1 (edited by AudioFreq 2017-09-28 09:03:35)

Topic: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

Today was supposed to be one of the most exiting days for making music. I just received a new FireFace UFX Plus.

I followed these steps:

1) Get the Latest Driver from RME Download page

2) Before plugging the unit to USB, install the driver first (Per Manual: This is not mandatory but I am a traditionalist)

Here is what happened:

After I successfully installed the driver, I am instructed to plug in the Unit. As soon as I plug in the Unit, Windows performs and installation of the device and a successful message is displayed. I am instructed to restart the computer.

It goes down hill form here:

When I attempt to restart the computer, it just hangs, never restarts, 5,10,20,30 minutes, it just stays at the restart splash screen.

Sometimes, the screen goes dark and the monitors go to sleep, I have to hard boot windows. If I turn off the FireFace, the computer shuts down/restart properly.

In the task bar I can see an FX Icon for Total mix but nothing opens if I click on it. I also see the MadiFace Series Setting Icon but the settings never opens no matter how many times I reboot, uninstall and re stall.

I am completely flabbergasted, given this is RME, the most power system period.

I have an old MAudio 1814 and it works flawlessly, no issues such as what is described.

My specs:

Windows 7 64bit Ultimate
ASUS Sabertooth with Intel X79 Chipset.
Processor    Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-3820 CPU @ 3.60GHz, 3601 Mhz, 4 Core(s), 8 Logical Processor(s)
Installed Physical Memory (RAM) 64.0 GB
NVIDIA GForce GTX 6060TI

UPDATE:

I tested the unit on several other USB 3 ports on the computer, there are about 6 of them and the problem persists.
I also removed all connected devices, leaving only the FireFace connected but it did not work.

Finally, I tried it on a USB 2 port and it worked flawlessly. But I did not buy this unit to use on USB 2, that defeats the purpose.

Why is this not working on the USB 3 port?

I have the most recent USB 3.0 driver installed from ASUS. And also, these ports works without issues for other devices.

Here is the USB information from ASUS:

ASMedia® USB 3.0 controller :
6 x USB 3.1 Gen 1 port(s) (4 at back panel, blue, 2 at mid-board)
Intel® X79 chipset :
14 x USB 2.0 port(s) (6 at back panel, black, 8 at mid-board)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

Did you try to change USB cable ?
Disconnect all other USB devices, leave connected only mouse and keyboard.
Try every USB3 port first, whether it works on a different USB3 port.
Try now USB2 port, whether it works at least under USB2.
Do you have another PC to connect the UFX+ to it ?

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

ramses wrote:

Did you try to change USB cable ?
Disconnect all other USB devices, leave connected only mouse and keyboard.
Try every USB3 port first, whether it works on a different USB3 port.
Try now USB2 port, whether it works at least under USB2.
Do you have another PC to connect the UFX+ to it ?

Please see my update above.
I do not have another PC for this.

Thanks

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

UFX+ uses much of the resources of an USB3 controller because of the amount of channels. It should work with all the chipsets documented in the handbook. But there is a combination of ocurrences why it sometimes does not work.

I have 2 UFX+ and one ADI-2 Pro connected to my supermicro server mainboard. 2 UFX+ alone or UFX+ and ADI-2 Pro work perfectly down to ASIO buffer sizes of 32 and under load.

But 2 UFX+ and one ADI-2 Pro conneted with all the other USB stuff that I have connected to my system (1 additional USB3 hub, USB Bluetooth adapter and other stuff) I experienced, that certain USB devicves like i.e. Bluetooth adapter influence stability of other components, although you see at the 1st glimpse no relationship.

What also can influence things is, that the USB3 and USB2 ports of your system are internally not really 100% separated from each other as at the end everything meets in one big controller which is the chipset (I hope I explained it technically not too bad).

You can try settings in the BIOS, you can try to remove/reduce the impact of other devices by inplugging them, etc. But if this all does not work and you can not connect ONE UFX+, then I assume there is something bugged in your BIOS or mainboard design or what else. This can also happen.

Long story short. If you think you did already everything in terms of testing, then do the same like I.
Get a quality USB3 PCIe board and "decouple" USB load.

I choosed this board here, because RME wrote in the handbook that the FL1100 USB3 controller is supported.
This card has the advantage to have 4 (!) USB3 controller on board, so behind each of the ports you have the full isolated power of an USB3 controller. So it will serve best also your future connection demand.
But it will require a x4 PCIe socket, you need to look if you have something like this, can also be a x8 or x16 socket, doest matter. You only should look that this socket is internally not shared with your GPU or other system components that you use.
https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/son … 79334.html
Other alternative is to use the smaller version of it with only one USB3 controller shared by the 4 ports:
https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/son … 48037.html

Supported by Win10, for Win7 you need driver, these run perfect for my Win7 Ultimate.

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

The ASMedia chipset is known to be problematic (see manual). I would suggest to purchase a PCIe card with e.g. the Fresco chipset.


Regards
Daniel Fuchs
RME

Regards
Daniel Fuchs
RME

6 (edited by ramses 2017-09-28 13:30:40)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

The more expensive Pro I have in use and it works phantastic with UFX+ and ADI-2 Pro connected to it.
See here my recording workstation: http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/inde … mponenten/

An alternative solution, which is even cheaper, could be for you, to install this USB3.1 card:
https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/1134638062 €32
https://www.startech.com/de/Karten-Adap … EXUSB312A2

I bought this for another purpose but also tested it with my UFX+. Worked for me without any issues even with a very large Cubase project and lowest ASIO buffer size.

This card came just out introducing one of the newer ASMEDIA chips, the ASM2142.
Asmedia has problems in the area of USB3.0, but with USB 3.1 Gen. 2 they seem to produce something that really works.

It depends what you require .. whether you need to connect i.e. the UFX+ only to this card and from time to time an external Harddisk or SSD in a USB 3.1 gen2 Case for casual backup to get up to highest USB 3.1 Gen2 speeds.
A nice case for 3.5" disks is i.e this one which supports USB3.1 Gen AND eSATA and has an on/off switch at the back and even comes with USB3.1 cable and a lot of different power cable plugs:
https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/sta … 29902.html

Or whether you need a reliable 4 x USB3 card with up to 4 dedicated USB3 controller which allow each of the port to run at full USB3 speed...

According to your mainboards handbook you can install x4 cards in these 2 PCIe sockets on your system.
I would prefer not to take the one where you could deploy a 2nd GPU as the board supports 2 GPUs with x16 lanes.

