X32 Discussion

[Brian Henson]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

I don't think this is an "official problem". Many official and un-official folks have commented on this, and as far as I have read, only a few have reported having this as a problem. As far as I know, most have not followed ALL the recomendations summed up here:

1. Less than 300' total length between mixer and furthest s16 (actually less than 330' but anytime your pushing over 250, your Increasing your chance of trouble. KT just released a new ethernet/optical extender this year that supports aes50 @ 48k and 96k both now, that might be the thing best for long mission critical uses.

2. Use shielded STP cat-5 wired to the "b" spec, with metalized ends having the drain wire soldered to the metalized end on both ends. This Is really needed when running over 250' for sure! I use cat-6 because it holds up better with the plastic insulator running the length, it's stiffer, but more resistant to crush damage. I've had no problems with 100+ shows. The Roland cat-5 cable was mentioned, I'm a Roland dealer, that's a 328' cat-5 STP with soldered metalized ends. My question is: was the new end that was shortened by 2' wired to the "b" spec and also with a metalized end having drain wire properly soldered to it?

3. Use a UPS for the mixer and all s-16's that has either zero "switch over time" (constant voltage) or at MINIMUM use a UPS that will kick In in less than 20 milliseconds. If your ups does not state it's transfer switching time, then it is not good enough for this application. It's been tested by Behringer officially and any sag under 80v for more than 20ms will cause "wierdness". If your s-16's are too far away, get another "good" UPS with the same specs for those too. I don't think I ever heard anyone official say the s16's have to be on the same circuit or electrical phase, that should not matter as long as it has a good UPS. The digital converters in the S16's elliminate any buzz from differences in neutral/ground potential (buzz), between them and the mixer (as long as you stay all digital). The circuit/phase/panel would matter if different between the s16 and other s16's and/or amps/powered speakers for sure (hear: nasty buzz)!

Thanks!

I can confirm that the Roland cable did not have metal heads on either end, although it did have ethercon connectors. This was 4 years ago though, things have probably changed with the stuff they currently ship. The wiring on the cable was not changed, so if it was wired to the "b" spec originally, then it still is.

We had the console on a UPS, but not the snakes. At this time we can't actually afford two more UPS units. Do you think it would be better to have the console on a UPS alone or have none of them be on UPS's? They definitely won't ever be on the same circuit.

The problem I have with all of this is that even when neither the mixer, nor the stage boxes was on a UPS, and we ran standard run of the mill cat5e cables, the Roland board has never had any drop outs or noise.

It doesn't exactly fill me with confidence to recommend the Behringer with it being so "picky" about its environment.

 

[Randy Martin]

Re: X32 live recording

Nice Randy. Very clean recording despite being "a little rough".... and so difficult to get out of the board

Thank you very much, yep its a little rough but its only the second time they played the song..

Big show on friday will have recording's and pic from the show soon...

Randy

 

[Eric Eskam]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

We had the console on a UPS, but not the snakes. At this time we can't actually afford two more UPS units. Do you think it would be better to have the console on a UPS alone or have none of them be on UPS's? They definitely won't ever be on the same circuit.

Console on the UPS is probably the more critical. And an online UPS doesn't have to be overly expensive - I've had great luck with these CypberPower units. That they are rack mountable out of the box is a double bonus. And lest you think these aren't cheap, good online UPS's (at least ones I would have used) were in the $800-$1000 range not too long ago. Technology (and China!) marches on. The nice thing about online (or double-conversion) UPS's is they are always "on" - your load is *always* running off of battery. No switchover. Ever. Well, unless the batteries go dead 8)~~

I'd say your biggest issue is cable length. The closer you get to reaching the max on a specification, the greater other issues in your overall install (such as wonky connectors) are amplified. The suggestion to change the sample rate on the board/S16's is an interesting one to give you some more "margin for error". That's a quick and easy test to see if the problems at least reduce.

