Decklink Duo

[samsc]

Fiber would be a great solution to eliminate that possibility

... thats the video production companies call ... but seeing as they are potentially affecting someone elses equipment...

[samsc]

decklink duo is on indefinite hold as - as seems usual with decklink - they havent got the parts to build it yet -

this isnt the first time they announce products well before any realistic ship date.

[OliLights]

Thanks for everyones posts.
Something you all should know is that we always ensure the Video PPU and and the Catalyst servers are on the same supply, I am a qualified electrician and I am fully aware of Potential Difference created between 2 different power supplies and the damage it can cause.

I would like Active Silicone to be more proactive in getting to the bottom of this with us. They know that we have 5 servers with 2 cards in each.
For the record.... a rogue machine has to be ruled out as we have suffered failures on a number of the machines.

I agree that opto isolation would help the cause in insuring a voltage free ground, but I'm sure in this case we have other issues. XL video are looking into this, but of course they see this as protecting someone else's kit.
How do we explain the intermittent comings and goings of the card and driver recognition for example. How come the Decklink HD3 worked straight from the box with no change of mains powers supply, and therefor the same possible potential difference as suffered by the AS cards, are they more hardy to it?

Whatever the resolution from AS, there hardware must be as durable as that from Kona or Decklink, we all agree on this right? I know that there is some flakiness with drivers sometimes from both of these manufacturers....


Thanks again for everyones input.
Oli

[ajmaudio]

I look forward to hearing how this ends... please do keep us posted if you dont mind? Thanks and good luck!

[Mr_P]

I would like Active Silicone to be more proactive in getting to the bottom of this with us. They know that we have 5 servers with 2 cards in each.
For the record.... a rogue machine has to be ruled out as we have suffered failures on a number of the machines.
Oli

In defence of Active Silicon - they have been very proactive in working to try and find an exact cause to the damaged cards - with the limited information available and without having access to the 'actual' touring system.

I asked those involved for information when the first 5 cards were returned back in March (2010) and little was forthcoming.

Active Silicon have replaced all the cards returned from the tour, without question, whilst still trying fault-find a problem that may not, ultimately be their responsibility.

Others of us have also been proactive in finding possible solutions:
http://www.bal.co.uk/cgi-bin/cp-app....s_transformers

http://www.bal.co.uk/cgi-bin/cp-app....0&cat=&catstr=
http://www.bal.co.uk/cgi-bin/cp-app....0&cat=&catstr=
http://www.bal.co.uk/cgi-bin/cp-app....SSORIES:ACCGLE
http://www.bal.co.uk/cgi-bin/cp-app....SSORIES:ACCHEC

http://www.allenavionics.com/AVI_Trans/AVI_Trans.htm

http://www.oxygendct.com/acatalog/Digital_Widgets.html
http://www.oxygendct.com/acatalog/SD...Isolators.html

http://www.len.co.uk/
http://www.len.co.uk/products.php?category_id=2

http://www.miranda.com/FOE-171p
http://www.miranda.com/FOE-171p



As yet - I've not tested these...

I actually have one of these returned 'repaired' cards - and have still not managed to break it yet....

There are hundreds of identical cards in system around the world that work perfectly and do not experience any of the issues that have arisen on Muse.

I urge users to post their findings to see if similar issues have ever occured with other D20-PE4 cards...



Simon

[samsc]

you are touring flight cases full of equipment...

stuff comes undone-as it always done-

if the driver isnt seeing the card - it means you have an intermittent problem with the hardware- the hardest thing to ever trace.


it gets banged around- as it always has gone in rocknroll touring.
rocknroll touring is really harsh on equipment.
the power systems we use on shows are really harsh- all these cables and power surges from all the systems.
and in the ten years i have been doing it - its a miracle the macs stand up so well-

your cards have been reported to have failed in exactly the same way - this just doesnt happen by chance- electronic failure are random.

---

as a software developer im usually the first in line for the blame when something goes wrong - but when the issues are resolved - its almost never my problem.
But in the first instance its always my fault - and i accept total responsibility.

---

active silicon make hundreds of cards - decklink/aja - tens of thousands- its an entirely different game

at least active silicon answer email-

i have never ever had an email response from either aja or decklink on technical issues. ever.

i spent 5 days - 5 days - trying to get a decklink intensity card to work last month - and in the end i gave up-
My AJA kona LHi crashes my machine completely if left on all day- doesnt survive a basic soak test. thats without my software running -

so the grass isnt any greener. its best to have someone with to work through technical problems.

as we need stuff fixed fast in this business.

Thanks for everyones posts.
Something you all should know is that we always ensure the Video PPU and and the Catalyst servers are on the same supply, I am a qualified electrician and I am fully aware of Potential Difference created between 2 different power supplies and the damage it can cause.

I would like Active Silicone to be more proactive in getting to the bottom of this with us. They know that we have 5 servers with 2 cards in each.
For the record.... a rogue machine has to be ruled out as we have suffered failures on a number of the machines.

I agree that opto isolation would help the cause in insuring a voltage free ground, but I'm sure in this case we have other issues. XL video are looking into this, but of course they see this as protecting someone else's kit.
How do we explain the intermittent comings and goings of the card and driver recognition for example. How come the Decklink HD3 worked straight from the box with no change of mains powers supply, and therefor the same possible potential difference as suffered by the AS cards, are they more hardy to it?

Whatever the resolution from AS, there hardware must be as durable as that from Kona or Decklink, we all agree on this right? I know that there is some flakiness with drivers sometimes from both of these manufacturers....


Thanks again for everyones input.
Oli

[samsc]

It worked very infrequently and when it did, all it took to cause failure was tiny movement of one of the BNC cables going into the Mac.

this indicates a connector or cable problem-

suggest someone tries to repeat this with either the macs or a set of cables.

[Mr_P]

Thanks for everyones posts.
Something you all should know is that we always ensure the Video PPU and and the Catalyst servers are on the same supply,

According to Erlwin - they are not!...

I am a qualified electrician and I am fully aware of Potential Difference created between 2 different power supplies and the damage it can cause.

Have you measured the voltages between earth and the SDI ground?

I would like Active Silicone to be more proactive in getting to the bottom of this with us.

We have been awaiting more detailed information from the tour to ascertain what is causing this issuse. Until very recently, information has been lacking

They know that we have 5 servers with 2 cards in each.
For the record.... a rogue machine has to be ruled out as we have suffered failures on a number of the machines.

I refer to my previous comment:
Hundreds of these cards are operating sucessfully in servers around the world - it seems strange that the cards on your show are having a unique problem - does this not point to a problem with your setup?

I agree that opto isolation would help the cause in insuring a voltage free ground, but I'm sure in this case we have other issues. XL video are looking into this, but of course they see this as protecting someone else's kit.

HD-SDI Isolating transpformers cost £165 each
4way HD-SDI 3G opto isolators are more expensive at £2498 a pair...
(if anyone knows of any cheaper - do get in touch!!!)

How do we explain the intermittent comings and goings of the card and driver recognition for example. How come the Decklink HD3 worked straight from the box with no change of mains powers supply, and therefor the same possible potential difference as suffered by the AS cards, are they more hardy to it?

To top this off we suffered for the final time when after installing and jigging cards into new slots, somehow it worked up until the point we moved the BNC connections on the MAC

When your solution to fixing the problem includes 'wiggling' the card in the PCI express slot - and 'wiggling' the bnc cables connected to it - im not surprised it failed!

Whatever the resolution from AS, there hardware must be as durable as that from Kona or Decklink, we all agree on this right? I know that there is some flakiness with drivers sometimes from both of these manufacturers....

Have you actually tried either of these cards in your setup to qualify this statement?

You may get frustrated that things dont work as expected - these things are highly complicated. Don't blame that manufacturers until you have ruled out all of your own potential problems...

Simon

[samsc]

i started off at the bottom at vari*lite ( as did a lot of people still around ) - fixing broken electronics many years ago - and it broke a lot - probably something like 10% failure rate per show. ( possibly more )

On every show you had to test every piece of equipment together as a system before it went out.

its a tough business - such a harsh environment for electronics - very electrically and physically unstable-
with users are under enormous pressure when things break- equipment on and off trucks every day -

and harsh on software developers too- who arent used to things being in continuous use for days at a time - with one unrepeatable and unmeasurable glitch a day -

its a bit of a miracle it works well enough most of the time-


in most cases the physical failures were electrical - cables - power supplies - connectors - mains - static issues -
electronics blows up really easily if you touch it when there is static electricity around -
and vari*lite built their flight cases with static generating material -
I remember the entire first batch of VL4's blew up when they arrived in london because they hadnt been tested on real 240v power.

then there are the design mistakes and the end user errors - dropping things - vari*lite consoles used to blow up when dropped- the relay which switched between 110 and 240 shorted in a failure mode.
Lamp power supplies had an unsafe failure mode which blew up all the transistors.

equipment that gets connected and disconnected all the time that is constantly shipped around - it breaks.
even the best designed stuff. even the worst designed stuff.

---

in my experience - with equipment failure like this - you always look to the electrical and cable conditions first of all.
and you check and double check what people say - because in show confusion accurate information is not easy to come by.

[OliLights]

Thanks for all the replies once again, seems like we're getting somewhere.
Before i start i need to clear up a couple of things with the remarks that Simon and Richard have made.

According to Erlwin - they are not!...

Erlwin has been away from the tour for the last month. In the US we had to run on seperate supplies because XL's UK PPU was changed out to a US spec PPU and had to operated on 110V, We used isolation on these shows. For the last months shows we have ensured we run the cats on the same supply as the video PPU. It's because of the Neg 240V UPS's in their racks that we have had to use a differing supply, i will seek to find a means around this upon our return in September.

Have you measured the voltages between earth and the SDI ground?

This happens before we connect up our SDi, when we measured it in Seoul, when we were up shit creek, i personally measured it myself and yes there was nothing floating between our grounds, there was however between 1.2 and 1.7 across Neutral Earth. The Decklink HD3 Placed in the same working conditions was fine. I see this not to have been our issue though, read on.

We have been awaiting more detailed information from the tour to ascertain what is causing this issuse. Until very recently, information has been lacking



I refer to my previous comment:
Hundreds of these cards are operating sucessfully in servers around the world - it seems strange that the cards on your show are having a unique problem - does this not point to a problem with your setup?

We have been suffering since early on in this campaign, however, we have never lost a show with these cards. We have done close to 130 shows since October last year without show failure. Having a spare server helped us to keep this so, invariably our faults would arise upon first power up or after a period of dormancy in the afternoon say after soundcheck and before doors open.
I have never said that the Active Silicone support is lacking and am fully aware that you and Neg are trying to get to the bottom of this.
All i have heard is that AS have looked at the boards and seen connection issues between the daughter and mother boards. From my memory of the cards there are pretty hefty pillars that adjoin these two boards and wondering how that connection could failing. They seem very well built.

HD-SDI Isolating transpformers cost £165 each
4way HD-SDI 3G opto isolators are more expensive at £2498 a pair...
(if anyone knows of any cheaper - do get in touch!!!)

I am going to see to it that someone invests in these, if only to irradiate the potential for a bit of PD! Seems like we should get a 4 way unit and wire it before our DA.

When your solution to fixing the problem includes 'wiggling' the card in the PCI express slot - and 'wiggling' the bnc cables connected to it - im not surprised it failed!

I never said that I had been 'wiggling the PCI Card inside the slots' as you pointed out. I have never even turned on a MacPro without all of it's covers on and it being back in the sleeve, the Neg servers are pretty hard to wire up without it been in their sleeves. At least with a Decklink card it's counting frames in catalyst from the second Catalyst comes online, with the AS Cards your relying on a signal being present into the card. When you have a DA delivering 2 machines with 4 SDi Sources and lets say inputs 3 and 4 are not counting on the second Catalyst, but they are on the first then what does that tell you? If then you shut down both servers and switch their SDi inputs, the same fault arrises it's the card correct! In Korea, we had NO connections to our severs.... NO CABLE CONNECTION PRESENT to the Phoenix Card.
Just the vibration coming from sound on stage deck itself was enough to upset the card inside the machine. From functioning to non-functioning in the space of 30 seconds. With a quiet stage and a reboot, recognised again but this time with NO driver installed. Re-installation of the driver and another restart and we'll try again, yes, we cried "it works... let's leave it working with SDi input and go for a cuppa". Upon our return the Sound had started again and both inputs frozen with no frames being counted. We knew at this point it was the cards.
It made me happy to hear that AS have at least found connection issues between there main PCI card and the SDi daughter board that is mounted to it.
Richard, can your driver be made to could frames or at least give card status without the need for an active SDi Signal. I guess it works with Decklink because it goes through at QT encoder right?

