as announced earlier we are working on the new HDSP series WDM streaming driver. This driver is equivalent to the current Fireface driver, offering additional support for WDM streaming, kernel streaming, all kinds of multimedia junk
etc etc.
The current version seems to be stable and worked out enough to start a public beta test in this forum. There are a few things you need to know before using this driver, so read carefully!
- The driver currently supports Digiface, Multiface, HDSP 9652 and HDSP 9632. RPM, AES-32 and HDSP MADI will be added in the next weeks.
- The driver does not yet support 64 bit. This feature will be added as last item.
- The driver does not support MME, and will never do. If you need low latency MME for whatever reason, stay with the current driver. Note that all older MME software will work, but will show more than 30 ms latency.
- The current version of DIGICheck does not work with this driver. A compatible version will be available in a few days.
Installation
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Download the file
http://www.rme-audio.com/download/hdsp_wdm_beta1.zip
unzip it, start the included hdsp_fut.exe and update your hardware. Then switch off the computer. On next boot Windows will ask for new drivers, pint to the directory where you unzipped them. The driver is version 3.0.
Notes on the driver
-----------------
The driver requires a new flash/firmware because of a completely new designed hardware. This new hardware combined with new driver routines offers these advantages:
- Lower system load on start of data transmission (start of record/playback)
- Better performance on playback. We added a small safety buffer of 32 samples on the playback side. To give some numbers from a typical test machine, crackling starts at:
Old driver 64 samples 60% 128 Samples 70%
New driver 64 samples 85% 128 Samples 90%
So even if you add the 32 samples to the 64 samples, the new driver still does a better job than the old one at 128! And the 32 samples are on the playback side only, so throughput monitoring is even more attractive. Because of this tremendous improvement we removed the highest buffer size and replaced it with a 32 sample setting as lowest setting.
- Secure Record Technique. This driver includes a new scheme for handling record data. It guarantess all record data to reach the application even when the computer is blocked with 100% CPU load for a short time. We think this is a real killer feature, as there is nothing more important than reliability when doing recordings.
Please post all bugs that you find in the RME Newsgroup. We will fix them as quick as possible and upload new versions daily (if necessary).
More information
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The Option 'Interleaved' and everything else that you need to know about WDM usage is described in detail in the current Fireface manual. Please download this one from our website until we have updated manuals for the HDSP series.
Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME
życzę miłego testowania
walu