If they were installed correctly, the metal housing on the Ethercons serve the same purpose of the metalized jacks the Roland cable came with originally. Have you had the cable scoped with a frequency analyzer/cable tester? Not the $300 thing you can get at Home Depot but a good couple thousand dollar Fluke unit? I've had more problems with cables with bad connectors; which is why I hate terminating my own cables anymore. Not that some of the cheaper cables factory terminations are much better I guess what I am trying to say in a somewhat obtuse way is you can't just look at a cable to know if it's good. AES50 is pretty demanding because audio is very demanding. We are stuffing 64 channels of low-latency audio down a couple of twisted pairs of copper. Talk about pushing the copper to it's theoretical limit!

Physics is a harsh misstress...

The problem I have with all of this is that even when neither the mixer, nor the stage boxes was on a UPS, and we ran standard run of the mill cat5e cables, the Roland board has never had any drop outs or noise.

It is a little disconcerting that there doesn't seem to be much concrete to go on at this point. However, it should be noted that Behringer and Roland use different physical signaling standards - and at least at this point it looks like Roland's might be a little more resilient.

 

[Brian Henson]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

Console on the UPS is probably the more critical. And an online UPS doesn't have to be overly expensive - I've had great luck with these CypberPower units. That they are rack mountable out of the box is a double bonus. And lest you think these aren't cheap, good online UPS's (at least ones I would have used) were in the $800-$1000 range not too long ago. Technology (and China!) marches on. The nice thing about online (or double-conversion) UPS's is they are always "on" - your load is *always* running off of battery. No switchover. Ever. Well, unless the batteries go dead 8)~~

I'd say your biggest issue is cable length. The closer you get to reaching the max on a specification, the greater other issues in your overall install (such as wonky connectors) are amplified. The suggestion to change the sample rate on the board/S16's is an interesting one to give you some more "margin for error". That's a quick and easy test to see if the problems at least reduce.

If they were installed correctly, the metal housing on the Ethercons serve the same purpose of the metalized jacks the Roland cable came with originally. Have you had the cable scoped with a frequency analyzer/cable tester? Not the $300 thing you can get at Home Depot but a good couple thousand dollar Fluke unit? I've had more problems with cables with bad connectors; which is why I hate terminating my own cables anymore. Not that some of the cheaper cables factory terminations are much better I guess what I am trying to say in a somewhat obtuse way is you can't just look at a cable to know if it's good. AES50 is pretty demanding because audio is very demanding. We are stuffing 64 channels of low-latency audio down a couple of twisted pairs of copper. Talk about pushing the copper to it's theoretical limit!

Physics is a harsh misstress...

[/COLOR]

It is a little disconcerting that there doesn't seem to be much concrete to go on at this point. However, it should be noted that Behringer and Roland use different physical signaling standards - and at least at this point it looks like Roland's might be a little more resilient.

It seems odd to me that Roland would spec a cable that is right at the limit if they weren't confident in its ability to transmit audio data reliably at that length. It can reliably run 40 channels in and out over that cable without issues. Also, as I said it never came with metalized jacks, it came with ethercon connectors over standard jacks.

We definitely can't afford a Fluke tester, nor do I think it is necessary. The cable is clearly working as intended and has been for 3 years.

If the length of cable we're running right now is too much, then this mixer isn't going to work for us.

 

[Klaus Mock]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

It seems odd to me that Roland would spec a cable that is right at the limit if they weren't confident in its ability to transmit audio data reliably at that length. It can reliably run 40 channels in and out over that cable without issues. Also, as I said it never came with metalized jacks, it came with ethercon connectors over standard jacks.

We definitely can't afford a Fluke tester, nor do I think it is necessary. The cable is clearly working as intended and has been for 3 years.

If the length of cable we're running right now is too much, then this mixer isn't going to work for us.

roland can spec every cable for their systems. But this dont mean that the same cable works without dropouts for any other systems and protocols. The same cable can also cause problems for A&H or Yamaha digital snakes. So what? Try to find a solution and dont insist on the usage of a particular piece of cable.
Just my opinion.

