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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: Dandy on March 20, 2007, 11:17:52 AM

Title: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: Dandy on March 20, 2007, 11:17:52 AM
Hi all,

 last year I bought an Mediator PCI busboard for my A4kPPC and fitted an Voodoo4, an 10/100 mBit NIC, an SpiderII USB 2.0 highspeed card and an Terratec 512i digital soundcard to it.

Everything (including audio HD-recording using the mixer from the MMCD and AHI-Record) worked fine, just that there was sort of a buzzing sound when I connected the Terratec to my HiFi equipment.

All the measures I took to get rid of the buzz weren't successfull. Last but not least I decided to use the digital output of my Terratec.

The downside was that my amplifier didn't have a digital input - so I had to buy a kit for a 24-bit digital-analog converter and asemble it.

When I powered the damn thing up for the first time I immediately noticed that the buzz was gone and I was happy. Great sound - finally I could use my Miggy as a Jukebox!

Last Week I wanted to record some more Music from CD to my Hd. So I started the mixer and AHI-Record as I did the last time before I switched to the digital output of my Terratec.

But now we come to the gory bit: the mixer doesn't work anymore - "doesn't work anymore" in the sense of it is no longer possible to switch to other input channels.

I can play mp3s with AmigaAmp - but when I want to play a CD and move the slider on the "CD"-tab up, nothing changes. I can still hear the mp3, but no sound from the CD and as a follow no sound to record with AHI-Record.

Does the digital output of the Terratec just play back from digital inputs (are there any?) and so makes the mixer useless?

Isn't the signal on "digital out" the same as on the "analogue out" - just digital?

Why can I not get other signals like the audio signal from my CD-drive or from my DVD-drive to the digital output of the Terratec (the (analogue) audio outputs of the drives are connected to the audio inputs on the soundcard - and even if not - I use AsimCDFS, which should play the sound anyway - even if the drives are not connected to the soundcard)?

Any ideas?


 :-?  :-?  :-?
Title: Re: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: Dandy on March 23, 2007, 06:04:45 AM
Bump!
Title: Re: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: Dandy on March 26, 2007, 06:32:49 AM
Bump!
Title: Re: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: keropi on March 26, 2007, 06:45:32 AM
did you try to email Elbox???
sorry I can't help ...
Title: Re: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: motorollin on March 26, 2007, 07:02:35 AM
I suspect the problem is with the sound card. I doubt it is able to mix an analogue signal (the CD audio) with a digital one (the MP3 audio) and send it to the same output. You might need to mix it externally. To confirm this you could connect something to the analogue output of the card and see if the CD audio is output from there.

--
moto
Title: Re: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: Dandy on March 26, 2007, 12:57:02 PM
Quote

keropi wrote:
did you try to email Elbox???
sorry I can't help ...

I wanted to contact them if nobody here has an answer...
Title: Re: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: Dandy on March 26, 2007, 01:24:09 PM
Quote

motorollin wrote:

I suspect the problem is with the sound card. I doubt it is able to mix an analogue signal (the CD audio) with a digital one (the MP3 audio) and send it to the same output.
...



Maybe you mis-understood me here:
I don't want to mix the signals (CD audio + MP3 audio).

Currently my situation is that I can play back MP3s via AmigaAmp (without having touched the mixer), but if I want to record some music to my HD (e.g. from a CD in the CD-ROM), I normally would move the slider of the mixer for AmigaAmp input to zero position and move the slider for the CD input to the desired volume position and then have the musik from the CD available at the speakers (and for HD-rec as well).
But if I do so since I switched to the digital output, no CD sound can be heard at the speakers and the LEDs of AHIrecord indicate that there is nothing to record.
The same is valid for all the other inputs.

It appears as if the mixer is completely out of function when the digital output of the Terratec 512i digital is used - and I have absolutely no idea how to change the input source when using digital out.
Title: Re: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: motorollin on March 26, 2007, 02:09:12 PM
Oh I see. Maybe it disables the analogue inputs when you're using the digital output. Why don't you contact Terratec and see if they can confirm whether this is a limitation of the card? Or maybe if you have a PC you can try it in that, and if it works there then you will know it is a limitation of the driver or a fault with the installation on your Amiga.

--
moto
Title: Re: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: Piru on March 26, 2007, 02:49:20 PM
Quote
if I want to record some music to my HD (e.g. from a CD in the CD-ROM), I normally would move the slider of the mixer for AmigaAmp input to zero position and move the slider for the CD input to the desired volume position and then have the musik from the CD available at the speakers (and for HD-rec as well).

Why are you recording CD-ROM from analog output? Why not just rip the tracks in digital 1:1 form? You can use for example disk/cdrom/cdda (http://www.aminet.net/package/disk/cdrom/cdda).
Title: Re: Terratec 512i digital in A4kPPC & Mediator: digital out and the mixer
Post by: Dandy on March 28, 2007, 06:22:02 AM
Quote

Piru wrote:

...
Why are you recording CD-ROM from analog output? Why not just rip the tracks in digital 1:1 form? You can use for example disk/cdrom/cdda (http://www.aminet.net/package/disk/cdrom/cdda).



Recording from analogue output?
Do you mean the card's output or the CD-Rom's analogue audio out?

Hmmmm - I'm not sure if the sound was recorded (when the mixer still worked) via the analogue output of the CD-ROM (which is of course connected to the analogue input on the soundcard) or if the sound was recorded via the data cable (which also works with AsimCDFS, which I'm using B.T.W.).

Nah - I didn't playback the CD and take the signal from the soundcard's analogue out to the analogue in for recording, if it's that what you meant...
 :-D