Its an old board, you really need to look whats more worth .. USB3.1 or 4x USB3 power ....
And if you pay around €128 for the better Sonnet card, this is half of the price of a reasonable new mainboard ...
But then you need also new CPU memory...
According to that maybe the €32 for USB3.1 (cheapest solution) ?! Its your decision wink

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ix4rz2rxboih63q/SABERTOOTH_X79_V3.jpg?dl=1

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

ramses wrote:

The more expensive Pro I have in use and it works phantastic with UFX+ and ADI-2 Pro connected to it.
See here my recording workstation: http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/inde … mponenten/

An alternative solution, which is even cheaper, could be for you, to install this USB3.1 card:
https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/1134638062 €32
https://www.startech.com/de/Karten-Adap … EXUSB312A2

I bought this for another purpose but also tested it with my UFX+. Worked for me without any issues even with a very large Cubase project and lowest ASIO buffer size.

This card came just out introducing one of the newer ASMEDIA chips, the ASM2142.
Asmedia has problems in the area of USB3.0, but with USB 3.1 Gen. 2 they seem to produce something that really works.

It depends what you require .. whether you need to connect i.e. the UFX+ only to this card and from time to time an external Harddisk or SSD in a USB 3.1 gen2 Case for casual backup to get up to highest USB 3.1 Gen2 speeds.
A nice case for 3.5" disks is i.e this one which supports USB3.1 Gen AND eSATA and has an on/off switch at the back and even comes with USB3.1 cable and a lot of different power cable plugs:
https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/sta … 29902.html

Or whether you need a reliable 4 x USB3 card with up to 4 dedicated USB3 controller which allow each of the port to run at full USB3 speed...

According to your mainboards handbook you can install x4 cards in these 2 PCIe sockets on your system.
I would prefer not to take the one where you could deploy a 2nd GPU as the board supports 2 GPUs with x16 lanes.

Its an old board, you really need to look whats more worth .. USB3.1 or 4x USB3 power ....
And if you pay around €128 for the better Sonnet card, this is half of the price of a reasonable new mainboard ...
But then you need also new CPU memory...
According to that maybe the €32 for USB3.1 (cheapest solution) ?! Its your decision wink

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ix4rz2rxboih63q/SABERTOOTH_X79_V3.jpg?dl=1


Thank you so much for the tremendous help and detail in your post.
Based on your recommendation, I am going to purchase a USB 3 PCI Card today and use your post as guidance.

I will report tonight the results of the change with the new card.

Thanks again, you are incredible.

AF

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

UPDATE:

After reading the response and recommendation from Ramses (A forum participant and RME User).
I purchased this USB 3.1 PCI Card (Inateck KT2001 red) made by Inateck:
https://www.inateck.com/pci-express-car … 1-red.html.

Per the diagrams above, I installed it in the last PCI Slot, plug in the RME Fireface and it worked.

A few behavior have stopped since I added the new card:

1) I am no longer having trouble restarting or shutting down the computer.

2) I can also put the computer to sleep and awake without issues. Previously if I attempt to put the computer to sleep
    it will never wake up and I have to hard shut down.

3) I also noticed that I have less to no pops-and clicks due to small Buffer size when using USB 2.0


However, there is still little pops and clicks when at buffer 64.
I was under the impression that RME Interfaces were self reliant, meaning they posed no drain on the system.
Why is there Pops and clicks?

This computer has 64GB RAM and all SSD Samsung PRO Drives, Audio on separate drive.

Just to be clear, I understand latency and pops and clicks are not exclusive to any interface but I was under the impression this did not happen with an RME device.

Thanks everyone.

9 (edited by ramses 2017-09-30 14:27:49)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

You didn't buy the card which I tested and thus could recommend.
Even worse, it has not the same tested (in this case older) chipset.

To come to speed and results I recommend you to buy both feasible cards and to take what works best,
send back then what doesnt work.

https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/son … 79334.html

https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/1134638062
https://www.startech.com/de/Karten-Adap … EXUSB312A2

> Just to be clear, I understand latency and pops and clicks are not exclusive to any interface
> but I was under the impression this did not happen with an RME device.

1st fix the issue with wrong card. Then lets see.

RME driver give you reliability and performance. But still a badly designed mainboard, wrong BIOS settings, bad Windows settings, bad drivers, bad combination of hardware, Wireless, Bluetooth, USB adapters, badly maintained windows installation can result in problems or that you need higher ASIO buffers at higher load.

For example: Windows is not a real-time OS. A badly written driver can keep the CPU core busy for too long. If an audio process or driver is waiting for the same core, then it can lead to audio interruption. The problem is that drivers can not be interrupted by a job scheduler of Windows Operating System. They run as long as its coded in the driver. If the develper does not stick to certain standards, then this can lead to issues if it blocks a CPU core for too long.

It becomes worse if you missed i.e. additionally to disable energy saving in the BIOS and in Windows, to put a few examples. Because this causes extra latency inside of your system where the CPU can react only laggy to process the jobs or the system even does not run with all CPU cores at full clock speed.

Its also still adviced to configure Windows to raise the priority for background services and to set energy settings to high performance. Its also an advantage to disable CPU core parking on desktop systems and there are a few more tricks to get a system better parametrized to deliver performance.

But as I said, step by step, 1st get the proper HW, then lets see further.

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

Okay my friend:
I have purchased this card with a new 9ft USB3.0 Cable.

Dual-Port-USB 3.1-Karte - 10 Gbit/s pro Port - 2 x USB-A - PCIe
https://www.startech.com/de/Karten-Adap … EXUSB312A2

It will be here October 6, that's next Friday and I will install it and  report back here.

The reason I did not initially buy this card was because of the mixed reviews.

In the main-time, can you recommend other tips I can employ to get the best performance?

Thank you.

11 (edited by ramses 2017-09-30 16:47:43)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

You should also order the other card in parallel.
We can not be 100% sure that the USB3.1 card will work in your system.
Otherwise troubleshooting lasts too long at least for my taste.
https://www.heise.de/preisvergleich/son … 79334.html

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

12 (edited by ramses 2017-09-30 16:45:42)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

Before we start could you pls describe in what situation the audio loss happens ?!
What DAW do you use ?
Please describe your project more, how many tracks, how many inserts, how many virtual instruments and which ?
What Samplerate are you using ?
What ASIO buffer sizes did you try ?
What is the CPU load of your system when you playing back your project ? average, recurring peaks, absolute peaks in %
What is the ASIO load and ASIO peak load when you playback your project ? On Cubase you can see this.

If you use LatencyMon on a not loaded system.
Just bootet and logged in. Do not start any application.
Wait 5 min until all startup and background programs settled ...
Then start LatencyMon v4.02 (you are on Win7 ?!)
Let it run for 10 minutes.
While doing this observe the values of "kernel latency timer".
What are the absolute minimums ? On my system around 1,75 microseconds ...
What are the usual avarage values ? On my system around 4-10 microseconds ...
What are recurring peaks ? On my system around 30 microseconds ...
What are the absolute peaks ? On my system around 80 microseconds ...
The absolute peaks are in the line below.
But the very interesting absolute minimum and averare values and recurring peaks are not especially displayed,
you need to take a paper and pencil and then make some notes about the usual values seen ....