 

[Brian Henson]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

roland can spec every cable for their systems. But this dont mean that the same cable works without dropouts for any other systems and protocols. The same cable can also cause problems for A&H or Yamaha digital snakes. So what? Try to find a solution and dont insist on the usage of a particular piece of cable.
Just my opinion.

Well one reason I mention that is that I'm not the only person who has experienced this issue with Behringer using cabling that worked just fine for other consoles, including Yamaha, A&H, and others.

If new cables will actually solve the issue I'm all for that. But if the problem isn't the cable, then it'd be a waste of time and money to go buy the recommended cabling.

 

[Dan Mortensen]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

Console on the UPS is probably the more critical. And an online UPS doesn't have to be overly expensive - I've had great luck with these CypberPower units.

SNIP

If they were installed correctly, the metal housing on the Ethercons serve the same purpose of the metalized jacks the Roland cable came with originally. Have you had the cable scoped with a frequency analyzer/cable tester? Not the $300 thing you can get at Home Depot but a good couple thousand dollar Fluke unit? I've had more problems with cables with bad connectors; which is why I hate terminating my own cables anymore. Not that some of the cheaper cables factory terminations are much better I guess what I am trying to say in a somewhat obtuse way is you can't just look at a cable to know if it's good. AES50 is pretty demanding because audio is very demanding. We are stuffing 64 channels of low-latency audio down a couple of twisted pairs of copper. Talk about pushing the copper to it's theoretical limit!

SNIP

Hi Eric,

Thanks for posting your experience with the Cyberpower and a link. I'm using some Extreme Power ones that I got through Juice Goose, and the experience has been not happy overall and getting worse. And they're more money than Cyberpower.

The Ethercons don't actually connect to the shield, to they? How could the shield connect to the shell? There's nothing in the instructions indicating that it does.

Regarding good cable checkers, from my experience with the workshop, while no reasonable person can expect to afford a good checker (the Fluke one that I had was over $10k) that will really tell you what's going on with the cable, there is still no substitute for having your stuff looked at with a good checker. The subtleties of CATx cable measurement, which I still don't fully understand after looking closely for a couple months, are very subtle, and your data integrity depends on them all being correct.

A cable is not a cable is not a cable, and it will only get worse as we get into CAT6 and above.

I've been reading this most recent discussion, and have nothing to add, as my busy season started the day after my AES workshop and I've not pursued anything relevant to the issue since then. As I wrote at the time, I'm going analog to the consoles.

It's extremely interesting that the Roland cable works for Roland but apparently not X32, and we really haven't gotten any information from the sufferers that would help us to know why. To Brian and the other sufferers: finding someone in your neighborhood who has a good tester (IT installers, etc.) and would run tests for you for a fee would be enlightening. You can take good cell phone pics of the screens for each measurement, as I did. We used the Fluke DTX-1800, I think. Each cable testing lasts less than a minute.

You want at least that level of measurement, although maybe there is something else that measures as well and at the same level of detail. I don't know, I only know that one.

It shouldn't cost much to do this, and would be definitive if really trying to find an answer. I hope.

Dan

 

[Per Søvik]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

It seems odd to me that Roland would spec a cable that is right at the limit if they weren't confident in its ability to transmit audio data reliably at that length. It can reliably run 40 channels in and out over that cable without issues.

The thing is that Roland's REAC along with some other protocols (CobraNet, SoundGrid, AES51 etc.) are using the Ethernet packaging protocol (Layer 2) that add some latency while being more tolerant. It is a tradeoff, the lower latency of AES50 makes it more demanding. Look at the cables specified by Riedel for RockNet, another layer 1 protocol, those cables cost an arm and a leg.
Running long cable runs close to or over the limit doesn't have to be that difficult or expensive since Klark has got a fairly inexpensive repeater, but I'm afraid the cable then has to be dedicated to AES50 (I don't think the Klark will (auto)switch to Ethernet protocol)


PS: As far as UPS go, my Eton 3S is still doing the job (for a lot less than the price of a pair of jeans).

