ASIO4All with RME Fireface

[Scott Campbell]

After much trial and error I got ASIO4All to work with the Terratec Mic 8 and the Echo Mia cards. So thanks for that. Brilliant piece of software.

I've now added the RME Fireface to my set up, but I can't get it to work with ASIO4All. I don't just mean in conjunction with the other cards -- I can't get it to work with ASIO4All at all, even by itself.

The weird thing is that ASIO4All reports the Fireface as available and working and all that. And the Fireface's own mixer shows signals coming into the Fireface. It's just that those signals never get passed by ASIO4All to my audio software (Cubase). The signals get through if I use the Fireface's own driver, though.

Also, when the Fireface is involved my other cards won't pass signals to Cubase either, although as soon as I disable the Fireface they're back to normal.

I've tried re-installing the Fireface, getting the latest drivers, re-starting numerous times, trying all possible input channels, checking sample rates, etc.

Any ideas? I will have to sell the Fireface and lose a lot of money doing so if it won't work in my multi-card set-up.

P.S. Another weird (and possibly related) matter: ASIO4All says that input channels 1/2 have 8 channels available (when it should be 2). 3/4, 5/6 and 7/8 and 9/10 are all fine on this matter, though.

[Michael Tippach]

Possible causes:

1.) Check the Windows mixer! The routing there _does_ have an influence when using ASIO4ALL.

2.) Only use the 8 channels combined interface and disable all the others. It is a quite common feature for multichannel cards to provide alternative representations of themselfs, i.e 4x2 channels vs. 1x8 channels, in which case you are supposed to either use the all of stereo pairs or the mulichannel interface, but not both at the same time.

[Scott Campbell]

Thanks for the reply, Michael. I've been away for a couple of weeks and have only just now seen it.

I've tried using only the 8 channel interface, but that didn't work (I also tried it the other way around).

As for the Windows mixer, I take it you're talking about the dialog box you get when you go to "Sounds and Audio Devices" in the Control Panel? I've made sure that the Fireface isn't selected anywhere there, and that the GS Wavetable synth is not selected anywhere, and the system sounds are turned off. Is there anything else I could try?

It had been suggested to me that RME's drivers did not conform 100% with WDM-KS (which ASIO4All apparently needs -- correct me if this is wrong), but I contacted the RME forum and the guy who wrote the driver confirmed that they were 100% compatible with WDM-KS.

Thinking out loud, he wondered whether it was a problem with ASIO4All's buffer memory allocation, which he said was a difficult matter (although this is just speculation, I think).

Another RME guy tried to use the Fireface with ASIO4All, and had similar problems, except that for him it sometimes worked and sometimes didn't. (And also someone else posted on that forum saying he couldn't get the Fireface to work with ASIO4All).

I know that you're not paid anything for ASIO4All, Michael, so I don't expect you to be able to sort the problem. But if you do manage to work it out, then it's only fair that I send you some money for doing so - say £50, or £100 if it involves you having to put out an updated version of ASIO4All. The £50 offer also applies to anyone else on this forum who can work out what's going wrong.

[Michael Tippach]

Hello Scott,

A possible way to smoke test any claim that something _generally_ works with WDM/KS is to download a trial copy of Sonar. Allthough, I would expect that folks at RME would probably already have verified that their WDM/KS interface works with Sonar...

_Some_ settings in the Windows mixer do indeed have an influence on ASIO4ALL operation, such as the master volume. If you ever, in the past, for some reason, have muted the master output, you'll never hear anything.

Another check to perform would be to see if the audio meters in the application (not in the RME software) are moving as you would expect them to. Also, if the _output_ meters in the RME software are moving, this would mean that their WDM driver _did_ receive the audio data - and what it eventually does with it is beyond ASIO4ALL's scope and we would be talking workaround for a WDM driver issue - if at all possible.

In order to find out, I would need some more information, as outlined above. And no! It won't cost you any money ;-)

[Scott Campbell]

Hi Michael,

The RME people have confirmed that it works with Sonar, so no problem there.

>If you ever, in the past, for some reason, have muted the master output, you'll never hear anything.

I may have done this at some stage in the past... although it's never been a problem before now, and doesn't affect ASIO4All running with my Mia card or my Mic 8 card (or both).

>Another check to perform would be to see if the audio meters in the application (not in the RME software) are moving as you would expect them to.

They don't register at all when ASIO4All runs with the Fireface. Cubase thinks it's playing -- the clock starts ticking, the bar that indicates the current position moves foreward, but the output meters are as flat as a tack.

The RME software mixer doesn't receive any input from Cubase -- its meters don't move either.

[st10ss]

Hi Scott,

please remember that you have to choose the right driver in Cubase. If you don't select A4A then it will not work. Can you select it in the ASIO dialoge?

Steffen

[Scott Campbell]

Yes. As I said, ASIO4All will run multiple soundcards in my Cubase setup with no problems, as long as the RME Fireface is not one of those multiple cards.