More about Onyx 1640i and Dell laptop

[demodoc]

New thread, same problem I've been having trying to get my Dell E 6510 (refurbished) to work well with my Mackie Onyx 1640i.

Just to bring folks up to date, when I got the laptop, I couldn't get the Onyx 160i and the laptop to stay clocked together for very long at all. Then I ordered one of these cards
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
and things appeared to work a lot better. In fact, I tested and tested and couldn't make the combination fail at all, worked perfectly. So, it seemed to be a firewire adapter issue. Then
,last night, I recorded a 2 hour event, just for testing purposes. It appeared that all was good when I brought the recorded files home last night. I played them at various times in the recording, multiple tracks and it seemed fine. This morning, I opened the session again and found that all was fine until about 68 minutes into the session, at which point, it's obvious that things went out of lock, The audio is pitched low and garbled, as I have experienced before.

Is it just possible that the Onyx is just not going to work right with the Dell for some reason? Because I don't know what else to do at this point. I have no problems with my 9 year old Acer Aspire 9410z at all, but since that machine is getting pretty old, I want another machine that can work with my mixer.

As I've said before, my Onyx 1640i is the older version of the mixer, the one with the serial number starting with 003 as opposed to 204, which is why I need to stay with Win 7, 64 bit, which I like anyway. This version of the mixer only has drivers up to and including Win 7.

I have done the Win 7 tweaks for the most part, power options are all set right, I turn off the Antivirus and internet connection entirely etc.

I really thought I had this problem licked, it was solid. But 68 minutes into a 2 hour record and it failed.

Bob, any input here??? Anyone?

Should I get yet another laptop. I have been looking at a refurbished HP Elitebook 8470P on Newegg.

[cgrafx]

New thread, same problem I've been having trying to get my Dell E 6510 (refurbished) to work well with my Mackie Onyx 1640i.

Just to bring folks up to date, when I got the laptop, I couldn't get the Onyx 160i and the laptop to stay clocked together for very long at all. Then I ordered one of these cards
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
and things appeared to work a lot better. In fact, I tested and tested and couldn't make the combination fail at all, worked perfectly. So, it seemed to be a firewire adapter issue. Then
,last night, I recorded a 2 hour event, just for testing purposes. It appeared that all was good when I brought the recorded files home last night. I played them at various times in the recording, multiple tracks and it seemed fine. This morning, I opened the session again and found that all was fine until about 68 minutes into the session, at which point, it's obvious that things went out of lock, The audio is pitched low and garbled, as I have experienced before.

Is it just possible that the Onyx is just not going to work right with the Dell for some reason? Because I don't know what else to do at this point. I have no problems with my 9 year old Acer Aspire 9410z at all, but since that machine is getting pretty old, I want another machine that can work with my mixer.

As I've said before, my Onyx 1640i is the older version of the mixer, the one with the serial number starting with 003 as opposed to 204, which is why I need to stay with Win 7, 64 bit, which I like anyway. This version of the mixer only has drivers up to and including Win 7.

I have done the Win 7 tweaks for the most part, power options are all set right, I turn off the Antivirus and internet connection entirely etc.

I really thought I had this problem licked, it was solid. But 68 minutes into a 2 hour record and it failed.

Bob, any input here??? Anyone?

Should I get yet another laptop. I have been looking at a refurbished HP Elitebook 8470P on Newegg.

The challenge as you are finding out is that a PC is not a PC. Every motherboard, bios, chipset has its own combination of drivers and idiosyncrasies. Some combinations simply will not work.

So yes, your likely going to have to find different laptop to make this work. However, since you already have the Dell, you might do a system backup and try and install win8 or win10 and see if the win7 drivers will work (in many cases they will).

If not, reload your backup and replace the laptop.

[demodoc]

How about just trying the ASIO4ALL driver? Anything there?

Not going to load a new OS.

[demodoc]

Well, ASIO4ALL was no help, it only gave me 2 channels in and out...no multitrack capability at all...out it goes.

I see that I can choose WDM drivers for the Onyx 1640i as well as ASIO. Tried it and it records/plays. Any possibility of this helping me for trouble free recording? I kinda doubt it, myself. The problem is that, even with the deluxe Startech Express Card FW card with TI chipset, I still lost lock last night after 68 minutes.

