Esi-pro Wami Rack 192x ...help!!

[atinocore]

hi everybody,
I need help with ESI-PRO.

I have a question for you all about my new WAMIRACK 192X.
(it is a perfect sound board, it has everything I need in the perfect
mesures. ...but.. )

recording with CUBASE SX 2(or1, and with all other
software such as nuendo or wavelab), anyway the recording
is not clear. it heavly glitches, and during recording some times
ASIO2 audio drivers get mad producing noise and metal distortion.
every sample rate, every latency (buffer size on the panel)
I'm not talking of a little thing, the gear is unusable for making music.
it cannot be this way!!
I'm sure, there must be something wrong
I'm doing. but I don't know what.
I have set windows to make PROGRAMS work better. (NO ANIMATIONS)
I have uninstalled other hardware of my system..::
no modem, no nets, no LAN... no usb, no other sound cards, no drivers.
(just WAMIRACK192X, keyboard, mouse, videoboard and monitor)
but the problem still remain.
I have updated Wami drivers to latest version.
...still the same.

can you solve this ?
I hope it's my foult, because I don't want to change board,
WamiRack 192x is just too good.
help me please.

mauro

PS: I apology for my bad english

 

[Sklathill]

Have you tried moving the card to different PCI slots?

Also, do you know your motherboard and CPU? If you're using a VERY old combination of chipset and CPU, it's possible that you just can't work that soundcard on your configuration.

 

[atinocore]

here it is my system

Have you tried moving the card to different PCI slots?

Also, do you know your motherboard and CPU? If you're using a VERY old combination of chipset and CPU, it's possible that you just can't work that soundcard on your configuration.

first of all, thank you for your answer.

no I haven't tried to move the PCI card to a different slot, I'm going to do it.
my system is recent, here is it is :

WAMIRACK 192X
ASUS k8v se deluxe
AMD XP 64 3000+
2 x 256mb memory stiks
2 x 120 MAXTOR SATA 150 in raid0 configuration (strip mode)
LG CD-reader 52x
LG CD-writer 52-32-52x
floppy reader
Trust power plus keyboard
Trust mouse one wheel
WINDOWS XP Professional
CUBASE SX2 (tried SX, SX2, 5.1, wavelab ...)

as you can see it's a powerfull "essential-setup" new PC.

reading of a guy who had some problem with WamiRack 192x
I tried the previous drivers such as 4.30 instead 5.01 but
problems still remain.

UK teach support tells me that the board has no problem with
CUBASE and any other applications.
In fact it seems to me very strange...
...there must be a problem somewhere.
ANYWAY there shouldn't be problems with gears of this level....
I'm disappointed. ..and tired.
US T-support is not so active...
....
.....any idea??

 

[Sklathill]

Is Cubase the only thing clicking and glitching?

Do regular windows apps (media player, winamp) have any problems?

You should mention the athlon 64 and motherboard in your correspondence with tech support. It's possible there's an incompatibility because it's a relatively new chipset/motherboard. (Also, it's the weekend, which probably explains why tech support isn't responding to you.)

Have you tried moving between PCI slots yet? Also, perhaps play around with memory timings (make them slightly slower than rated?) (That memory thing is a long shot...)

 

[atinocore]

Is Cubase the only thing clicking and glitching?
Do regular windows apps (media player, winamp) have any problems?

no. regular app do not have problems with this board. they play any file OK.
problems seems to appear with asio driver.

You should mention the athlon 64 and motherboard in your correspondence with tech support. It's possible there's an incompatibility because it's a relatively new chipset/motherboard. (Also, it's the weekend, which probably explains why tech support isn't responding to you.)

I did mention the athlon 64 and motherboard. I finally had a response from
UK support telling me:
There are some issues with Sata hard drives connected
through some specific PCI Raid controllers
Unfortunatly ESI do not have an absolute solution to this it may
be caused by controllers and not ESI cards

I don't know.
I'm tired. I think that they should tell me this before.

Have you tried moving between PCI slots yet? Also, perhaps play around with memory timings (make them slightly slower than rated?) (That memory thing is a long shot...)

well I tried first to move to another slot. NO CHANGE.
than I resetted it on 4th slot (that's the "non-shared RQ")
I tried to slower memory but also this produced NO CHANGE.
so, crying I say that I've been loving you all.
Save a prayer, I'm going to suicide.

 

[sumitsimlai]

Hello, what happened after that? Was the problem cured? I know it is sounding funny and crazy asking this question after 20 years. I am 60 and own the very same card ESI WAMI RACK 192X as you. And I want to install it in my Advantech computer with windows 10.

 

[TalismanRich]

Since those guys have been gone for about 8 years, they probably won't respond. But you might answer a few questions. Do you have the last drivers. Looking on ESI's website, they have a driver for Win8.1 64bit. Assuming you're doing Win 10 64 bit, I would get that driver and give it a shot. Sometimes, they do work with the next version.

ESI - Download: WaMi Rack 192X

download.esi-audio.com

The next obvious question is "Does your motherboard have the right PCI slot?" Very few modern systems have a PCI slot. I don't know the Avantech so I cant comment on that.

