If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above. You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below. |
|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#1
|
|||
|
|||
ASUS XONAR S/PDIF processor funk
Ultracurve DEQ2496
Lately, cooler weather and a couple nasty PwrCompany brownouts, hammering a repeated ON/OFF condition over the grid - getting a more pronounced effect: Either/or reaction to turning the unit on after sometime after left being off. The unit: http://lampizator.eu/LAMPIZATOR/TRAN...ltracurve.html Normal: The factory logo first lights up, as the ROM routines are initiated for an operational state (real time sound-spectrum/EQ graph). Newest abnormal condition: The display/graphical yellow TTL interface display cycles repeatedly in luminosity, if not a lit/logical condition being present. Oldest: Upon powering up past the ROM, there's a momentary high squeal passed to the amp. Touch warmer now, 10F deg., and I've pulled the top, exposed but not taken apart the unit. Looks new inside, no capacitor discharges or crystals on the top, two ribbons from the main board (each either to full-frontal/rear subsystem I/O boards) are glued down and appear tight. Using a hard rubber rod (in eraser) to prod and poke anything for loose solder joints or induce the power-up error. No luck. Working perfectly (that I should be so lucky if it's a grounding I/O loop or power-plug condition) with the top removed and 115V fan blowing on it. Can't get it to fault/fail now. Friggin' replacements in other models, to duplicate its functions especially in studio or performance stage rack levels, can run anywhere from $600-$1000. I'm eyeing a mid-level DBX EQ box, however. (Have a DBX117 compressor that's got to be 40 years old and works like a friggin' champ. Closest then is possibly an ART dualband full-octave. Of course, DBX as well sources out to Chinese production modes these days.) Goddamn Behringer, friggin' German scum engineering, is a month out of their warrantee (according to sticker manufacturing dates I'm seeing inside). Oh, well. What are you going to do...this sort of crap is very commonplace now-a-days. Make it better and cheaper and not to last. My, my. And, a one and a two and a three... Hit it: It's Off and Over-The-Shoulder Again. |
#2
|
|||
|
|||
ASUS XONAR S/PDIF processor funk
On Sat, 22 Nov 2014 07:57:05 -0500, Flasherly
wrote: No luck. Can't get it to fault/fail now. Might if I had a can of electrician's cold-refrigerant, compressed air. Alas. |
#3
|
|||
|
|||
ASUS XONAR S/PDIF processor funk
Flasherly wrote:
Ultracurve DEQ2496 Lately, cooler weather and a couple nasty PwrCompany brownouts, hammering a repeated ON/OFF condition over the grid - getting a more pronounced effect: Either/or reaction to turning the unit on after sometime after left being off. The unit: http://lampizator.eu/LAMPIZATOR/TRAN...ltracurve.html Normal: The factory logo first lights up, as the ROM routines are initiated for an operational state (real time sound-spectrum/EQ graph). Newest abnormal condition: The display/graphical yellow TTL interface display cycles repeatedly in luminosity, if not a lit/logical condition being present. Oldest: Upon powering up past the ROM, there's a momentary high squeal passed to the amp. Touch warmer now, 10F deg., and I've pulled the top, exposed but not taken apart the unit. Looks new inside, no capacitor discharges or crystals on the top, two ribbons from the main board (each either to full-frontal/rear subsystem I/O boards) are glued down and appear tight. Using a hard rubber rod (in eraser) to prod and poke anything for loose solder joints or induce the power-up error. No luck. Working perfectly (that I should be so lucky if it's a grounding I/O loop or power-plug condition) with the top removed and 115V fan blowing on it. Can't get it to fault/fail now. Friggin' replacements in other models, to duplicate its functions especially in studio or performance stage rack levels, can run anywhere from $600-$1000. I'm eyeing a mid-level DBX EQ box, however. (Have a DBX117 compressor that's got to be 40 years old and works like a friggin' champ. Closest then is possibly an ART dualband full-octave. Of course, DBX as well sources out to Chinese production modes these days.) Goddamn Behringer, friggin' German scum engineering, is a month out of their warrantee (according to sticker manufacturing dates I'm seeing inside). Oh, well. What are you going to do...this sort of crap is very commonplace now-a-days. Make it better and cheaper and not to last. My, my. And, a one and a two and a three... Hit it: It's Off and Over-The-Shoulder Again. Should have had your rack on a sine wave UPS. Then the grid ON/OFF would not have been seen by your gear. The luminosity ramp could be some sort of test mode. At the display panel level. You'd need schematics to figure it out. If the display panel was commercial, perhaps there would be a pinout for the display section. It's either that, or the ROM code is affected in some way. And that doesn't seem too likely. A third possibility, is your connection has forced some high potential into the lower voltage electronics in that box. Paul |
