Motormix (x3) losing sync - possible fix

[Brent Evans]

Been having a problem keeping my trio of motormixes connected to SAC Remote for any length of time. Sometimes they'll go a couple of hours, sometimes just a few minutes before becoming unresponsive. It was to the point that I had stopped using them becasue even with one or two it would drop out.

I thought it might be the MIDI interface, so I tried a different one (built into a Motu 8pre I have around, which it turns out isn't compatible with Asus I3 laptops, anyway...) and still had the same problem. I noticed that when it was happening, the laptop was also becoming unresponsive for a moment before resuming activity. Then I noticed AVG was popping up scan notices shortly afterwards. Disabled AVG... system ran for a couple hours, then went down again (again, with a glitch in the laptop).

Just for shiggles, I tried turning on Realtime priority in the Remote menu (and verified that it does actually change the priority). So far, it's been running nonstop for 6 hours with no glitches. I'll leave it overnight. If anyone else has been having problems like this, I'd appreciate some verification if you have time in the next couple of days... I've got to go out with the rig for two weeks starting Sunday and hopefully this fixes it.

TIA
BE

[mr_es335]

Brent,

I gather that for a period of time = everything was "tickity-boo" - and then not? It would be interesting to note what really HAS transpired to trigger some of the things that take place. And what was it that Sherlock stated, "Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth."

I was under the impression, that, similar to Norton and McAfee, AVG was somewhat "bloated" and therefore, was really hogging all kinds of resources - and in a lot of different areas.

I have not used AVG for years, even though at one time it was one of the best. I did work for one of the major players for approximately 5 years on their "heuristics" development - until I found out that the concept had already been developed by someone else.

Have you tried completely uninstalling AVG and seeing what transpires? An update of some sort?

[jlklein]

I've got two pairs of Motormixes for our FOH and Record stations, and had also used them on our portable system when needed. Initially we had numerous issues with one or both of a pair dropping offline, coming back after a reboot of the MIDI interface (power cycling the Motormixes didn't help).

After some discussion with Carl at CM Labs (and hearing his opinion of our M-audio interfaces), we tried the Roland interfaces that he recommended and that took care of the problems. I believe it's the UNO version, with the integrated MIDI leads.

Lately our Recording Motormix pair has been having problems with the 2nd of the pair dropping offline, which also stops any MIDI message return to SAC, so while the first still-working Motormix is still up, and will physically follow any software manipulations done onscreen, the software will not follow physical movements.

I did some troubleshooting on the pair this past weekend and ended up replacing the MIDI jumper cable between the pair of units as it was rather tight. I got too short of a cable (1' whereas it really needs 1.5'-2.0') so I suspect that it was experiencing some wear.

As that was a short "retest", I'm doing more testing during tonight's business meeting and should know if that was it.

Hope this helps,
Jeff

[KUI]

Always run SAC Remote in single cpu and real time priority with hardware faders connected.

Also disable any usb power saving features in device manager.

Also never use any virus software on SAC computers.....They should dedicated machines....

You think a digico desk is running any anti virus software.


KUI

[Brent Evans]

This isn't the host, it's a laptop which is being pressed into service as a remote. It has to be online at other times, which means it shouldn't go without AV.

It does seem though, after a 24 hour burn in, that it's fairly stable running at realtime priority with AVG scans disabled. That should be sufficient.