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Focusrite Liquid Saffire 56 problems on brand new iMac

I have a mate who's just shedded out over £2000 on a brand new 27-inch iMac and another £500 on a Focusrite Liquid Saffire 56 audio interface only to find that after about 20 secs the audio completely drops out. He's a music producer so it's really important that the problem is fixed. In terms of the setup, the Liquid Saffire is connected with a Firewire cable which passes through a Thunderbolt to Firewire adapter and plugs into the iMac.


May I reitorate that both the iMac and Liquid Saffire are brand new. I think it's down to a dodgy Thunderbolt to Firewire adapter, however it may be to do with Mavericks or something else.


Any thoughts?

iMac, OS X Mavericks (10.9)

Posted on Oct 29, 2013 3:34 PM

Reply
78 replies

Oct 25, 2018 1:05 AM in response to K00ry

I got this from "GearSlutz".com


Well, since the USB 2.0 hub still was messing up here and there, I decided to walk down to the Apple store to buy a Belkin Thunderbolt express. Yeah, this solved the problem 100%. Audio interface is finally working as it should. No dropouts at all. Not even once after a whole days work! NICE. So, yeah, if you have $300 to burn, this is a perfect fix.


It seem to be a problem with USB and Thunderbolt. I hope this gets fixed soon, after spending 3k I dont have another 300 for a dock.

Oct 29, 2013 5:07 PM in response to tay07600

Is he using the latest drivers for the Saffire that came out on the 5th of Oct...?


Saffire Mix Control 3.2

10/05/2013


Click here for more details:

Fixes:

* Added a workaround to resolve asynchronous FireWire transactions on newer model Macs (starting with 10.8.2) which might have caused:
- Distorted VRM using Pro 24 DSP
- Disappearing outputs on the Pro 40 and Liquid Saffire 56
- Unable to load from hardware
- Firmware updates failing

- Audio no longer distorted using WDM KS mode in Reaper


Note the comment in the driver notes about fixing an issue with FW.......


http://us.focusrite.com/firewire-audio-interfaces/liquid-saffire-56/downloads


He shouldn't have any issues using the TB to FW adaptor.. unless the adaptor itself is faluty...

Oct 30, 2013 4:22 AM in response to tay07600

Morning. This sound exactly like the issues I am having.


Bought a new iMac i7 and Saffire Pro 14, using the thunderbolt connector and same issue.

People have been reporting on another thread that the 2013 iMac's (New) are have serious issues with audio both USB and FireWire.


https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5428602?start=210&tstart=0


I have an older MBP with is running mavericks and works flawlessly with the Saffire Pro 14 so I KNOW it's not the unit or the FW cable or even Logic Pro X.


It's the Mac. Get your friend to call apple support and report it.. The more people who report it and log it the more serious a problem it will become for apple to solve. Some people are saying its cause of having a Fusion drive but don't know about that as the internal speaker/microphone works perfectly fine with Logic Pro X and Ableton.


Might be the bus board for the interfaces have issues.


Apple are yet to respond as the new iMacs are only around a month old but Apple & Focusrite are apparently aware of the issue.

Oct 30, 2013 10:02 AM in response to tay07600

Nice to know that my mate's not alone johnpaulmusic!


Thought i'd give an update by saying that I've been in touch with Focusrite and they are (once again) aware of the issue and have asked for my mate's system logs and information so that they can work out how to address the problem, they'll be in touch hopefully tomorrow.


In the meantime, Apple have agreed to send my mate out a brand new iMac as they think that it is down to a faulty Thunderbolt port, which hopefully should be a good result.


Will provide more info once I get it.

Oct 30, 2013 10:08 AM in response to Johnpaulmusic

Johnpaulmusic wrote:




I have an older MBP with is running mavericks and works flawlessly with the Saffire Pro 14 so I KNOW it's not the unit or the FW cable or even Logic Pro X.


It's the Mac. Get your friend to call apple support and report it.. The more people who report it and log it the more serious a problem it will become for apple to solve. Some people are saying its cause of having a Fusion drive but don't know about that as the internal speaker/microphone works perfectly fine with Logic Pro X and Ableton.


Might be the bus board for the interfaces have issues.


Apple are yet to respond as the new iMacs are only around a month old but Apple & Focusrite are apparently aware of the issue.


Obviously Apple doesn't do much, if any testing of their own hardware/software combination, since Logic falls into the "Pro Apps" category you would think they might do a little more groundwork.

Nov 7, 2013 12:59 PM in response to tay07600

Hi,


I have the exact same issue with a Saffire Pro 14 and the new 21' iMac with Fusion Drive.


I wrote a long post on the tread mentioned above by Johnpaulmusic, explaining my whole story..


Here's what I wrote :


I bought the new 2013 21 inch iMac when it came out, directly online on the Belgian Apple Sore, with 16gb of ram and Fusion Drive. But I had some problems with my M-audio Fast Track Pro : after about 10 minutes, the sound started to be completely distorted, and the only option was to unplug it and plug it back and it was working again for again some 10 minutes (this was not only in the DAW but with any audio such as itunes, youtube..)