Then post a screenshot of LatencyMon (using i.e. Greenshot) in this forum thread.

Does LatencyMon eventually tell you, that the system is not able to properly process audio ?

The old version you can download here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/imcbu6lcac5vg … 2.exe?dl=1
https://www.dropbox.com/s/9h6uoqgcaqqvd … e.md5?dl=1

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

13 (edited by ramses 2017-09-30 16:54:16)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

AudioFreq wrote:

The reason I did not initially buy this card was because of the mixed reviews.

But it makes absolutely no sense to take another card with a completely different chipset.
Most compatibility problems are caused by chipsets. But also by bad design / quality of PCI/PCIe cards in general.

So if the RME handbook says, UFX+ is not compatible to ASMEDIA USB chips
and if I found out now on my system (by accident/occasion) that a certain card
with a certain USB3.1 chipset works ...

Then it should be clear, that you need to take exactly this card and nothing else.

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

ramses wrote:
AudioFreq wrote:

The reason I did not initially buy this card was because of the mixed reviews.

But it makes absolutely no sense to take another card with a completely different chipset.
Most compatibility problems are caused by chipsets. But also by bad design / quality of PCI/PCIe cards in general.

So if the RME handbook says, UFX+ is not compatible to ASMEDIA USB chips
and if I found out now on my system (by accident/occasion) that a certain card
with a certain USB3.1 chipset works ...

Then it should be clear, that you need to take exactly this card and nothing else.

Okay so you are saying that the StarTech card does not use the Asmedia chipset?

15 (edited by AudioFreq 2017-09-30 17:22:24)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

ramses wrote:

Before we start could you pls describe in what situation the audio loss happens ?!
Little Pops and clicks, sometimes the audio will drop but start when I hit play.

What DAW do you use ? Sonar Platnum

Please describe your project more, how many tracks, how many inserts, how many virtual instruments and which ?

Average Track Count: 50 - 100
No Virtual Instruments: (Never used them)
However, I used lots of effects, Reverb Lexicon Patheon, EQ.

What Samplerate are you using ? 96K

What ASIO buffer sizes did you try ?  64

What is the CPU load of your system when you playing back your project ? average, recurring peaks, absolute peaks in %:
About 5% - 10% but nothing over 50%.

What is the ASIO load and ASIO peak load when you playback your project ? On Cubase you can see this.

If you use LatencyMon on a not loaded system.
Just bootet and logged in. Do not start any application.
Wait 5 min until all startup and background programs settled ...

Then start LatencyMon v4.02 (you are on Win7 ?!) Yes Windows 7:

Let it run for 10 minutes.
While doing this observe the values of "kernel latency timer".
What are the absolute minimums ? On my system around 1,75 microseconds ...
What are the usual avarage values ? On my system around 4-10 microseconds ...
What are recurring peaks ? On my system around 30 microseconds ...
What are the absolute peaks ? On my system around 80 microseconds ...
The absolute peaks are in the line below.
But the very interesting absolute minimum and averare values and recurring peaks are not especially displayed,
you need to take a paper and pencil and then make some notes about the usual values seen ....

Then post a screenshot of LatencyMon (using i.e. Greenshot) in this forum thread.

Does LatencyMon eventually tell you, that the system is not able to properly process audio ?

The old version you can download here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/imcbu6lcac5vg … 2.exe?dl=1
https://www.dropbox.com/s/9h6uoqgcaqqvd … e.md5?dl=1


I have provided some answers but will respond in detail later on after I have perform the process you recommend and observed more detail.

My computer is used for music only, meaning there are no other software installed.

Thanks again.

16 (edited by ramses 2017-09-30 18:24:59)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

AudioFreq wrote:
ramses wrote:
AudioFreq wrote:

The reason I did not initially buy this card was because of the mixed reviews.

But it makes absolutely no sense to take another card with a completely different chipset.
Most compatibility problems are caused by chipsets. But also by bad design / quality of PCI/PCIe cards in general.

So if the RME handbook says, UFX+ is not compatible to ASMEDIA USB chips
and if I found out now on my system (by accident/occasion) that a certain card
with a certain USB3.1 chipset works ...

Then it should be clear, that you need to take exactly this card and nothing else.

Okay so you are saying that the StarTech card does not use the Asmedia chipset?

I tell you the whole story now:

ASMedia USB 3.0 controller have issues, they do no not work good in conjunction with Audio Interfaces.
Also RME had issues with them.
Therefore its documented in the handbook in chapter 39.3 that ASMedia USB3 controller are not supported.
Of course RME only tried only USB3 Asmedia Chipsets for the UFX+ because the UFX+ has an USB3, not USB3.1, interface.
So in terms of ASMedia USB3 controller simply forget them for audio.
But ASMedia USB3.1 might be a different story and an USB3.1 controller can also work in USB3 mode.
Whether its fully compatible is questionable and needs to be tested.

Now comes the interesting part. I bought around 2 weeks ago an USB3.1 controller from Startech for my system for connecting an USB3.1 backup disk. As I am an adventurous guy I tried the UFX+ on this particular USB3.1 controller and you know it already it worked for me. I offered it to you only as an option shall you prefer a cheaper solution and maybe even want to invest into USB3.1 update for your board.

Now the point is ..
1- there are meanwhile at minimum 4 different USB3.1 controllers out from ASMedia if not more
2- different USB controllers simply are different
3- if one ASMedia 3.1 controller worked for me it does not mean that this will be the case for all other
4- for you its the same situation and even the USB3.1 card that worked for me might have problems in your PC.

But .. your issue is a very special one .. you bought now an USB3.1 card with ASMedia controller, where at the moment nobody has experience with. You are the 1st and it doesnt work for you.

I personally wouldnt waste time, give the wrong USB3.1 card back, order the Startech and also the Sonnet card.
Otherwise all will last much too long.

I think that key for success is in your case
a) to get a proper PCIe card
b) to make measurements (LatencyMon) and adjustments to your system (BIOS / Windows)

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

You wrote you record with 96 kHz.
Higher sample rates put higher stress to your system, as it needs to process more data.
And an ASIO buffersize of 64 is the lowest setting for 96 Khz.
It could be the case that you have by this the following issues
- wrong USB3 chipset
- more stress on the system in general terms by using higher sample rates
- up to 100 channels might be challenging already
- the UFX+ has a lot of channels, so a lot of channels run on 96 kHz

It can lead to issues if your system is not optimized for audio.

What are the results of your LatencyMon measuring, see comments in my post #12.

