same chipset available which has 2 Type-A plugs, but which I didnt test:
https://www.startech.com/Cards-Adapters … EXUSB312A2 (2x Type-A, not yet tested)

Related articles (DE only):
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/index.php … Windows-7/
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/inde … mponenten/

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub13

Re: UFX+ seems to work on USB3.1 Controller with ASMedia ASM2142 chipset

I never even considered trying this given that the thunderbolt connection was so good.  If I have the cabling to use 3.1, I'll give it a try also.  I probably do because until I actually had all of the thunderbolt connection ports in my hand, I was trying to be prepared and wound up with about 4 different ends

Have you sampled latency yet?  If so, will you be inserting these numbers into your blog?

Babyface Pro, UFX+ via Thunderbolt, Win 10, Cubase 9.5 Pro, Asus Z270 i7700k Guitarist-1961

3 (edited by ramses 2017-09-17 19:59:41)

Re: UFX+ seems to work on USB3.1 Controller with ASMedia ASM2142 chipset

There is no change in RTT. USB 3.1 falls back to USB 3.0 speed.

Its only remarkable in that regards: ASMedia USB3.0 chipsets were really bad.
Therefore the statement in the UFX+ handbook that they are not supported.
This seems to be different now with USB 3.1 chipsets from ASMedia, at least the ASM2142.

So lets construct a case ... if somebody has
- issues with his USB3 ports (audio loss)
- no thunderbolt
- maybe only one x4 PCIe socket (with 4 PCIe lanes)

Instead of investing into a new USB3 controller he could directly invest into an USB 3.1 controller.
During times, when you do not record you could connect i.e. a fast external SSD via USB3.1 to make
very quick backups. This article here gives information about such products:
https://www.computerbase.de/2017-09/g-d … -r-series/

G-Technology (WD) introduced a new "robust external SSD series" (IP 67 certified against dust and water).
Due to USB 3.1 Gen2 data rates of 560 MB/sec are possible via USB-C connector. Of course it can be any other SSD, doesnt have to be an IP 67 certified drive.
http://www.g-technology.com/products/g- … d-r-series

Thats IMHO a real alternative to eSATA.

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub13

4

Re: UFX+ seems to work on USB3.1 Controller with ASMedia ASM2142 chipset

The perfomance gain from 3.0 to 3.1 is - in real-world sitations and with existing hardware - near zero. Therefore I would still recommend the Sonnet 4 port card instead, unless you have a specific need for a USB-C port.

Still this is a nice find, thanks for testing and sharing.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

5 (edited by ramses 2017-09-18 09:35:41)

Re: UFX+ seems to work on USB3.1 Controller with ASMedia ASM2142 chipset

MC wrote:

The perfomance gain from 3.0 to 3.1 is - in real-world sitations and with existing hardware - near zero. Therefore I would still recommend the Sonnet 4 port card instead, unless you have a specific need for a USB-C port.

Still this is a nice find, thanks for testing and sharing.

You're welcome Matthias wink

Maybe one remark to your statement about the performance gain and that USB 3.1 gives you no real benefits.
I think this you mean this for recording interfaces only ?!

In my own measurings I already noticed, that the RTT time differencies become smaller and smaller.
An upgrade to even higher BW is surely only adviced, if you need to transfer even more channels than the UFX+ can handle.
But as these are already a lot of channels, this will surely take some time ;-)

But what I wanted to point out is ....

In the last month we read news about all these encryption trojans. So the demand for an external backup becomes higher and higher.

IMHO these USB3.1 Gen2 interfaces are really a present from industry as they offer high speed data transfer to a real affordable. USB3.1 Gen2 offers (theoretically) the same speed like 10 Gigabit network interfaces to a fraction of the price. You pay between €32-40 for an USB3.1 card.

In contrast to that every other higher than 1 Gbps speed solution (LAN), be it based on Link aggregation (2x Gigabit) or 10 Gigabit Ethernet, Thunderbolt, NAS, etc ... has a much higher price tag and often additional requirements that you need to meet (i.e. LACP, etc...). Channel bundeling might even not be available for one PC because of 1Gbe Interface only or lack of LACP in the driver.

StarTech offer these USB3.1 cards and has also i.e a 1 drive external case for USB3.1/eSata. Together around €100.
With this you can build a very nice high speed external backup solution (plus the costs of the disk of course).

I backup with an internal disk so that backup can run automated. And on top I have this external drive, where its very handy that there is an on/off switch in the back of the drive enclosure. So that its fully isolated and your data can not be encrypted by a trojan.

So .. if you need to upgrade your PC, because your usual USB2 or USB3 ports are causing a problem, then I would take such a high speed USB 3.1 Gen2 interface for more flexibility (if it is supported by the recording interface).

Especially because the PCIe socket resources on your mainboard might be "limited".
You need to look for x4-PCIe sockets and this can be a challenge on consumer mainboards:
Some do not have these. Some have them shared with other components on the board like M.2.
Or you need to take a x8 or x16 socket. If taking a x16 socket you need to make sure, that your GPU doesnt run of all sudden than with half bandwidth (x8 instead of x16).

So if such an upgrade is due, then better only one time for such an high speed interface than maybe for a 4xFresco Chip card which also needs a PCIe socket with 4 lines. Of course if you have multiple recording interfaces, like ie 2 UFX+ and ADI-2 Pro then having such a 4xUSB3 cards with 4 Fresco Chips on it might be required.

So it would be nice to find out whether these newer ASMedia chips are also compatible to other RME USB3 or USB2
recording interfaces to find out, whether its feasible to also have a high speed interface for quicker backup and restore.

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub13