Massive problem with audio interface

Bought the new iMac 3.5 i7 a week or so ago specifically for music recording and production. Got everything hooked up and the last thing I did was do exactly what Apogee states on its website re: the Apogee Ensemble. That is - get a Firewire to Thunderbolt adapter plus a Firewire 400 to Firewire 800cable. In their FAQ they state unequivocally that it works. It definitely doesn't. That's **** poor.

It worked for about 2 minutes and then just distortion. That's a sad game when you consider Apple and Apogee have a close relationship. It's not like theses things are exactly cheap. The computer and the audio interface come to £3600 plus alone. It wasn't until I read about the same problems on the net from everyone else I realised this is a massive problem that should have been beta tested in the first place.

So I contacted Apple Support and they agreed a refund which I accepted. They were good and up front about it but seemed to not have heard of the issue. I find that weird when you read about this issue everywhere. So I will wait until this gets resolved and go in again on the iMac but I just didn't want to gamble one being stuck with a large paperweight for ages until they worked it out.

I ended up returning my iMac as well, so frustrated and disappointed. I always thought Macs "just worked." lol

Does anyone know if the Mac Minis have the same problem when running Mavericks? I've already purchased Apogee and Logic so I'm invested in Apple.

I have had the same issue with my iMac late 2013. LIke others, I have about come to the conclusion that it is somehow related to the fusion drive. I just called Applecare and was told that they were aware of the problem and were working on a solution.

I would imagine that you will have the same problems as the only differences I have noticed in my case was the change from Mid 2013 imac with last gen processor and Mountain Lion OS to Late 2013 Haswell processor running Mountain Lion. All worked fine until I installed Mavericks.

So....

In short, it's the Haswell generation Mavericks OS imacs which have issues, so I really do think the mini will also suffer. Would be interesting to hear though from any mini owners.

Hello all! I've been using a Macbook Pro with a Focusrite 18i6 interface with DP 8 with no issues, but was looking into getting an iMac for a new studio setup. It seems the issues with the Fusion drive is a show stopper. I was going to get the 1TB 7200 rpm drive model. Does anyone know if that configuration will work with the Focusrite interface and running Mavericks on a 27" iMac?

Thanks!

Hi RichBo61,

I am dealing with this problem for more than month now.

from my experience, it seems the problem is linked to the Fusion drive.

running from regular HD, or external HD, seems to work fine.

I will get back my Motu interface, and verify it today.

When i bought my Late 2013 iMac, i had to choose between 500G 5400 rpm drive model, or the 1T fusion,

so i waited for one month to get my custom iMac, just to find out is it have issue with external interfaces.

If i have the option, i will go for the 1TB 7200 rpm drive model.

it is fast and big enougth.

you welcome 🙂

I have a new iMac with Maveriks and the 1TB Fusion Drive. I partitioned like another poster tried and the problem is gone as long as I run my studio off of the new partition. I run Logic Pro X and Apogee Duet. Amazing once I partitioned, no more cracks, distortion, delay, nothing. Internal instruments and midi was working fine, but once you run audio into the iMac via the audio interface, it would last about a minute before the whole thing became unsuable.

Has anyone with this problem tried to seperate the Fusion SSD and HDD as described in various articles like http://www.macworld.com/article/2015664/how-to-split-up-a-fusion-drive.html? If the problem is due to Mavericks moving things around on the fusion drive(s), I guess the problem should go away.

That fix has in-fact worked for a number of people.

Also, my solution (installing mavericks on an external usb 3.0 drive and booting from there) also worked (for me)

Update:

Hi All,

Installing Mavericks on external HD and booting from it does not seems to fix the problem for me,

although the issues become a bit better - less cracklings.

Tested on Motu Microbook ii.

Now i am really not productive and helpless.

for the sake of compelteness - neither installing Maverick on an external HDD nor using the Tunderbolt Express Hub from Belkin solved my issues either (cracking/distortion with QU-16 digital mixer which also does USB-Streaming of the audio).

Does anyone know if there is an official Bug/Report ID I can refer to when talking to someone at Apple Care? I am currently thinking of returning my Mac and get one without FusionDrive instead of taking the hassle of partioning my HDD and moving stuff around to fit things on the SSD.

I have a late 2013 27" iMac, 3.5GHz Core i7, 8GB RAM and 3TB Fusion drive running Mavericks. I am not using any external hardware, just the internal microphone. There is tons of static on the receiving end of my Facetime and Skype calls. As a test I made a quick audio recording using Quicktime, both Quicktime 10 and Quicktime 7 Pro. Both recordings sound horrible, loads of static. I tried JonnyK's solution only I used a LaCie thunderbolt external hard drive and booted the system from that. The static problem disappeared. I tend to agree with the conclusion that this is a Fusion drive issue.

Some Problems with Imac late 2013 3tb fusiondrive. I´m using the new RME - UCX.

A few times My Mac Crashed totaly. On my MBP 2011 i never had issues like that.

Update:

Reverted my iMac late 2013 with Fusion Drive back to Mountain Lion, but still had some clicks and pops.

Found a temporary fix that works for those pops and clicks for my setup with my Mbox Pro 3:

Shut Down iMac.

Unplug power cable and wait 10 sec. Plug back in -- Resets system managment controller

Power on Mbox Pro (or other interface), wait appropriate amount of time for external interface to fully power on.

Start Computer, immediately pressing Command + Option +P +R and hold until the second start up chime --Resets PRAM

Then do everything else as you normally would.

I found that I wouldn't have to reset the clock source for primary output, as the interface has been properly and correctly synced. I have no more pops and clicks either. Have only tested a few times, but it seems that when I dont do this, the pops and clicks arise. Interesting. Dont exactly know if there are any negative effects of resetting SMC and PRAM every time you use your interface. Will look into that next.

Hi iSTAVI, and all other people that struggles with audio interface problems...

I just tried out your solution (PRAM reset) on my iMac (see configuration below) and it didn't help me at all.

My audio interface is a Motu Track 16, but I have also big problems with my Apogee MiC and Jam devices.

I'm starting to get really ****** on Apple that still havent released any fix for this issue that is strogly related to Fusion Drive on Maverics.

My configuration:

iMac 27-inch, Late 2013

Storage: 3 TB Fusion Drive

Processor 3,5 GHz Intel Core i7

Memory 32 GB 1600 MHz DDR3

Graphics NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780M 4096 MB

Software OS X 10.9 (13A603)

Come on now Apple, fix and release a new version for us NOW!!!