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

ramses wrote:

You wrote you record with 96 kHz.
Higher sample rates put higher stress to your system, as it needs to process more data.
And an ASIO buffersize of 64 is the lowest setting for 96 Khz.
It could be the case that you have by this the following issues
- wrong USB3 chipset
- more stress on the system in general terms by using higher sample rates
- up to 100 channels might be challenging already
- the UFX+ has a lot of channels, so a lot of channels run on 96 kHz

It can lead to issues if your system is not optimized for audio.

What are the results of your LatencyMon measuring, see comments in my post #12.

I have not yet ran LatencyMon but will this evening.
Just to clarify, I am only using about 6 Analog Inputs on the FireFace plus the AES input, so total 7 physical Inputs.

I was referring to the amount of Audio Tracks I record per song.

About 50 - 100 tracks.

The Pops and Clicks I mentions are not very apparent but they are sometimes audible at playback.
This usually happen when I am at: 96k sample Rate and 64 Buffer size.

I will post the LatencyMon results this evening.

Thank you so much and I hope our Thread benefit other users.

Regardless, I am very pleased with RME and I hope to get another FireFace in the future.

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

ramses wrote:
AudioFreq wrote:
ramses wrote:

But it makes absolutely no sense to take another card with a completely different chipset.
Most compatibility problems are caused by chipsets. But also by bad design / quality of PCI/PCIe cards in general.

So if the RME handbook says, UFX+ is not compatible to ASMEDIA USB chips
and if I found out now on my system (by accident/occasion) that a certain card
with a certain USB3.1 chipset works ...

Then it should be clear, that you need to take exactly this card and nothing else.

Okay so you are saying that the StarTech card does not use the Asmedia chipset?

I tell you the whole story now:

ASMedia USB 3.0 controller have issues, they do no not work good in conjunction with Audio Interfaces.
Also RME had issues with them.
Therefore its documented in the handbook in chapter 39.3 that ASMedia USB3 controller are not supported.
Of course RME only tried only USB3 Asmedia Chipsets for the UFX+ because the UFX+ has an USB3, not USB3.1, interface.
So in terms of ASMedia USB3 controller simply forget them for audio.
But ASMedia USB3.1 might be a different story and an USB3.1 controller can also work in USB3 mode.
Whether its fully compatible is questionable and needs to be tested.

Now comes the interesting part. I bought around 2 weeks ago an USB3.1 controller from Startech for my system for connecting an USB3.1 backup disk. As I am an adventurous guy I tried the UFX+ on this particular USB3.1 controller and you know it already it worked for me. I offered it to you only as an option shall you prefer a cheaper solution and maybe even want to invest into USB3.1 update for your board.

Now the point is ..
1- there are meanwhile at minimum 4 different USB3.1 controllers out from ASMedia if not more
2- different USB controllers simply are different
3- if one ASMedia 3.1 controller worked for me it does not mean that this will be the case for all other
4- for you its the same situation and even the USB3.1 card that worked for me might have problems in your PC.

But .. your issue is a very special one .. you bought now an USB3.1 card with ASMedia controller, where at the moment nobody has experience with. You are the 1st and it doesnt work for you.

I personally wouldnt waste time, give the wrong USB3.1 card back, order the Startech and also the Sonnet card.
Otherwise all will last much too long.

I think that key for success is in your case
a) to get a proper PCIe card
b) to make measurements (LatencyMon) and adjustments to your system (BIOS / Windows)

Okay my friend:
I have now purchased both cards: StartTech and Allegro Pro:

http://www.sonnettech.com/product/alleg … 3pcie.html
This Card does not have Asmedia Chipset.

I will test Both Cards and see how they perform.

I am existed.

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

AudioFreq wrote:
ramses wrote:
AudioFreq wrote:

Okay so you are saying that the StarTech card does not use the Asmedia chipset?

I tell you the whole story now:

ASMedia USB 3.0 controller have issues, they do no not work good in conjunction with Audio Interfaces.
Also RME had issues with them.
Therefore its documented in the handbook in chapter 39.3 that ASMedia USB3 controller are not supported.
Of course RME only tried only USB3 Asmedia Chipsets for the UFX+ because the UFX+ has an USB3, not USB3.1, interface.
So in terms of ASMedia USB3 controller simply forget them for audio.
But ASMedia USB3.1 might be a different story and an USB3.1 controller can also work in USB3 mode.
Whether its fully compatible is questionable and needs to be tested.

Now comes the interesting part. I bought around 2 weeks ago an USB3.1 controller from Startech for my system for connecting an USB3.1 backup disk. As I am an adventurous guy I tried the UFX+ on this particular USB3.1 controller and you know it already it worked for me. I offered it to you only as an option shall you prefer a cheaper solution and maybe even want to invest into USB3.1 update for your board.

Now the point is ..
1- there are meanwhile at minimum 4 different USB3.1 controllers out from ASMedia if not more
2- different USB controllers simply are different
3- if one ASMedia 3.1 controller worked for me it does not mean that this will be the case for all other
4- for you its the same situation and even the USB3.1 card that worked for me might have problems in your PC.

But .. your issue is a very special one .. you bought now an USB3.1 card with ASMedia controller, where at the moment nobody has experience with. You are the 1st and it doesnt work for you.

I personally wouldnt waste time, give the wrong USB3.1 card back, order the Startech and also the Sonnet card.
Otherwise all will last much too long.

I think that key for success is in your case
a) to get a proper PCIe card
b) to make measurements (LatencyMon) and adjustments to your system (BIOS / Windows)

Okay my friend:
I have now purchased both cards: StartTech and Allegro Pro:

http://www.sonnettech.com/product/alleg … 3pcie.html
This Card does not have Asmedia Chipset.

I will test Both Cards and see how they perform.

I am existed.

Yes the Sonnet card has the FL1100 chipset, which is according to RME compliant.

That was the plan, either the cheap ASMedia USB 3.1 which I tested or
the Sonnet with FL1100 USB3, which is an USB chipset which has been validated by RME.

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

21 (edited by ramses 2017-09-30 21:03:35)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

AudioFreq wrote:
ramses wrote:

You wrote you record with 96 kHz.
Higher sample rates put higher stress to your system, as it needs to process more data.
And an ASIO buffersize of 64 is the lowest setting for 96 Khz.
It could be the case that you have by this the following issues
- wrong USB3 chipset
- more stress on the system in general terms by using higher sample rates
- up to 100 channels might be challenging already
- the UFX+ has a lot of channels, so a lot of channels run on 96 kHz

It can lead to issues if your system is not optimized for audio.

What are the results of your LatencyMon measuring, see comments in my post #12.

I have not yet ran LatencyMon but will this evening.
Just to clarify, I am only using about 6 Analog Inputs on the FireFace plus the AES input, so total 7 physical Inputs.

I was referring to the amount of Audio Tracks I record per song.

About 50 - 100 tracks.

