Motu 896Mk3Hybrid dump

Martin Armsby on GMX m.armsby at gmx.de
Sun Feb 5 12:54:38 CET 2023


On 30.01.2023 14:19, Takashi Sakamoto wrote:
> Hi,
>
> (C.C.ed to administrator of alsa-devel mailing list)
>
> On Mon, Jan 30, 2023 at 12:40:06PM +0100, M. Armsby wrote:
>>     Hi Takashi,
>>     I'm writing direct because I cannot seem to get a post on AlsaDevel
>>     list.
> I've realized your two posts, but no reaction since they have no message
> body:
>
> * Firewire ALSA Motu and Phase24
>      * https://lore.kernel.org/alsa-devel/sokos1-r6xj933yn42y-hmy3gsrfgsma-mnwe9a-cahiug-3btbiljo1il7-8lhisz-trzq63b9es27-41z6o2wylkgf-tjvaeo3olqkz-elr571-us6u4977mlo1-p2gxkncmroem-foujcu-jg85lg-sqi612.1674640678660@email.android.com/
> * Firewire Motu ALSA (Re-post)
>      * https://lore.kernel.org/alsa-devel/v6inx6-fwmr0r-kvajcd-kfs8u9l6m2qn2cnogd-2odpkz-d7vadu94fw76-iv1ohfsnh0nxdhq3hl-irmx6t-3alyitjtt3oq-m2jt5z8uktj3-1khriq-w6pr0c-bitxl26qa5mx-sc4dcno22ycq-2x7a4f.1674740730928@email.android.com/
>
> Jaroslav, would I ask your opinion for the problem which perhaps dropped
> the message body from his messages?
>
>>     I need to repair my two Phase X24 (defekt caps?) and I'm having
>>     problems with Traveler and other Motu interfaces on Linux.
>>     Thanks for any hints or where I should post.
>>     Here's  a copy of my post:
>>     Hello everyone!
>>     Thank you for all the hard work on this.
>>     Especially Mr. Takashi Sakamoto.
>>     I'm an experienced studio engineer and was a Beta tester for Samplitude
>>     for years.
>>     Not a programmer and have very little experience with Linux.
>>     So please excuse me blundering in on this professional programmer forum
>>     but I'm hoping my experience will help somehow to find bugs. I'll
>>     provide any information I can or test following instructions.
>>     I really would love to completely change over to Linux but I need
>>     reliable drivers.
>>     How can I help?
>>     Here's my experience so far.
>>     Around November I started testing Linux for audio as I have
>>     occasionally over the last years. I was pleased to find Manjaro and
>>     Sparky would detect Traveler Mk1 and Mk3 and to run so efficiently
>>     compared to Win10.
>>     But things would freeze.
>>     Reaper has a long standing Midi bug so it was difficult at first to see
>>     why my laptop would freeze on occasion.  I dissabled hardware midi in
>>     the software.
>>     Then I updated Sparky beginning of December and to my surprise Firewire
>>     didn't work anymore. The Firewire stack must have been removed.
>>     I use:
>>     Dell Laptops 4310, 6510, M4800
>>     Tested platforms Ardour and Reaper using Pianoteq 8
>>     No JACK
>>     Manjaro Kernel from 6.0 rc4? and 6.1.1 work for a limited time.
>>     Sparky only works with special kernels Xanmod1 6.1.7-x64v2 but the
>>     audio is completely distorted.
>>     CachyOS Kernel 6.2 rc4 sounds good.
>>     Common problem is freezing or loosing audio. Ardour is less sensitive
>>     than Reaper but Reaper is far more efficient on CPU
>>     (20% compared to 90%and more with one instance of Pianoteq 7 or 8)
>>     Motu Traveler MK3 and MK1 wrong channel assignment from 1+2 (3+4 are
>>     actually 1+2) and freezing or just loosing audio.
>>     Motu 896Mk3 Hybrid not recognised in firewire or USB mode.
>>     Shame cause its the best.
>>     Motu 8pre working similarly.
>>     Phase 24 working much better but still freezes or looses audio after
>>     long period.
>>     Tested in Ardour and Reaper.
>>     I hope that's not too much at once.
>>     Martin Armsby
>>     M. Armsby
> Thanks for the report including many issues. I apologize to trouble you.
> In my opinion, the issues are not so easy since each application uses ALSA
> PCM device by slightly different ways. So we need to investigate the
> issue step by step to take relevant longer time than easy issues.
>
> Before discussing about the issue, I need to ask a help about MOTU
> devices. As you realized, 896 mk3 is neither supported yet, FireWire only
> nor Hybrid, in IEEE 1394 bus nor Universal Serial Bus. For example, you
> can see no entry for the device in module device table[1] in the file
> which consists of snd-firewire-motu driver.
>
> The reason is apparent; no one provides information enough to support
> it. Then I would like you to help me to integrate for it in the case in
> IEEE 1394 bus.
>
> I maintain a remote repository for my collection of configuration ROM
> image which includes identity information of each node in IEEE 1394 bus[2].
> The information is useful both to make the entry of module device table
> and to make hardware database[3] in systemd project.
>
> When 896 mk3 Hybrid is connected to IEEE 1394 bus and only connected to
> the bus, Linux FireWire subsystem detects it as '/dev/fw1'. Then the
> rom image is exported to an node on sysfs. You can retrieve the content
> by the command line below:
>
> $ cat /sys/bus/firewire/devices/fw1/config_rom > motu-896mk3hybrid.img
>
> If retrieved successfully, please send it to me. I don't mind to receive
> it to private message, mailing list, any upload services.
>
> [1] https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/sound/firewire/motu/motu.c#n162
> [2] https://github.com/takaswie/am-config-roms
> [3] https://github.com/systemd/systemd/blob/main/hwdb.d/80-ieee1394-unit-function.hwdb
>
>
> Thanks
>
> Takashi Sakamoto
>
Ok, Im pleased to help with the drivers for Motu 896 Mk3 Hybrid
I followed your instruction and dumped an .img
Just for comparison I also dumped an .img for Traveler Mk1
These are both in the zip file - (or how would ou like it)
The img seems ver small - I hope it's usefull :)

BTW
Manjaro update with Kernel 6.2.Rc6 is running very well with Terratec
Phase24 and both Motu Travelers.
Not perfeclty but I was able (for the first time) to edit productions
using Reaper for over an hour with no problem!

Note:
Traveler have wrong output numbering.

Cheers,

Martin
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