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Word CLock...

Discussion board for Mackie's d8b Digital Console users.

Re: Word CLock...

Postby Phil.c » Sat Nov 19, 2011 9:07 am

Here's one on Ebay 170658816434 I would jump at it!

Phil
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Re: Word CLock...

Postby High C Double G » Sat Nov 19, 2011 9:19 am

I can't specifically remember where or what, but I remember (I do not own any of the Mackie recorders) that the M,S, or HDR works best when it is the master and with the sync card (original) in the d8b the d8b can be set to slave and the clock rides over the digital stream and it works. The only way to see is to try it. I know this has been talked about before.

The bottom line is the Apogee clock card (with the BNC I/O) should have been standard issue on the d8b, however the d8b shipped with the original clock card and the Apogee was an "upgrade". Shame, shame, shame... I know it was early in the game but it was pretty apparent after the Apogee card came out that anything other than the "upgrade" clock card was not sufficient and much less desirable. The only thing good about buying the "upgrade" is that now you had both cards.

It is my opinion that after the Apogee clock card was released, the original clock card should have been sold (or given out) as a backup card and the upgrade become standard issue, of course this is all history and now we are left to sort it out on eBay.

Michael

PS:
Mistahand, if you have the equipment to try this... maybe you can see if d8b [slave], H,M,or SDR [master] settings works over the 1-24 main card slots Opt-8 or PDI-8 I/O's with the original clock card ?
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Re: Word CLock...

Postby Zorba the Geek » Mon Nov 21, 2011 5:56 am

Hi again guys,

Michael, sorry but I believe you are mistaken about the ability of the d8b to act as a word-clock slave without the Apogee clock card. As I mentioned on the 1st page of this thread, whilst both the ADAT and AES/EBU protocols are capable of carrying embedded clock information, the intended 'slave' machine must be capable of extracting this clock signal.

The d8b and the HDR are BOTH NOT capable of extracting their digital clocking signals from either of these protocols, but instead requires a word-clock input to be slave machines. As Mistahand's d8b only has the original clock card with no BNC connectors his d8b cannot therefore function as a word-clock slave, as there is no way to input or extract word-clock.

Mistahand's d8b could function as the master clock (with the older stock clock card) however this would mean that the slave machine (which could not be an HDR in this case) would have to be able to extract its digital clock from with the AES or ADAT stream. The Alesis HDR units can do this, many soundcards can do this (RME for example) and I believe the Mackie SDR had this capability, but it was a little flaky from what I can remember.

Michael's memory about the d8b acting better as a slave is related to another issue. A d8b with the newer Apogee clock card is often preferred as the slave machine when paired up with an HDR or MDR. This is because the clock output of the d8b Apogee clock card is undervolted and not very powerful, often leading to a lack of sync when cable termination is not taken care of or dodgy cables are used. In these circumstance the HDR/MDR's more powerful word-clock output is better suited to the task of being the clock master, and the d8b then acts as the slave. Note this still requires that the d8b has the newer Apogee clock card with the BNC input-output connectors.

One last quirk is the possibility of using the Apogee DIO8 cards in the d8b as a clock output. These cards (which are definitely not clock cards) have both ADAT and TDIF outputs (selectable within the d8b/HDR software) and also have a TDIF BNC clock output. This BNC provides an out of phase word clock signal specific to the TDIF format (I think it was 180 degrees out of phase by memory). Some people have tried to use one of these DIO8 cards in the d8b as a master clock source (usually occupying the first card slot I believe) to clock an HDR slave. Not sure about their success, but it may be worth searching the forum and the FAQ pages for more details.

Hope this helps guys.

Cheers,
George
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Re: Word CLock...

Postby High C Double G » Wed Nov 23, 2011 2:29 am

Hi George,

Yeah I wasn't sure this is why I suggested that Mistahand give it a go to see, but like I said I wasn't sure about it. Also I am one who has used the DIO-8 card for a clock out and I didn't even think about that until you mentioned it. It depends on the EPROM chip to whether the clock signal is out of phase (yes 180 degrees) or not.

There are basically three versions the first was a 16-bit offering and this in today's world is sub-par being 24-bits is really the norm. The other two were both 24-bit but the first Eprom chip was out of phase to the Tascam machines it was intended to connect to (therefore in phase with the clock signal) and the second Eprom corrected this problem by reversing the clock signal to be in phase with the Tascam equipment and therefore out of phase with the original clock signal, but this has little effect in practical use, e.i it still works.

Good point, I think I remember Mistahand mentioned that he has the DIO-8 cards in one of the machines... The problem though is he (or she) sorry don't know, still needs a way in. The DIO-8 doesn't allow for this. But I know that the clock out does work on the DIO-8 card as I have used it, mine is the second version Eprom in all three FWIW.

Hope this helps,
Michael
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Re: Word CLock...

Postby Red Carpet » Mon Nov 28, 2011 8:43 pm

anybody want to buy a appogee world clock
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Re: Word CLock...

Postby Scartt » Tue Mar 27, 2012 1:57 am

Hi RedCarpet Do you still have the apogee clock for sale ? Thanks Scartt
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