The Pops and Clicks I mentions are not very apparent but they are sometimes audible at playback.
This usually happen when I am at: 96k sample Rate and 64 Buffer size.

I will post the LatencyMon results this evening.

Thank you so much and I hope our Thread benefit other users.

Regardless, I am very pleased with RME and I hope to get another FireFace in the future.

Regardless how many channels you actually use in your project, the UFX+ will always run all of the channels over the USB3 bus. The DAW only needs to process the channels that are assigned to the project. But 96 kHz will cause roughly double the processing load compared to 44.1 as more data needs to be processed in the same time interval.

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

UPDATE:

Good Afternoon Friends:

I received the new PCI Card from Sonnet Tech.
http://www.sonnettech.com/product/alleg … pcie.html.

I installed the card and there are no longer Pops and Clicks. However, I am running only about 10 Audio Tracks but with lots of Effects and Processing plug-ins.

I plan to run heavy projects soon.

I also ran LatencyMon before and after I installed the New Card and below is a summary:

I am not sure what's happening because this computers does not run any services or other programs, it's only for music.
How can a 64GB Intel QUAD Core with Dedicated NVidia 6060Ti not be suitable for Audio?

Before I started recording on this computer, I use to Run Photoshop and Visual Studio and every heavy system dragging software you can think of and it just chewed it all up.

I have already research that turning CPU Parking off can damage your CPU but I leave that to the expert.

But I do have Power to Maximum and like 10 fans in this Tower so it's cool.

Screen shot:

https://thumb.ibb.co/j4Dcdw/report.png

Full Report:

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CONCLUSION
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Your system appears to be having trouble handling real-time audio and other tasks. You are likely to experience buffer underruns appearing as drop outs, clicks or pops. One problem may be related to power management, disable CPU throttling settings in Control Panel and BIOS setup. Check for BIOS updates.
LatencyMon has been analyzing your system for  0:56:43  (h:mm:ss) on all processors.


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
SYSTEM INFORMATION
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Computer name:                                        WORKSTATION
OS version:                                           Windows 7 Service Pack 1, 6.1, build: 7601 (x64)
Hardware:                                             ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC., SABERTOOTH X79
CPU:                                                  GenuineIntel Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-3820 CPU @ 3.60GHz
Logical processors:                                   8
Processor groups:                                     1
RAM:                                                  61377 MB total


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU SPEED
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Reported CPU speed:                                   360 MHz
Measured CPU speed:                                   1 MHz (approx.)

Note: reported execution times may be calculated based on a fixed reported CPU speed. Disable variable speed settings like Intel Speed Step and AMD Cool N Quiet in the BIOS setup for more accurate results.

WARNING: the CPU speed that was measured is only a fraction of the CPU speed reported. Your CPUs may be throttled back due to variable speed settings and thermal issues. It is suggested that you run a utility which reports your actual CPU frequency and temperature.



_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
MEASURED KERNEL TIMER LATENCIES
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
This value represents the maximum measured latency of a perodically scheduled kernel timer.

Highest measured kernel timer latency (µs):           11706.620269


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
REPORTED ISRs
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Interrupt service routines are routines installed by the OS and device drivers that execute in response to a hardware interrupt signal.

Highest ISR routine execution time (µs):              86.850
Driver with highest ISR routine execution time:       dxgkrnl.sys - DirectX Graphics Kernel, Microsoft Corporation

Highest reported total ISR routine time (%):          0.031399
Driver with highest ISR total time:                   dxgkrnl.sys - DirectX Graphics Kernel, Microsoft Corporation

Total time spent in ISRs (%)                          0.036875

ISR count (execution time <250 µs):                   1072619
ISR count (execution time 250-500 µs):                0
ISR count (execution time 500-999 µs):                0
ISR count (execution time 1000-1999 µs):              0
ISR count (execution time 2000-3999 µs):              0
ISR count (execution time >=4000 µs):                 0


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
REPORTED DPCs
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
DPC routines are part of the interrupt servicing dispatch mechanism and disable the possibility for a process to utilize the CPU while it is interrupted until the DPC has finished execution.

Highest DPC routine execution time (µs):              505.435833
Driver with highest DPC routine execution time:       nvlddmkm.sys - NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 384.94 , NVIDIA Corporation

Highest reported total DPC routine time (%):          0.019083
Driver with highest DPC total execution time:         USBPORT.SYS - USB 1.1 & 2.0 Port Driver, Microsoft Corporation

Total time spent in DPCs (%)                          0.047566

DPC count (execution time <250 µs):                   4233698
DPC count (execution time 250-500 µs):                0
DPC count (execution time 500-999 µs):                16
DPC count (execution time 1000-1999 µs):              0
DPC count (execution time 2000-3999 µs):              0
DPC count (execution time >=4000 µs):                 0


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
REPORTED HARD PAGEFAULTS
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Hard pagefaults are events that get triggered by making use of virtual memory that is not resident in RAM but backed by a memory mapped file on disk. The process of resolving the hard pagefault requires reading in the memory from disk while the process is interrupted and blocked from execution.

NOTE: some processes were hit by hard pagefaults. If these were programs producing audio, they are likely to interrupt the audio stream resulting in dropouts, clicks and pops. Check the Processes tab to see which programs were hit.

Process with highest pagefault count:                 svchost.exe

Total number of hard pagefaults                       4455
Hard pagefault count of hardest hit process:          1384
Highest hard pagefault resolution time (µs):          135740.890
Total time spent in hard pagefaults (%):              0.030965
Number of processes hit:                              20


