Aardvark released its XP and 2000 drivers!

  • Thread starter Thread starter neirbo
  • Start date Start date
N

neirbo

New member
The planets have aligned, and I think Hell is getting chilly, because Aardvark just posted the Windows XP and 2K drivers on their website. The link still says "Prerelease", but when you click it you go to the driver download page and can download it.

I just hope they work.
 
neirbo,

Nice post, I've been waiting (like everyone else) for those drivers...

Should be interesting to see if my previous problems with the Beta drivers go away...

Queue
 
MME or WDM?

Ok, they updated the web page so it doesn't say "prerelease" anymore.

Aardvark also just posted a page explaining its WDM drivers for XP and 2000. This a little weird. They call their driver the A/WDM (Aardvark WDM) drivers - no problemo. But, they then say that Sonar users need to click the box that forces Sonar to use MME drivers: "Choosing MME allows the Aardvark hardware to use the low-latency A|WDM driver, which isn’t possible via WDM". Hmmmmmmm.

Also, I spoke with the Aardvark driver guy, Tom Adler, about this a couple weeks ago, and he told me that the drivers would be MME, but somehow optimized to give latency lower than WDM.

To me it looks like MME and smells like an MME, so if it quacks like a duck....

I don't really care what kind of driver it is as long as latency is low, and the website gives a ridiculously low latency of 1.5 to 3.0 ms!

Anyone try the drivers yet? Any thoughts?
 
Before I inatall win-2000 I REALLY want to know how well these new drivers work. Surely someone has tried them?
Larry
 
So far so good...

I was having REAL issues (couldn't playback without a high pitch whine) with the beta drivers, those are gone. I'll see if I can record soon.

Queue
 
Hey Aard users..Need help..

Hi guys
Really need your help..
Im having problems with my 24/96.. When I started working on my PC, there was no sound sometimes.. Then I opened the Aard contorl panel , it all sounded " boommm" with some weird crackles and all was Ok then.. The sound came back..

I use WIN98SE with Cubase...Had VIA chipset with SDRAM...It was all ok with those little problems..

But..
These days I've changed my motherboard..VIA Kt266 I think and Im using DDR ram.. I worked fine 4-5 hours..And then the problems started.. I started to hear very loud noises, crackles..Distorsion.. And then the program freezes..
Next, i couldnt play WAV files.. Then, in my Cubase audio settings - my Aardvark card was missing..!!!!!

And at the end, no sound at all.. I reinstalled my card.. But the problems were still there..
I once again heard the sound Ok, and after that It was all gone wrong, again..

Im a little desperate.. Dont know where to start from..Cant locate the problem.. Is it the motherboard change?
Or is my card causing the problems?

It all came out without a reason..
Really need your help aardvark guys..


Thanx
TORUS



P.S. Before I posted this message, I wanted to ask you If you suggest me turning to XP.. But , this happened..
 
torus,
When you got a new MOBO, did you re-install the OS?
Queue
 
I've had weird problems using my Q10 on Win98SE that sound similar to yours. I tried everything I could think of for months, and nothing really took care of the problem. Usually, I can let the program run a while and then restart and the crackles disappear, so I just live with it. Annoying, but still functional.

Do you have another sound card (like a Soundblaster)?, If so, this has been shown to sometimes create problems for others. I'd try disabling any other sound cards in BIOS and in Windows and see if the problem presisits.

You could also try reinstalling your OS, and/or the sound card drivers. Do you know a program called Ghost? It is a way to make exact copies of your hard drive to CDs or to a different hard drive, and it comes in really handy for troubleshooting. When I was fiddling a lot I reformatted my hard drive, then installed Windows, then backed up my drive using Ghost before adding any other progarms or drivers. That way I could easily go back to a "virgin" Windows system and try something else without having to reinstall Windows each time.

I hope to updgrade to XP this weekend, and I really hope this takes care of my problem. I'll let you know how it goes.
 
Answers...

Guys..
I think I've solved my problem..
It seems that I didnt reinstaled my OS..It had to be done..I ve made a copy with Ghost..But I didnt make a reinstall of the OS..
Then I made a clean install od XP and it was all fine..

Xp is acting Ok as it seems to me. I only had some problems with some of my software but I can be solved..

I cant see the difference between these and the old drivers..What about AWDM they talked about??
LAtency is the same, everything is the same..

ITs Ok for now.. Will update you with newest things..


Thanx
TORUS
 
Re: Answers...

TORUS said:
I cant see the difference between these and the old drivers..What about AWDM they talked about??
LAtency is the same, everything is the same..
Click to expand...

That's not encouraging. Torus, did you do the tweaks to Sonar that Aardvark recommends, like clicking the "use MME only" button under audio options?
 
partial success

I installed the new Aardvark drivers and Sonar XL on Windows 2000. My results were 50/50.