So I thought well, this is a USB 1 interface and the iMac has USB 3, so that would be the problem + I've had already minus trouble with the Fast Track Pro with my previous computer so I really thought that it was the problem.


So i just ordered a Focusrite Saffire Pro 14 (Fire Wire) for 185 euros + obviously the Thunderbolt to Firewire 800 adapter (30 euros !) + I realized I also had to buy a FireWire 400 to 800 cable since the cable included in the box was Firewire 400 to 400 (+ 15 euros..).


All that money spent for nothing, the Saffire pro 14 simply doesn't work. No sound at all, and not only in Logic but also in iTunes and youtube. Then when I change some parameters in the Saffire mix control (such as switching between 44 and 48 kHz) I have some sound for about 10 seconds then it drops again. I tried both the soundcard powered with the power suply and bus powered.


So as you can imagine I'm completely depressed. I spent both my money and a lot of time and in the end it is all for nothing.. I wish I had found this tread before...


And I really don't konw what to do, should I wait for Apple to fix it, since they're already aware of it, should I return my iMac and replace it with one without Fusion Drive (so ironic, I have to buy something less expensive in order for the stuff to work....), but I kind of would like to keep Fusion Drive (and by the way how can I be sure Fusion Drive is really the problem??), do I keep the Saffire pro 14 or not... And also who should I try to contact first, apple or focusrite.. I'm too tired right now to call anybody, I wanna die in peace (joke)


Anyway sorry for this long post, I hope you'll read me and hope we'll all find a solution..


Nov 8, 2013 5:21 AM in response to tay07600

I'm on an older (4 gig 2008) iMac, with Mavericks, Focusrite Sapphire Pro and Logic X , though I'm really happy

with the quality of Audio and the plugins in Logic -It's become a troubleshooting environment which fortunately I have the skills to circumvent, although -Very annoying!

Aside from certain prominent plugin vendors (not reallly apple's fault) not ready at 64 bit (basically killing my massive orchestra/synthy lib)

I have a lot of audio clocking issues. I always see random cpu spikes, spinning beach balls and even worse- Big Crashes. It may all be related to autosaving? I had one crash where autosave saved nothing! - I had another where it was current - but I'm pretty sure it's also having issues Finding stuff (I had to reinstall Kontakt 5 Player bc it would not find the libraries after a crash)

If the system sleeps (app nap on logic is off) I have to kick the Audio in the butt (usually switch Preferences/Audio) to get it back. This is a result of going to Mavericks. I had no such issues in Mountain Lion.


I just relate this here because I really fdont' think this is a Focusrite issue and Mavericks seems to play nicely with it (do check with focusrite - they updated the drivers in October, but even before that was not an issue) -

i think the issue is with Logic Pro X - new stuff in my logs indicate there are


Audio engine failures- and stuff like this:

11/7/13 6:08:02.215 PM Logic Pro X[60682]: CGContextSetFillColorWithColor: invalid context 0x0. This is a serious error. This application, or a library it uses, is using an invalid context and is thereby contributing to an overall degradation of system stability and reliability. This notice is a courtesy: please fix this problem. It will become a fatal error in an upcoming update.


That's all-

sorry if this is whiney I do send feedback to Apple but fyi...

Nov 8, 2013 10:54 AM in response to tay07600

Hi everyone, apologies for not being on here for a while...


Thought I'd update you all in saying that even after Apple sent my mate out a brand new iMac - it still didn't work! After a long chat with Apple over the phone, they claim that it is down to the manafacturer to ensure that their products work with Macs and OS X - bloody ridiculous! Therefore, I'm inclined to agree with the other people on it that it MUST be to do with the Fusion Drive in the iMac


Don't ask me how on earth a hard drive has got anything to do with an audio interface - it's madness!


So now my mate is 2 weeks without a fully functional studio so thus is losing money by the day. It all rests on Focusrite at the moment.


And Sebastienka's story explains brilliantly how we're shedding out all of this money to find that these things don't even work! I thought we all payed the Apple premium for it to work out of the box!


Let's just hope (especially for you Benjamin Lowengard1!) that Apple can simply fix this with a OS X update!!

Nov 8, 2013 11:34 AM in response to Benjamin Lowengard1

11/7/13 6:08:02.215 PM Logic Pro X[60682]: CGContextSetFillColorWithColor: invalid context 0x0. This is a serious error. This application, or a library it uses, is using an invalid context and is thereby contributing to an overall degradation of system stability and reliability. This notice is a courtesy: please fix this problem. It will become a fatal error in an upcoming update.

This error relates to a corrupted or invalid library rountine that LPX is trying to access... I have seen this one before and what fixed it was a full clean install of OS X.. (Actually I have also seen the same issue under Lion and Mountain Lion and again it resulted from a bad OS X insatllation/upgrade!)


Summary: It is not a LPX bug as such but an OS X install/Upgrade issue... as the same error msg has been reported in other apps such as FCPX and iPhoto.... Again, in all cases a clean install of OS X fixed it.

Focusrite Liquid Saffire 56 problems on brand new iMac

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