 

[Nick Davis]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

I don't know whether to be worried or not - but have recently done a couple of outdoor 5-6 hour shows with 2 s16s using a cat6 shielded 30m cable that cost £7 from amazon - no dropouts and cable running across the fields under thin rubber matting (btw i did add ethercon connectors to the cable)

 

[Rob Spence]

Well one reason I mention that is that I'm not the only person who has experienced this issue with Behringer using cabling that worked just fine for other consoles, including Yamaha, A&H, and others.

If new cables will actually solve the issue I'm all for that. But if the problem isn't the cable, then it'd be a waste of time and money to go buy the recommended cabling.

All those consoles have different protocols even though they use "Ethernet cable".
The data rate for 40 channels is a lot less than that for 64 channels.
The 100m length spec is for the Ethernet protocol. Other protocols may run on longer or shorter cables. Personally, I never run things at their max be it cable length or speaker volume. Running at max doesn't often end well.

I always (yes, always) run my mixer power from my distribution at the stage. When I run the snake I run a power cable along side. Good power practices prevent all sorts of issues.


Sent from my iPad HD

 

[Brian Henson]

Re: X32 Discussion

All those consoles have different protocols even though they use "Ethernet cable".
The data rate for 40 channels is a lot less than that for 64 channels.
The 100m length spec is for the Ethernet protocol. Other protocols may run on longer or shorter cables. Personally, I never run things at their max be it cable length or speaker volume. Running at max doesn't often end well.

I always (yes, always) run my mixer power from my distribution at the stage. When I run the snake I run a power cable along side. Good power practices prevent all sorts of issues.


Sent from my iPad HD

I thought it was always best to use the shortest runs possible for power, is that not the case?

AES50/SuperMAC lists the same 100m length spec as Ethernet, and lists 48 bi-directional channels, not 64.

Running at max is not something I tend to do either. Our Cat5e runs are only as long as they have to be to reach from FOH to the stage.

Running the mixer power from the distribution at the stage is not currently an option.

 

[Nick Davis]

Re: X32 Discussion

I always (yes, always) run my mixer power from my distribution at the stage.

Sent from my iPad HD

I have zilch experience compared to Rob but I have always understood this is the correct and safest practice.

 

[Declan Slater]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

If you can't afford another ups, then how about please trying a long ac cable down the snake (NOT twisted.. to tie the mixer and s16(s) all on the same ups! I've seen problems of "some channels work/some not" issues once with the s16's not on a good ups.

I use a $150 'ish minuteman pro500lcd. Works great where others just as expensive that have no transfer time rating cause major problems. This mixer seems very intolerant of power sags! I think the Roland power supply is much more tolerant than the x32. This just sounds like bad power to me... what ups do you have and what is it's switchover time spec?

I can confirm that the Roland cable did not have metal heads on either end, although it did have ethercon connectors. This was 4 years ago though, things have probably changed with the stuff they currently ship. The wiring on the cable was not changed, so if it was wired to the "b" spec originally, then it still is.

We had the console on a UPS, but not the snakes. At this time we can't actually afford two more UPS units. Do you think it would be better to have the console on a UPS alone or have none of them be on UPS's? They definitely won't ever be on the same circuit.

The problem I have with all of this is that even when neither the mixer, nor the stage boxes was on a UPS, and we ran standard run of the mill cat5e cables, the Roland board has never had any drop outs or noise.

It doesn't exactly fill me with confidence to recommend the Behringer with it being so "picky" about its environment.

 

[Brian Henson]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

If you can't afford another ups, then how about please trying a long ac cable down the snake (NOT twisted.. to tie the mixer and s16(s) all on the same ups! I've seen problems of "some channels work/some not" issues once with the s16's not on a good ups.

I use a $150 'ish minuteman pro500lcd. Works great where others just as expensive that have no transfer time rating cause major problems. This mixer seems very intolerant of power sags! I think the Roland power supply is much more tolerant than the x32. This just sounds like bad power to me... what ups do you have and what is it's switchover time spec?

I wasn't aware they even made 250 foot IEC power cables. I mean, obviously they make extension cords but those can only be used temporarily. That is, if you want to be in line with the fire code.