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
PER CPU DATA
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 0 Interrupt cycle time (s):                       1.749090
CPU 0 ISR highest execution time (µs):                2.695833
CPU 0 ISR total execution time (s):                   0.099083
CPU 0 ISR count:                                      218174
CPU 0 DPC highest execution time (µs):                115.39750
CPU 0 DPC total execution time (s):                   1.256335
CPU 0 DPC count:                                      813110
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 1 Interrupt cycle time (s):                       0.044473
CPU 1 ISR highest execution time (µs):                0.0
CPU 1 ISR total execution time (s):                   0.0
CPU 1 ISR count:                                      0
CPU 1 DPC highest execution time (µs):                0.0
CPU 1 DPC total execution time (s):                   0.0
CPU 1 DPC count:                                      0
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 2 Interrupt cycle time (s):                       20.887755
CPU 2 ISR highest execution time (µs):                86.850
CPU 2 ISR total execution time (s):                   9.664295
CPU 2 ISR count:                                      821316
CPU 2 DPC highest execution time (µs):                505.435833
CPU 2 DPC total execution time (s):                   10.621663
CPU 2 DPC count:                                      2818282
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 3 Interrupt cycle time (s):                       0.421070
CPU 3 ISR highest execution time (µs):                13.486667
CPU 3 ISR total execution time (s):                   0.268726
CPU 3 ISR count:                                      32294
CPU 3 DPC highest execution time (µs):                41.969167
CPU 3 DPC total execution time (s):                   0.093053
CPU 3 DPC count:                                      35126
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 4 Interrupt cycle time (s):                       0.793223
CPU 4 ISR highest execution time (µs):                0.0
CPU 4 ISR total execution time (s):                   0.0
CPU 4 ISR count:                                      0
CPU 4 DPC highest execution time (µs):                15.830
CPU 4 DPC total execution time (s):                   0.469039
CPU 4 DPC count:                                      294083
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 5 Interrupt cycle time (s):                       0.058214
CPU 5 ISR highest execution time (µs):                10.138333
CPU 5 ISR total execution time (s):                   0.007171
CPU 5 ISR count:                                      835
CPU 5 DPC highest execution time (µs):                14.929167
CPU 5 DPC total execution time (s):                   0.000898
CPU 5 DPC count:                                      872
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 6 Interrupt cycle time (s):                       0.045636
CPU 6 ISR highest execution time (µs):                0.0
CPU 6 ISR total execution time (s):                   0.0
CPU 6 ISR count:                                      0
CPU 6 DPC highest execution time (µs):                0.0
CPU 6 DPC total execution time (s):                   0.0
CPU 6 DPC count:                                      0
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 7 Interrupt cycle time (s):                       0.845728
CPU 7 ISR highest execution time (µs):                0.0
CPU 7 ISR total execution time (s):                   0.0
CPU 7 ISR count:                                      0
CPU 7 DPC highest execution time (µs):                15.446667
CPU 7 DPC total execution time (s):                   0.509114
CPU 7 DPC count:                                      272241
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________

23 (edited by ramses 2017-10-05 20:19:44)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

> I also ran LatencyMon before and after I installed the New Card and below is a summary

You should have posted them earlier, then I could have directly told that something is very wrong.

> I am not sure what's happening because this computers does not run any services or other programs,
> it's only for music. How can a 64GB Intel QUAD Core with Dedicated NVidia 6060Ti not be suitable for Audio?

Wrong BIOS settings, bad drivers.

> Before I started recording on this computer, I use to Run Photoshop and Visual Studio and every
> heavy system dragging software you can think of and it just chewed it all up.

You mention software which is not sensitive to any form of delay.
If an audio process needs to wait too long for a CPU until it becomes available again then you get audio loss.

> I have already research that turning CPU Parking off can damage your CPU but I leave that to the expert.

Sorry, but this statement is bullshit. On a laptop which has temperature problems "by nature" I fully agree.
But not with a Desktop and good cooler.
Unix / Linux doesnt use CPU core parking, so all Linux systems are now gonna die ?

> But I do have Power to Maximum and like 10 fans in this Tower so it's cool.
And you say it on your own, Tower, enough blowers, etc ...
If you are frightened, then get a CPU temperature measuring tool to observe.
And before a modern CPU overheats completely it throttles clock and finally turns itself off.
As you run windows 7 you can use the same widgets as me which show you the load and
temperature of your cores, you can find this information in this article:
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/inde … arrow-ILM/

> Highest measured kernel timer latency (µs):           11706.620269

This is much too high, bad BIOS settings and potentially bad driver


>Highest ISR routine execution time (µs):              86.850
>Driver with highest ISR routine execution time:       dxgkrnl.sys - DirectX Graphics Kernel, Microsoft Corporation>
>Highest reported total ISR routine time (%):          0.031399
>Driver with highest ISR total time:                   dxgkrnl.sys - DirectX Graphics Kernel, Microsoft Corporation

These values are ok


>Highest DPC routine execution time (µs):              505.435833
>Driver with highest DPC routine execution time:       nvlddmkm.sys - NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 384.94 ,

This value is really bad.
This was taken on a not busy system with no applications running ?


If I were you I would ensure that you disable energy saving in the BIOS and to experiment with different versions of nVidia driver.

Did you already check the BIOS settings, that energy saving is turned off for the CPU ?

Speaks for RME drivers and the USB3 card, that you do not get audio loss under these conditions....

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

24 (edited by ramses 2017-10-05 20:26:18)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

Latencymon btw tells you that your system is not useable for audio when the value is over 1000 microsystems.
You have Factor 11 more: 11000 !!!!
The setup of your system is not ok for audio loads.
And compared to my values this is > Factor 1000 more.

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

ramses wrote:

> I also ran LatencyMon before and after I installed the New Card and below is a summary

You should have posted them earlier, then I could have directly told that something is very wrong.

> I am not sure what's happening because this computers does not run any services or other programs,
> it's only for music. How can a 64GB Intel QUAD Core with Dedicated NVidia 6060Ti not be suitable for Audio?

Wrong BIOS settings, bad drivers.

> Before I started recording on this computer, I use to Run Photoshop and Visual Studio and every
> heavy system dragging software you can think of and it just chewed it all up.

You mention software which is not sensitive to any form of delay.
If an audio process needs to wait too long for a CPU until it becomes available again then you get audio loss.

> I have already research that turning CPU Parking off can damage your CPU but I leave that to the expert.

Sorry, but this statement is bullshit. On a laptop which has temperature problems "by nature" I fully agree.
But not with a Desktop and good cooler.
Unix / Linux doesnt use CPU core parking, so all Linux systems are now gonna die ?

> But I do have Power to Maximum and like 10 fans in this Tower so it's cool.
And you say it on your own, Tower, enough blowers, etc ...
If you are frightened, then get a CPU temperature measuring tool to observe.
And before a modern CPU overheats completely it throttles clock and finally turns itself off.
As you run windows 7 you can use the same widgets as me which show you the load and
temperature of your cores, you can find this information in this article:
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/inde … arrow-ILM/

> Highest measured kernel timer latency (µs):           11706.620269

This is much too high, bad BIOS settings and potentially bad driver


>Highest ISR routine execution time (µs):              86.850
>Driver with highest ISR routine execution time:       dxgkrnl.sys - DirectX Graphics Kernel, Microsoft Corporation>
>Highest reported total ISR routine time (%):          0.031399
>Driver with highest ISR total time:                   dxgkrnl.sys - DirectX Graphics Kernel, Microsoft Corporation

These values are ok


>Highest DPC routine execution time (µs):              505.435833
>Driver with highest DPC routine execution time:       nvlddmkm.sys - NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 384.94 ,

This value is really bad.
This was taken on a not busy system with no applications running ?


If I were you I would ensure that you disable energy saving in the BIOS and to experiment with different versions of nVidia driver.

Did you already check the BIOS settings, that energy saving is turned off for the CPU ?

Speaks for RME drivers and the USB3 card, that you do not get audio loss under these conditions....