Have you actually tried either of these cards in your setup to qualify this statement?

Yes, Actually, My server that delivers my FOH Preview has a Blackmagic and Kona card installed.

Having this level of support is very important to me, i know what Active Silicone are doing to try and put these issues to bed and know that we as users need to do is keep tabs on the issues we have in order to be serviced with support in the way we would like.
I have been using Catalyst now for nearly ten years and still today i keep finding may interesting ways of flaunting it in my designs. Having 4 SDi inputs is a luxury i know and i know that richard has put so much ground work in with Active Silicone to in order to make the product work so well with Catalyst, like i pointed out earlier, i on this Muse tour alone have executed nearly 130 shows with 4 Servers running 2 cards, and have got through every one of them with out major issues.

i started off at the bottom at vari*lite ( as did a lot of people still around ) - fixing broken electronics many years ago - and it broke a lot - probably something like 10% failure rate per show. ( possibly more )

On every show you had to test every piece of equipment together as a system before it went out.

its a tough business - such a harsh environment for electronics - very electrically and physically unstable-
with users are under enormous pressure when things break- equipment on and off trucks every day -

and harsh on software developers too- who arent used to things being in continuous use for days at a time - with one unrepeatable and unmeasurable glitch a day -

its a bit of a miracle it works well enough most of the time-


in most cases the physical failures were electrical - cables - power supplies - connectors - mains - static issues -
electronics blows up really easily if you touch it when there is static electricity around -
and vari*lite built their flight cases with static generating material -
I remember the entire first batch of VL4's blew up when they arrived in london because they hadnt been tested on real 240v power.

then there are the design mistakes and the end user errors - dropping things - vari*lite consoles used to blow up when dropped- the relay which switched between 110 and 240 shorted in a failure mode.
Lamp power supplies had an unsafe failure mode which blew up all the transistors.

equipment that gets connected and disconnected all the time that is constantly shipped around - it breaks.
even the best designed stuff. even the worst designed stuff.

---

in my experience - with equipment failure like this - you always look to the electrical and cable conditions first of all.
and you check and double check what people say - because in show confusion accurate information is not easy to come by.

Thanks Richard, i am aware of your past, and appreciate your look back at the times where kit was unreliable, unstable and susceptible. I began my life in this industry as a service technician fixing dead moving lights, desks and scrollers, i remember it in my nightmares!

In the world of lighting things have got much better, kit still breaks of course but now common faults are mechanical, along with the occasional electrical failings. I have had 100% of my lighting kit hired by me on Muse for 99% of the shows i have used it on, a lot less can be said for the reliability of the LED screen technology i'm using on the other hand! Your right, most of the time faults are traced back to bad cabling and power / data supplies.

I am happy to say that Catalyst has never let me down and i really love using it, i mean that and you won't hear me saying that about many products.
You have developed aspects of your software for me and my ideas and made it more usable with every build.

I still have a MacPro 3Ghz Intel core 2duo that is 3 years old plus, it's been round the world 4 times on Planes, Boats, and Trucks on countless tours and still goes strong to this day. If that is not a testiment to reliability then i don't know what is.

I will ensure from now on that every fault gets logged and sent to Simon and Active Silicone in a means to try and resolve these issues.

Thanks again for everyones time and getting to the bottom of this matter and helping to get it sorted.
A word of advise to all other Video Input users ---- Get some Opto Isolation in order to take good preventative measures and streamline the cause of your faults.

Simon of you need to contact me then Neg has my details.
Thanks a lot
Oli