Longest I've found on any online retailer was 50 feet.

 

[Nick Davis]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

PS: As far as UPS go, my Eton 3S is still doing the job (for a lot less than the price of a pair of jeans).

Per,
Which version of the Eton 3S do you have?

 

[Uli Behringer]

Re: S16 audio drop outs



Dear all,

I wanted to give you a quick heads up.

The X32 RACK is currently in full production and the first shipments are leaving the plant right now. The attached picture shows our aging test where each unit is "burned in" for 4 hours.

Numerous large shipments of the X32 CORE have already left the factory and you can expect units to be in stores in a few weeks.

Mass production of the X32 PRODUCER is planned to start next week.

Warm regards

Uli

 

[Dan Mortensen]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

I wasn't aware they even made 250 foot IEC power cables. I mean, obviously they make extension cords but those can only be used temporarily. That is, if you want to be in line with the fire code.

Longest I've found on any online retailer was 50 feet.

Where do you get the idea that for portable use you can't use long cables of the appropriate type (SOOW or similar) with Edisons or whatever on each end to plug another cord into them?

Or, for fixed installations, that you can't run conduit or whatever from whatever source you choose to whatever location you choose?

 

[Timo Ulkuniemi]

Re: S16 audio drop outs

Hello from Finland

I have been in sound business over thirty years now - so I have a little experience running long power cables.

Basic practice - as Rob pointed out - is to have ONE electric supply point, that is strong enough to run your entire system - here it is mostly 3-phase 240V16A outlet - or 32 or even 63 Amps - take all power from there into distribution centre close to your amp-rack, where most power is consumed. from there you pull lines for backline amps etc. And one line to FOH . With three-phase system it is also essential to load all three phases equally, if you are using a lot of power. I usually connect one side of pa into phase one, other side into 2 and monitor-amps, FOH and backline into 3 ...

Sometimes I do this in a place, that already has plenty of outlets all around the stage and musicians are wondering, why I do not allow them to use those. Simple reason is, that those outlets might get their feed from who knows where and therefore create a massive ground loop - or even worse, burn your equipment or cause personal injury or death !!!

If your power cable is of decent thickness - consult your electrician - it can be hundreds of meters long - but everything MUST be grounded in ONE point and ONLY in one point. Search internet for "ground loops" or audio grounding or or or...

Or you can imagine a tree - every single leaf has connection to ground - through branches and stem - but only one way.


One more thing - have you have electrician check the power-feed to your sound system? Is it properly grounded? Are there any machines using same powerline? Like freezers, air conditioners etc ? If yes, get rid of them or reorganize your power.


I have had my X32 since mid-august last year and S16 as soon they were available - this all has been used in dozens of places ranging from my warehouse ( we were trying to induce errors with spikes ) to small clubs to largest festival in this country. There was NEVER any issue. Of course people using system were all aware of importance of right cabling.


Most common source of problems in any audio system ranging from simple hi-fi to recording studio to live sound system has always been some fault in cabling.

I do not recall all details of your problem, but have you ruled out RF coming from somewhere outside the system? We had a serious problem with that in 1975 or so in a recording studio, who had a plastic-molding company on next lot. They had a HF-apparatus to weld pieces together and it emitted a non-frequent BZZZZZ in our left monitor in studio A - it took well over an year to find out.....


Whatever the cause of your problem is - do not give up - X32 is a lovely thing to operate - thats hy I have X32 rack coming soon, too.

 

[Marcus Prier]

X-USB card

Hi Uli,


one of the new features in firmware 1.14 ist the support of a X-USB card.

Is this the direct-to-USB-harddrive card?

Any news about the development prozess or a release date?


Thanks

 

[Henry Moreau]

Re: X-USB card

Hi Uli,


one of the new features in firmware 1.14 ist the support of a X-USB card.

Is this the direct-to-USB-harddrive card?

Any news about the development prozess or a release date?


Thanks

Ahoy Marcus -

We are up to firmware1.15 now.






Sent from my X32 console using hellonwheels