#4
|
|||
|
|||
ASUS XONAR S/PDIF processor funk
On Sat, 22 Nov 2014 17:11:12 -0500, Paul wrote:
Should have had your rack on a sine wave UPS. Then the grid ON/OFF would not have been seen by your gear. The luminosity ramp could be some sort of test mode. At the display panel level. You'd need schematics to figure it out. If the display panel was commercial, perhaps there would be a pinout for the display section. It's either that, or the ROM code is affected in some way. And that doesn't seem too likely. A third possibility, is your connection has forced some high potential into the lower voltage electronics in that box. Nothing too fancy about the PS section inside the rack processor, but voltage brownouts are about living here and a regular thing with the power company. The ROM is the only thing socketed on that PCB, or an otherwise wave-soldered board, and found no unusual/noticeable "chip creep" on it. My abilities, as far as I can go - will be to cut off the glue fasteners to the ribbon connections and use electrical parts cleaner on all those connectors. I can also go modular breadboard, pull everything out of it and bring it up running, to stress/flex the PCBs for evidence of any cold solders I know to reflow. Being of an intermittent or logical/digital-related nature, though, I'm kinda stuck and it's beyond me. No logic probes, Oscopes, and I don't do current flow. It was functioning fine, had stopped the problems and was powering up right, until a day or two ago when the power company hit me with three or four successive brownouts, (it was going on/off during them), within a few seconds. Nasty crap, but hey, my computers and alarms clocks survived (as has the processor unit up until now). Not an ideal environment for its delicate if not indeterminate nature, perhaps. It's the only EQ units I'm also seeing out there being resold after being reconditioned. Behringer won't even handle its own 2yr warrantees, so no telling what all's behind that reconditioning. A totally filtered/backed up power supply might be nice, true, but a little too much. Got enough boxes already. My sister visited, walked in and said this isn't a house - called it Flash's TV and Musical Shop. Not enough flower vases, I guess. Should have maybe settled on the tried and true - a DBX EQ box. Dunno. Have to see how this thing limps along. I'll tell you, though, Behringer just moved down quite a few notches on my credibility chart. I wouldn't trust them now on a 400-watt amp, say, no farther than I could throw an old Crown (Crown used to demo their amps at audio industry shows by arc-welding with current/speaker outputs). |
#5
|
|||
|
|||
ASUS XONAR S/PDIF processor funk
On Sun, 23 Nov 2014 18:03:30 +0000 (UTC), Dustin
wrote: Have you considered a UPS? It would keep most grid related power issues from causing your equipment problems. I've always had EQs, but it's getting pretty sophisticated with newer VST plug-in modules (software DSP modules for approximating tubes and various studio application). Been awhile since looking such things over, but after trying out several the past couple days, have to hand it to them -- they're some really classy operations. Educational, too. I get hammered with power-grid fairly often over the course of a year. It's the area -- complete with a big insurance business, electronic repairs related to power issues, storms and lightning. Survival of the fittest. My computers take it, everything else, so when Behringer comes along with its nose in the air and takes to losing it when a cold spot rolls through, acting up after power interruptions, I'm not really interested in indulging it further. If it craps out, well, I'll move on to a DBX unit. That's the plan. Pretty amazing VST modules -- I need to figure out how to chain at least a couple. Heavy stuff, attempting to add subtleties for shades of improvement to already good mixes on good monitors. But, it's really too basic when about full control with 2 banks of 31-bands of stereo hardware filters. When it comes time, I'll just move past the Behringer processor. Find something more suitable. They're a bit of a mixed bag and just not ready for prime time. Great concept box, though, except I took a chance after I'd seen some pretty dicey reviews on their other gear, notably high-end amps -- played and, depending when and if it fully craps, may have lost. Win some, lose some. |
