Am I losing my mind?

[NeilParfitt]

So my new PCIe to PCIe Magma came in today and was excited to finally get HD2 running (was only able to use my core card due to lack of available PCIe in my mac).

I lost a lot of hair.. and everything is working perfect now.. but.. not the way I think it's supposed to!!

Before I begin writing this saga.. please note that:


-On my 10.4 startup with 7.4 and HD|2 in the Magma, it crashes a horrible death upon launch, and digicheck crashes as well... yet if i put the HD1 card back into the computer directly. It works fine... figuring I'll be leaving 10.4 in the dust soon.... I did the following:

-fresh install of 10.5.6 w/ PT8
-digicheck fully passed both cards
-I did these tests with no other PCIe cards in the system (other than primary video) and tested the Magma in every PCIe slot on the Mac Pro
-I also made sure the Magma was assigned 4x lanes in the Expansion slot utility
-during tests that didn't work, I tested many Playback Engine settings (which didn't change a thing).

Setup scenario #1 - the way it SHOULD work FAIL

in Magma:

Slot 1 - Core - B to Accel A - 192 Digital connected here
Slot 2 - Accel - A (from core B)

Result - crazy digital breakup on audio playback. Sounds like the most insane bitcrusher effect you've ever heard. Checked playback engine/buffer/DAE.. no effect.

Setup scenario #2 - the way it SHOULDN'T work - but does! Works Great!

In Magma:

Slot 1 - Core - A to Accel B
Slot 2 - Accel - B (from core A) - 192 Digital connected here

Result - Works fine???! In the System performance - The Accel shows up top of list, Core #2. This can't be the proper way? But it works as it should.

????

Setup scenario #3 FAIL


Slot 1 - Accel - A to Core B
Slot 2 - Core - B (from Accel A) - 192 Digital connected here

Result - crazy digital breakup on audio playback. Same as test #1.. Digital Noise Junk.

Setup scenario #4 - the way it SHOULDN'T work - but does! Works Great!

In Magma:

Slot 1 - Accel - B to Core A - 192 Digital connected here
Slot 2 - Core - A (from Accel B)

Result - Works fine... but is backwards from the way it SHOULD be setup. No problems.



Does anyone have any insight on this? I'm confused - as this is all working in a backwards configuration.

Very puzzled over here.. but at least I can get back to work in the meantime.

Cheers,

Neil

[TimNielsen]

Interesting, all I know is that in the Magma, you can start from either end of the slots, as long as the Core card is in one of the outside slots and your Accel cards then move towards the middle of the case...

And you're saying that you're connected the TDM Flex cable from port A on the Core to port B on the Accel? That definitely shouldn't work. I did that by mistake on my first install, but PT wouldn't see my interface (well, maybe it would have if I had attached to the Accel instead of the core, hmm).

So your scenario A is how it should have worked. Very weird.

Glad you can at least work. I guess I might not even worry about it.

[NeilParfitt]

Yeah - It's so strange.. as the wiring is exactly backwards from the card order to the flex to the interface connection point... as per the HD manual and included Magma manual on card positioning.

I'm going to call digi on this - maybe it's some weird PCIe to PCIe Magma issue... but with no "issues" as it works great. It sort of proves in a strange way that there seems to be no real difference between a core or accel card other than the serial port. Hmmm....

I don't think the Magma is faulty - as I dropped in a UAD2-duo after the fact and there's no issues with that either.