How much time and effort are you willing to expend on this project? I know it sucks to toss out what was expensive gear, but a lot of advances have taken place in the past 20 years. Grabbing a USB Focusrite for a couple hundred $$ might be less frustrating unless you just enjoy working on computer stuff (I'm fiddling with an old Mac IBook G4 right now just for fun and looking to convert an old Dell to Linux next week).

 

[sumitsimlai]

Hello Sir, your reply was a godsend.

Please allow me to elaborate on my situation, hoping that it clarifies what exactly I did so far.

I sent a detailed email to ESI who in the near past have responded to me nicely, giving me confidence that windows 10 will work. That’s how I landed upon this expensive exercise. Here it is:

“Dear Andreas,

Hello. Firstly, I wish you a belated Merry Christmas and a very happy and meaningful 2024.

I have been able to install much of my computer hardware by now, after a long delay due to non availability of Advantech motherboards from Taiwan.

I am writing this email to verify steps that I have taken and to check if I have done something incorrectly, so as to make the Wami Rack 192X work, and if it turns out that it won’t work with my computer configuration, at least I can take a decision.

I have since installed Windows 10 on the Advantech IPC, with configuration as follows:

- Advantech AIMB-705 motherboard
- Intel H110 chipset,
- Intel i7-7700 processor
- 32GB RAM (DDR4)
- Zotac GeForce GT730 DDR3 Graphics Card
- System HDD 320GB (C drive)
- Additional HDD 1TB

I installed the version 1.10 driver from ESI website which complies with Win 8.1 and older Windows versions. However, I find that instead of the usual devices such as WaMi Rack EWDM 192 MIDI, WaMi Rack EWDM 192 Wave-1 to 5 and WaMi Rack EWDM 192 Controller by ESI, only two devices were installed as follows:

- WaMi Rack 192 Audio
- WaMi Rack 192X Controller

There were no MIDI devices and no Wave devices installed.

Thinking it could be a driver issue (note that the readme.txt says driver not tested on hardware), I uninstalled version 1.10 completely and installed 1.08, but with same results.

To check whether the two drivers 1.10 and 1.08 were same or different, I went into device manager of version 1.08 and selected to update the driver. It came back with a message saying that the best / latest drivers were already installed.

So I stayed with version 1.08.

I then selected WaMi Rack as audio playback device and connected the interface cable between the breakout box and PCI card. However, please note that I didn’t makeany audio input connections, assuming that the breakout cable would faithfully transmit audio data from hard disk based audio files to the breakout box headphone port. With headphones connected to the HP socket on the breakout box, I tried playing a song saved on my computer. NO SOUND.

However, the song played on computer speaker when I selected Realtek (onboard audio).

I have no idea what’s going on, but I surely want to rule out all possibilities, and take a decision. I do need support of experts at ESI like you to help sort this out.

Please tell me where I am going wrong.

I am attaching a screenshot of Event Viewer and of Device Manager for your needful.

PS: An important observation I forgot to mention.

When I tried playing the song with WaMi Rack selected as the playback device, the song time position would remain at zero, as if being blocked from moving forward. The moment I switched to the internal audio playback device of the computer, the cursor would start moving and the song playing back.

Thanks in advance for any advice that may help me proceed.”

 

[sumitsimlai]

While I do agree that new decides are there and I did also buy myself a Focusrite 4i4 a couple of others, my set up being a multi computer one, there’s no way I’m willing to ditch the old stuff for obvious reasons. I also hand the Echo Mia and the EMU 1212M PCI.

The Advantech AIMB-705 has five PCI slots. It’s an industrial motherboard designed for government work where they are still into older OSs and peripherals for works like space, nuclear, defence etc.

I did try the latest driver which installed perfectly but May be I’m unable to collect the system properly to get sound. Since I’m currently in the process of setting up yet again, my mixer and speaker are not in a position to be connected. I tried attaching headphones to the breakout box but no sound. All this old mentioned in my email to ESI.
Let me know if you could throw some light on a possible solution for me. Shall remain grateful.

 

[TalismanRich]

One thing that I would try is doing a rollback to Win 7 (I wasn't a fan of 8 or 8,1), You know that the drivers work with Win7. I would pick up a cheap SSD (500GBs are $40 or so), clone the current drive and work on the clone. You might need to find or create install discs. If you get things running, you can always clone back to your primary drive.

Considering that Win 10 goes EOL in 2025, you'll be looking at the same situation in 1.5 years, plus your 7th Gen I7 isn't supported by Win 11. As long as you aren't going online with the computer, Win 7 is a perfectly good OS.

 

[ecc83]

Some years ago I bought an ESI 1010 interface (PCIe card + breakout box on HDMI still have it somewhere!) The chap at ESI was very patient and helpful and eventually managed to get the driver installed and running but it was a huge faff. I then asked him about the MIDI side? "I would not bother with that" he said and I concluded the interface was not very good.
Since moved on to USB. NI KA6 and now MOTU M4. Both bombproof.

Dave.