#6
|
|||
|
|||
ASUS XONAR S/PDIF processor funk
On Thu, 27 Nov 2014 00:04:42 +0000 (UTC), Dustin
wrote: Sort'a, as for your question, yes, it's worth less. I expect, electrically, a degree of ruggedness to a fully digitally-designed sound processor for spreading out sound into spectral bands. I expect the opposite. Infact, I expect that the more complex, delicate components inside, the more it's not going to like dirty power coming into it. Oh sure, it's probably got all kinds of electronics to help it clean the current up, but I'd rather begin by feeding it clean power in the first place. Less work for it to do, less chance something gets past it's own filters and causes undesired operation. Behringer is OK in some regards. But, they're undercutting most for the price and, at times, take an innovative approach to it. There's one little board in the EQ, about 4x4, two I/O boards and a power section. All the good stuff is on that board (better Japanese processing chips). The problem, I've a strong hunch, will be identifiable with a can of (electricians) cold-compressed refrigerant. Physically that'll tell me where or close to what components are at fault. My troubleshooting abilities, then, are limited to pretty much reflowing solder or cable reconnections. I'm not confident about tracing current from a schematic, identifying intermittent conditions for faulty components. Might try, see what happens with a can of cold air, though. Then, again, the unit might not get any worse and limit itself to marginal conditions during the cold while remaining, basically, in working condition. charging that money for something that breaks.' (Worse, I'm seeing that unit "refurbished" and being sold for $200;- refurbished EQ units, now, that's a first!) I'm leary of refurbished equipment.. Unless I know what the applied fix was ahead of time. If it's had a main transformer change out and I know the one that was installed is a better unit, I'd be okay with it. Not knowing what was replaced, reflashed (with modern equipment, it's probably got flashable firmware) etc.. I'd be disinclined to purchase. This Syntax 32" monitor is over 10-, 15-years-old (close to $1000 when they first came out) and refurbished. Broke at a year, they sent me the next model up, (dunno if it was new, though), but it's still going and just won't quit. That's running it 24/7 too. An EQ that's refurbished is pretty much unheard of, ludicrous, but EQs are normally physical bandpass filters -- different approach and not a totally chipped digital analysis of an signal for analog output reformation/modulation. Not that the latest and greatest is always better anymore, either. I've read many reviews where people bought the next version of a stereo component or something like that only to find it's less capable than the model it's replacing. Right after I bought the Behringer, I ran into this - http://www.stereotool.com/download/ It's another "heavy duty" piece of software, popular in studio and broadcast environments. (There should be a free version, not at all that limited/crippled last I looked. Very nice, but requires some processor-umph.) Does quite a bit, a definite overlap processing wise, along what the semi-faulty EQ does (or will do) so far as dynamic limiting/compression, e.g. - normalization. Stereo/studio stuff, hardware, can be on shaky ground with advancements in technology from digital inroads going head-to-head with equipment boxes from yesterday. Had a hell'va time, a couple years ago, locating a multitracker for a singer who didn't want to record through a computer. As you say, a different market depending on the application and complexity of factors involved. |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
Asus Xonar: disabling DS3D GX | Man-wai Chang to The Door (24000bps) | Homebuilt PC's | 3 | January 12th 10 05:16 AM |
Switching to a PCIe sound card: Asus Xonar DX vs Creative Titanium | Man-wai Chang ToDie (33.6k) | Homebuilt PC's | 0 | January 24th 09 10:40 AM |
Asus K8N-E Deluxe: Jerry-rig an S/PDIF In? | Toney | Asus Motherboards | 3 | March 2nd 05 03:00 AM |
Asus Pundit-R Optical S/PDIF output to Dolby Digital Processor | Moonshine | Asus Motherboards | 0 | December 31st 04 09:52 AM |
Asus A7N8X - Is S/PDIF included? | ZigZag Master | Overclocking AMD Processors | 7 | November 19th 03 05:13 PM |