The good news is that, after some intial glitches and freeze ups installing, I got the drivers to work. And, I can get my latency down to about 3 ms! I haven't tried softsynths yet. My latency numbers are from using Revalver amp simulator and some reverbs plugins with live monitoring on a new, empty project. When I added a guitar track with live monitoring of reverb to an existing project that was fairly big (12 tracks, lots of plugins) I only had to boost my latency up to around 6 ms to avoid problems. Pretty cool results.

The bad news is that the Aardvark software won't work, so right now I can't adjust preamp trims or route my signal. I get an error that says "The procedure entry point SMapLS could not be located in the DLL KERNEL 32.dll". I have no idea what this means, except that is looks like a file is missing. Anyone know what this means and how I can fix it?

my sytem highlights:
1400 Ghz Athlon
256 DDR ram
Q10
Sonar 2.0 XL
Windows 2000 professional
separate data drive, 7200 RPM
 
neirbo, (and everyone else)
Please be sure to report any problems with the drivers to Aardvark, as they are the anly ones who can fix 'em.

The problem you're experiencing looks like a programming error. What version of Win2k are you using? dlls are basically programs with lots of little programs (procedures) in them. Looks like the Aark driver is expecting a certain procedure to be in your KERNEL32.dll, and it isn't there... Different versions of dll's have different stuff in them. Maybe hitting Win2k with a service pack would help (I think they were at SP2 last time I checked.)

Queue
 
I have Windows 2000 professional, without any service packs or any other updates. I'll give the service packs a try. Also, I went to Aardvark's web page and they now have an updated FAQ page. One of them talks about the software not loading and that Aardvark has a fix. It doesn't sound exactly like my problem, but it could be so I'll give that a shot too.

Queue, have you tried the new drivers yet?
 
I have them successfully loaded on an XP Pro setup. Playback was working fine, haven't had a chance to record (yet).

Queue
 
hey
has anyone tried to run gigastudio on the new drivers? do they support gsif - i haven't seen anywhere they do!
does gigasampler 1.65 run under win2000?

lukgier
 
Problems..Please help

Hi Aardvark guys..
I did a clean install of Xp ... Everything works fine and the drivers are ok.. BUT.

Now the problems started and I cant locate my problem..
When I play many tracks in CUbase and when edit the tracks and go in and out of the tracks, when I minimize the cubase window, sometimes even when i stop and rewind the song it gets slow...:(
The CPU meter shows 30% usage and on some moments when I rewind, edit or something while playing - It gets 100% and peaks..Slows..
Dont know what to do..
In soundforge either, when I play wav , at the end of the playing file it freezes and plays in circle...

It was all ok and then this happened.. I put new MOBO with 512 DDR ram, have Via chipset kt266a ..Running on Athlon XP 1500...

Dont know what to do..Cant work this way..
Please help..


TORUS
 
Does anyone have the Q10 with new drivers under WinXP? What is your experience? I want to buy this gear, but I'm not sur if it will work...

What about AWDM - is this a competitor to ASIO or do they work togehter? What latecy can you achieve with them?
 
Drivers get two thumbs up!

The new Aardvark drivers perform as advertised for me. The latency is down to anywhere from 2 to 6 ms depending on how many tracks and plugins I have running.

My previous problem (reported above) came from a weird dual-boot issue and files being shared by both systems. I have since cleared it up, and the drivers appear to be working perfectly (on 2K).
 
Neirbo,

I tried to set up a dual boot, but gave up and went back to w-98. After I installed the new ark drivers I was getting worse results than with Win-98. With W-2000 I was using about 15% CPU with one stereo track and no effects. Could you help me maybe?
I have:

P-III 733 MHz in asus CISL2-C MOBO with intel 815 EP chipset

Primary HD = 20 Gig maxtor, 5400 rpm, which I split into two partitions.
Win-98 on the first partition and W-2000 on the second.
( I have now formatted the win-2000 part. and reinstalled win-98)

Secondary HD = 40 gig maxtor 7200 RPM for audio files.

Aardvark direct pro 24/96

I installed 2000 service pack II and everything I could think of and it still would not work as well as win-98.

I record with n-track version 3.05 which is supposed to work much better with 2000 than 98.

Any Ideas?????
Larry
 
Larry,

I haven't notice any obvious additional CPU drain when I switched to 2K, so I doubt it is a fundamental issue with the new OS. Did you do the tweaks recommended on the Aardvark web page? The most important (for Sonar) is clicking "always use MME drivers." I'm not sure if N-track has something similar.

Also, what latency are you trying to use? I find that the CPU power required goes up rapidly as I get down under around 5 ms. I usually run at around 6 ms, which I find is a good balance between latency and CPU power required. If I run at 2 ms, my CPU jumps up to around 50% with just a couple tracks.

I had problems when I had both 98 and 2K versions of drivers around. I ended up uninstalling all my audio related software and drivers from my 98 OS, then reinstalling everything in 2K. That cleared things up. I had both systems on one partition however, so I'm not sure this would be a problem for your computer, but it might be worth a shot.

Beyond that, I'd suggest the usual tweaks to get more power from your computer (reduce video bit depth to 16, turn off all non-essential programs running in the background etc.).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top