I am still happy I got the card, so no regrets:

My BIOS is set to Performance Mode:

I will check the NVidia Driver and the BIOS driver see how things are looking.

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

> I am still happy I got the card, so no regrets:
> My BIOS is set to Performance Mode:

"Performance mode" is not a BIOS parameter, its most likely a collection of settings from the company building the BIOS.

I wrote you already this URL about a blog article which I wrote which is about tuning BIOS for my system.
I hoped you take the time to learn from it:
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/inde … -X10SRi-F/

There you can also clearly see in the tabular, what impact sleep states have in terms of latency for the system.

So you need to evaluate how these parameters are named in your BIOS.
Luckily the names are usually only different between Intel and AMD systems.
And in this case you and me have an Intel system, but still the parameters might be slightly different.

Best is you search for a settings page in BIOS with parameters like: C-States, EIST, Turbo, Enhanced Halt State (C1E)
Make a photo of it or a few if necessary and post the current values.

C-States should be C0, at maximum C0/C1, so that the CPU doesnt enter deeper sleep states.
Then look for parameters like C1E and disable it.

This could already help ... but please make some photos, to see your performance / energy related BIOS settings.

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

ramses wrote:

> I am still happy I got the card, so no regrets:
> My BIOS is set to Performance Mode:

"Performance mode" is not a BIOS parameter, its most likely a collection of settings from the company building the BIOS.

I wrote you already this URL about a blog article which I wrote which is about tuning BIOS for my system.
I hoped you take the time to learn from it:
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/inde … -X10SRi-F/

There you can also clearly see in the tabular, what impact sleep states have in terms of latency for the system.

So you need to evaluate how these parameters are named in your BIOS.
Luckily the names are usually only different between Intel and AMD systems.
And in this case you and me have an Intel system, but still the parameters might be slightly different.

Best is you search for a settings page in BIOS with parameters like: C-States, EIST, Turbo, Enhanced Halt State (C1E)
Make a photo of it or a few if necessary and post the current values.

C-States should be C0, at maximum C0/C1, so that the CPU doesnt enter deeper sleep states.
Then look for parameters like C1E and disable it.

This could already help ... but please make some photos, to see your performance / energy related BIOS settings.

Thank you.

Will do accordingly and post the info this evening.

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

ok ..

the photos will help you to see, from which settings you came, shall you need to go back to old settings.

What I personally do .. I make photos of all of my BIOS settings to have the complete picture, what the settings are.

By this I can never become lost in terms of BIOS settings, as I can reliably recover ...

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

29 (edited by ramses 2017-10-05 22:28:58)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

Do only one change at a time and re-measure using LatencyMon to get a feeling what brings you what kernel timer latency values.

And also pls have a look and try to use a different nVidia driver, this one looks to me as if he has too high values for DPC.

I am using the nVidia driver version 375.70.
I had luckily only one time a bad nVidia driver which made my system very slow in graphics mode.

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

30 (edited by ramses 2017-10-05 22:34:06)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

And btw .. it looks to me that you let LatencyMon  run for 58 minutes, that much too long and I have then my doubts that you didnt use your system for such a long time.

As I said, this measuring needs to be done on a just started and otherwise IDLE system.
Please start no other applications and pls also no mouse / keyboard action, while it is running.

5-10 minutes is fair enough to get a 1st impression on what is going on on your system.

You can let it run longer once you have optimized BIOS, Windows, Windows Services, etc ...
To validate whether the system stays not loaded over a longer period of time.
But when doing the fine tuning of parameters, you an not wait for so long after every single
change otherwise everything will take much too long for you.

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

31 (edited by AudioFreq 2017-10-06 05:07:15)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

UPDATE:

Hello there and thanks again for the amazing support.

This is what I found.

I updated the Graphics Driver and also configured for Performance NOT Quality as illustrated in the screenshot below.

https://thumb.ibb.co/b5YSBG/Capture.png

Now into the BIOS, I already have the most recent BIOS version installed. The other version is a Beta, it's been in beta for about 2 years now. I know this because I have been Monitoring it.

BIOS CPU Configuration:
In the BIOS, this is what the Section for CPU Configuration looks like:

https://thumb.ibb.co/ewBxBG/thumbnail_20171005_194649.jpg

I changed CPU C States from Auto to Enabled: And the other fields appeared as illustrated:

https://thumb.ibb.co/j53Ndw/Capture2.png

Finally, I changed the Enhanced Intel Speed Step from Enable to Disabled, and C1E to Disabled.

Running LatencyMon, I get the same message as before. I ran this for about 5 minutes without touching the keyboard or mouse.

Just an FYI:
I just translated your article, I am going to read it and try to follow as close as possible and see what happens, will let you know.

Thanks

32 (edited by ramses 2017-10-06 06:36:13)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

> I updated the Graphics Driver and also configured for Performance NOT Quality
> as illustrated in the screenshot below.

This only influences the quality (rendering, etc) in graphics mode and has no impact on LatencyMon values in regards to get fewer audio drops or make the CPU react more agile.

But what would be more interesting, whether the new nVidia driver makes DPC values lower for the nVidia graphics driver ... in that regards: The old relatively high value was:
>Highest DPC routine execution time (µs):              505.435833
>Driver with highest DPC routine execution time:       nvlddmkm.sys - NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 384.94 ,
For my system the highest DPC routine is the ndis.sys driver with only 110 microseconds.
And my nVidia driver v375.70 has only 88 microseconds highest execution time compared to yours 505.

1- Did you re-measure BEFORE changing the nVidia driver whether also with a 5 minutes measureing the DPC values becomes so high (I think this was over 500 microseconds) ? And if you make another run of LatencyMon, is it always reproduceable or do you get much different values ? This is the 1st thing that you need to find out, before making any change. With one measuring only you will not get a high quality statement, whether this was only a "one shot" bad value, whether its always that bad, whether the numbers are changing in a certain range. You simply need this information to have the confidence to know, what values you can expect from a measuring or whether there is a variance. Otherwise you can not be sure, whether the values of the newer driver are better or not.
2-After getting confidence, what the typical DPC values for the nVidia driver are, see point 1), I would have changed the driver and started 3-4 re-measures of LatencyMon.

This structured approach is the only way to get reliable and comparable data.
And only one change after the other.
In this case I have the feeling you changes multiple things: nVidia Driver, BIOS
and later you did a final LatencyMon measuring.
By this you loose control in the troubleshooting process, what change had what effect.
Even worse, it could also happen that some change have positive influences and some change negative ones.
And the result of your troubleshooting made it better, but you did perhaps only achieve average enhancement
compared to optimum values.

I dont want to push you now to go back and repeat everything.
Keep the nVidia driver.
But I would like to ask you to go back to the former BIOS settings.
And then pls repeat the LatencyMon measuring for 2 times 5 minutes and tell me how the DPC value for the new nVidia driver now is compared to your initial measuring.