I need to know what to look at next. Do I buy yet another laptop and, if so, what kind? All I can afford is another refurbished one from Newegg with Win 7 64 bit on it and an Express Card slot for the Startech adapter.

[UpTilDawn]

I don't have much to add to this, except to suggest that if you need a different laptop, you might look for an older Lenovo ThinkPad that has the express slot you need. I've had both an x60 and x61 (with pcmcia slot) and they have worked great with Windows 7, SAW and SAC and a Behringer x32 external mixing console setup, using Behringer's Windows driver. That may be little comfort to know, or it may be something similar enough to make it worth checking into a Lenovo ThinkPad.... I hope that helps, anyway.

[mr_es335]

Hello,

As Philip stated, you cannot compare one make or model of a system with another - they are "plain 'n simple" different. Even among the same make/model there can be discrepancies.

IBM/Lenovo would be my preference at present...I have not heard too much good about the Dell E6000 series, or the M6000 series for that matter. A W520 would be an excellent machine.

You need to contact someone who can check your BIOS for you. This may prove very beneficial. I had a Dell M6700 laptop and tweaking the BIOS was very helpful. Without being in front of the system, it is very difficult to make suggestions.

This all being said, the E6000 series are great units and you should be able to get this all to work for you.

[demodoc]

That's good input, thanks. Will, at least look for one of those on Newegg.

I read some post somewhere about somebody having a similar problem and, in his case, it turned out to be a cell phone very near the laptop messing with things. I can't remember now but maybe I left the wireless nic turned on last night, not sure. My tablet which was streaming video out from the event was about 2 feet away. I don't know, I'm grasping at straws now. Because I tested and tested this combo for several days and couldn't make it fail at all.

[demodoc]

I really like this little Dell laptop a lot, overall. It's quite snappy and stable. Regardless of what I end up recording on with my Onyx, I will keep this machine for simple 2 track recording with my Focusrite 2i2 and many other applications. My old Acer Aspire 9410z from 8 years ago still runs ok and records perfectly, for now, but it is getting pretty old. That's why I am trying to get a good solid replacement going. I have to do a fair amount of live multitrack recording on a laptop.

I can get someone to look at the BIOS but I need to know what to tell him to look for and what to tweak. Any help there?

Hello,

As Philip stated, you cannot compare one make or model of a system with another - they are "plain 'n simple" different. Even among the same make/model there can be discrepancies.

IBM/Lenovo would be my preference at present...I have not heard too much good about the Dell E6000 series, or the M6000 series for that matter. A W520 would be an excellent machine.

You need to contact someone who can check your BIOS for you. This may prove very beneficial. I had a Dell M6700 laptop and tweaking the BIOS was very helpful. Without being in front of the system, it is very difficult to make suggestions.

This all being said, the E6000 series are great units and you should be able to get this all to work for you.

[demodoc]

How about this?

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...9SIA7AB48H6307

or this?

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...02G1-_-Product

Hello,

As Philip stated, you cannot compare one make or model of a system with another - they are "plain 'n simple" different. Even among the same make/model there can be discrepancies.

IBM/Lenovo would be my preference at present...I have not heard too much good about the Dell E6000 series, or the M6000 series for that matter. A W520 would be an excellent machine.

You need to contact someone who can check your BIOS for you. This may prove very beneficial. I had a Dell M6700 laptop and tweaking the BIOS was very helpful. Without being in front of the system, it is very difficult to make suggestions.

This all being said, the E6000 series are great units and you should be able to get this all to work for you.

[UpTilDawn]

How about this?

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...9SIA7AB48H6307

or this?

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...02G1-_-Product

I can't say much about those two, except where's your express card slot? I don't see it on either machine. Or is there a useable USB to Express card adapter device?

The two I referenced are much older systems... started as XPpro and turned into Win7.... and of course, like I mentioned, mine only has pcmcia slot.

I also don't know how much the newer Lenovos adapt themselves (or can be manipulated) to our needs... es335 will likely have a better answer than me. I just happened by to respond.