Problem connecting to BSS 9088ii's. Can you help?

Marsellus Fariss

Marsellus Fariss

Sophomore
Oct 25, 2011
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I scored a couple of the older green BSS Soundwebs and am trying to program them but the Sound Designer software keeps saying "preparing to go online" and then "Soundweb could not find a device on the network"

Here's what I've tried so far...

Two different RS232/RS485 adapters.
Two different 9088ii's
Three different PC's with two different OS's
Multiple baud rates, com ports and addresses.

The only thing left to try is to build a cable and try the front 232 port. I read in my travels that perhaps if the units where being controlled by one of the aftermarket controllers that they wold be programmed to answer only the front port.

Today I took the units to work where we use a rs232 adapter to talk down the snake system to our XTA DSP's. This was to eliminate any potential problems concerning the adapter, OS, or PC. Everything worked like clockwork when talking to the XTA's. I fire up and connect the 9088's and Sound Designer can't find any units on the network. I went directly from the USB port through the adapter to the 9088ii's rear port.

So I guess I'll try hacking up an S-video cable and building a front port dongle.

Ideas?
 
Re: Problem connecting to BSS 9088ii's. Can you help?

I assume you've used a null modem cable, they usually show up with no problem if the cable and com port is set right, in designer you must have the com port set to the same as your device shows in the control panel, also 11500? is the standard for the back panel and 9800 for the front panel, the help file/instructions on the designer download is usually very helpful with wiring of coms cables etc. One other thing it may be wise to upgrade the firmware to the highest available as the control software and the firmware have to be somewhere in the same revision series, from memory you can only update them from the front port, its been a while since I did that. G
 
Re: Problem connecting to BSS 9088ii's. Can you help?

gordon mcgregor said:
I assume you've used a null modem cable, they usually show up with no problem if the cable and com port is set right, in designer you must have the com port set to the same as your device shows in the control panel, also 11500? is the standard for the back panel and 9800 for the front panel, the help file/instructions on the designer download is usually very helpful with wiring of coms cables etc. One other thing it may be wise to upgrade the firmware to the highest available as the control software and the firmware have to be somewhere in the same revision series, from memory you can only update them from the front port, its been a while since I did that. G
Click to expand...

Thanks Gordon!

It's 115200 for the rear and 9800 for the front right.. I know my serial to USB adapter is working as it talks to the XTA's just fine. So all I do it change the baud rate to 115200 and make sure Sound Designer is set to the same com port (which is it) and it should work. But it doesn't. As it seems I may need to have a cable for the front port around anyway if what you say about the firmware is correct I might as well make one. The pin out is in the Sound Designer help file. that's about all that's really left to try.

Oh.. I also popped the top of the units to check for burst caps and cooling fan issues and firmware version. 1.04 and 1.06 chips in there though they may have been flashed at some point. so I downloaded an older compatible version of Sound Designer just in case. No luck.
 
Re: Problem connecting to BSS 9088ii's. Can you help?

Thought I could rebuild a s-video cable for use with the front port but it's an 9 pin din not a 4 pin din as I had read. So I guess I order an 8 pin serial cable.
 
Re: Problem connecting to BSS 9088ii's. Can you help?

make sure your 9 pin cables is wired as in the wiring diagrams as well it's a crossover or null-modem cable not a straight pin to pin job. Thos things are pretty good units there's lots of useful stuff there and in my opinion its clarer and easier to use than Architect but of course tha means you cant easily integrate them into other Harman stuff.
 
Re: Problem connecting to BSS 9088ii's. Can you help?

The issue was not having a null modem adapter. Thanks for the help guys!

Both units are doing fine now.

Once I got up and running with one I wasn't able to connect to the second unit. Either on the network vie Ethernet between the two or by using it's rear com port. Turned out both units where named the same name although they came from the same install previously. After renaming the problem unit I was able to flash the firmware and now both are talking just fine and I can use both units rear com ports. Time to play with expensive audio toys!

At least one of these is probably going to go into monitor world to process wedges. I'm going to play around with custom built control windows in sound designer to see if it would be feasible at all to use the software PEQ's and or GEQ's for wedges in monitor world via PC control. Or possible wireless tablet.
 
Re: Problem connecting to BSS 9088ii's. Can you help?

I had 2 in a rack that could do all of the above, I didn't bother with any custom window just used the PEQs because they were easier to use with a mouse(you can load up 8 of these on each unit no problem and jump about in the control screen between them) , with wireless it's def easier to remote control a PC connected to the units rather than faff about with wireless 232 adaptors. The "ethernet" like ports that you link the units with is NOT ethernet but a custom network probably some flavour of RS485, read about it in the help file, it can travel a lot further than ethernet, one cool thing is you can have one unit locally at the console for inserts and the other at the amp racks and control both from the local unit via their network connections. Have fun G

Ps just remembered you can run audio between the devces on the network as well so you could use the cat5 cable as a drive snake if you wanted to.
 
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