When we finished this, then lets go to the BIOS section:
1t of all .. It might be worth to set the BIOS setup mode to "Advanced" to see more BIOS options.
Check that Advanced mode is enabled vs the more terse "EZ mode".

And now as I said, one parameter at a time, and then remeasure with LatencyMon and
observe the absolute minimum and recurring peaks and absolute peaks of the
kernel timer latency.

Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Tech ("EIST") - Enable
This enables your CPU to change clock. I would let this enabled first like I did in my system.
But it might be required to experiment with it as it can also decrease CPU voltage and clock.
If your system stays at higher clock speeds you can leave it enabled.
CPU clock you can check with CPU-Z.

Turbo Mode  - Enabled
This enables your CPU to use higher clock rates (Turbo mode). But your CPU will much likely not reach full Turbo frequency, if all cores are working. The only reason why you should keep it enabled is, that your system might reach a little higher clock speed than the base clock _instantly_. If I remember right this requires EIST to be enabled. Check it. You can start CPU-Z and watch, what CPU multiplier is being used by your system and at which clock your system runs.
On my system base clock is 3.5GHz, Turbo is 3.8 GHz. And I reach instantly 3.6 GHz with my system without a clock change (requires in Windows to set high performance energy profile if your BIOS is configured to work with the energy profile of the Operating system).

C-States - AUTO is definitively wrong selection, because this will enable C-States to deepest sleep levels, which we need to prevent. Low latency settings exclude energy saving, so we need to get rid of C-States.
Look if C-States can be "DISABLED". If not then we need to disable it piece by piece.
So according to your screenshot this would be:
CPU C1E - Disable
CPU C3 Report - Disable
CPU C6 Report - Disable
CPU C7 Report - Disable

You need to look whats behind "Package C State limit".
When googling this seems to be the "rest of the CPU" like L3, GPU, PCIe Root Hub ...
What values can you set besides AUTO ?

CPU Spread Spectrum you can Disable, it varies the CPU clock a little bit SHOULD the CPU clock influence radio devices on a certain frequency. I tried it, its in a good case completely irrelevant. I disable it to reduce changes of clock speed which also introduce latency. It makes only a very little difference, but I wanted to have this turned off in my system to have a stable clock.

There is also a parameter PCIe Spread Spectrum, test whether it is ok to have it disabled as well.
My system has not this separate paramter. I thnk a fix/stable clock can not hurt everywhere in the system.

For SATA only look whether this has been set to AHCI mode.

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

33 (edited by ramses 2017-10-06 06:16:49)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

Let me introduce to you another part inside of LatencyMon where you potentially didnt have a look yet and what its good for.

In TAB "Drivers" you find the highest DPC execution times of all drivers.

You can sort the output by clicking to the column header "Highest execution time (ms)".
Sort it from highest to lowest value.

These values are in miliseconds (ms). 1000 microseconds are a milisecond.

So .. if you find there drivers with lets say over 0,2 ms execution time (200 microseconds) then this is already suspicious.

Note: if the image below is too tiny, then zoom in with your browser, if Firefox then use Ctrl++ and Ctrl+- to zoom in and out.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/j2o2uwtjr90r77c/LatencyMon-nVidia-Driver-DPC.jpg?dl=1

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

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

This is great.
I am going to start over and try these approaches and let you know what happens.

Thanks again.

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

UPDATE:

As discussed, over the last 3 days, I tried everything mentioned in these posts.

Disabling C State or individual C State, like C1E, if you can think of it, I did it.

Nothing works, still the same issue. I even perform the changes one at the time as recommended but it did not help.

Feeling frustrated, I open the Tower and disconnected all Peripherals. I removed the NetWork card and the SATA Card and all extra hard drives, leaving the system almost completely bare. Then I also disable all USB except for the Sonnect usb 3. i ALSO DISABLE Audio and Network even Firewire in the BIOS.

Still the same problem. Next I removed the NVidia Driver, same problem, finally, I started Windows in selective startup so that only important services are started but same problem.

Finally, I gave up and left the studio.

Later yesterday I was logged into one of my Servers running Windows Server 2012 64 R2. I decided to install LatencyMon on the server to see what will happen. In fact, I have been contemplating running my DAW on Windows Server instead of Windows 7.

Historically, all of my work is done on Servers, I do not use Windows 7 or any other Windows OS for anything, except for Music.

So when I ran LatencyMon on the Server it was Green and Suitable for Audio.

I went back to the Studio, performed a DISK PART and clean the SSD (Samsung EVO PRO), then I installed Windows Server 2012 R2 64. I tested LantecyMON and it passed.

Then I installed my DAW, the driver for the USB 3 and RME and the results were still green.

I opened up a project containing 208 Audio Tracks at 96k 64bit and 64 Buffer, this project also has hundreds of plugins.

The CPU Measured at 18% and there were no Pops, clicks or dropouts. 208 Audio Tracks at 64 buffers.

I reverted the C State change to the BIOS but kept all unneeded hardware out or disabled.

With these findings, do you think this was a Windows Problem? What do you think?

Thanks

36 (edited by ramses 2017-10-13 12:10:52)

Re: FireFace UFX Plus Causes Total System Paralysis and nothing works

impossible to say

and btw "green" is not a value which enables somebody to rate the effect of a single change or the sum of some good changes which can aggregate to something even more good.

You did much, but at the end didnt report anything meaningfull to be able to support and further guide you on your way to optimize your system.

Green is BTW from LatencyMon perspective a wide range of in total 2000 microseconds and 2000 is a LOT.
I personally wouldnt like on my sytem more than 100.
And I know that it is possible to come to better values down to even 1-2 as lowest value and with recurring peaks under 20-30. And normally it is doable. Except you have a crap mainboard in terms of BIOS or a Laptop where energy saving is required for the device not to become to hot.

The lower the values of kernel latency timer, the lower you can get with the ASIO buffersize on a given audio load.
Therefore the strategy is to get lowest possible values not simply to say, "its green".

Why you had crazy 10.000 with Win7 at the beginning is unbeliebeable for me, never saw something like this.
So there is something very wrong. But its not the fault of Win7.
Something must be wrong in terms of BIOS, drivers, hardware, Win7 installation somehow in combination.
Win7 should not be worse compared to a server installation.
Maybe the difference is you installed the server newly and you made some things better, compared with the prior Win7 installation.

I assume you still have not ideal values in the BIOS and simply are using wrong / bad drivers for certain HW.

You need guidance of a guy who has deeper knowledge than you and is on site together with you. Remotely is impossible this way if you rush through things without breaking stuff into peaces and telling details and numbers.

This guy here had better luck and did the BIOS part right and had success:
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/index.php … -eine-Daw/

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