finally got Otari MX5050, having trouble hooking up a mixer...

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Hi_Flyer

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finally got the MX5050-8.... brought it home to play with but I'm having trouble with my mixer. I have a Mackie Onyx1220, which the manual says is a +4, the Otari has an input level trim control, so the -10/+4 mismatch shouldn't be an issue, right?

I tried to simply patch a stereo recording to tracks 1/2 on the Otari through the mixer, I patched it from channels 1/2 on the Mackie with gobs of gain (clipping the hell out of the channels on the Mackie) but its barely moving the needle on the Otari. I also tried taking the signal from the ALT3/4 outputs and same deal, barely a whisper of a signal...

Then I plugged an Audix i5 -> Rane MS 1B -> right into the input on the Otari and it seemed like it was working OK. It was a helluva lot hotter at least, I dunno if it was where it needed to be, but it was better and got the needle into the red.

So any ideas whats going on here? I gotta be mis-matching something, right? The Mackie has a Dsub connector for the recording outs (which I used with my Tascam 38) but I don't have the break out snake with the XLRs. I suspect I need to be taking the signal from the Dsub connector in order to do this correctly, but there has to be another way to do it.

A signal from the main output should be moving the needle, right? could it be the wrong kind of cable? I was a using a balanced XLR -> 1/4" connector, but I don't know if there is some kind of impedance mismatch.

Any ideas? Should I just get a new board? I have thinking about it, the 1220 is a little underpowered for 8 track recording/monitoring.

I'll call the dude that sold it to me tomorrow and make sure he tested it. I suspect its something I may be doing wrong though....

could this have something to do with the way the inputs are wired, i.e. unbalanced XLR with pin 3 hot? do I have to get special cables that are wired differently?
 
I would imagine if you are running your source through channels 1 and 2, and then going from either tape out (don't know if the Onyx series has that or not), line out, or monitor out, you should be working the pre-amp circuit of the Otari pretty good. I'm not familiar with the Onyx series of mixers, but I can only assume that you either have the bus re-routed somewhere by mistake or something is muted.

I miss my 1402.:(
 
no, not a mute/mis-routing. at one point, I disconnected my monitors and plugged the Otari into the same jacks with a balanced 1/4" TRS to XLR cable. One minute, it was cranked through the monitors, but nothing to the Otari...

Also, it appears the Test Osc is working just fine, it moved the meters although I didn't try to record it to tape...

I'm REALLY thinking its the weird Pin 3 hot thing, apparently this is common with Otaris? I found some old posts on the topic in the archives...

Can anybody advise me on the kind of cabling I will need for the Otari?
 
you are correct. you will have to make cables (16). swap the + and - pins at the side of the cable that connects to the otari.
 
will I need those cables for both the inputs and outputs?

make 'em myself huh, I've never done that, how hard is it to do? I got a dsub cable that breaks out to RCAs that I bought for my 38, can I just buy XLR connectors and put them on that snake?
 
also, i'm a little confused here, if i am not getting any signal AT ALL at the Otari inputs, then that must mean that my mixer is sending the ground signal to pin3?? If pin2 is normally hot, is pin 3 normally ground/shield?

I thought pin1 was usually the ground, and pin3 is the inverted copy? So in this case, I was coming out of a balanced 1/4" output on the mixer with a TRS->XLR balanced cable run. and If pin3 is normally carrying a signal from a balanced output (either the normal signal or the inverted one), then I should be getting a signal into the Otari, it would just be inverted.

this doesn't make sense to me, I guess I need to read up a bit on cable wiring...
 
the otari isn't balanced. Its unbalanced +4. Some gear will show up inverted on the inputs and some gear wont show up at all. yes you need to do the inputs and the outputs. you could put xlr's on the dsub. Pin 1 is ground pin 3 is signal.
 
OK thanks, I spent a couple hours working on these cables tonite, it seems to work, but channel 2 input is intermittent. I dunno if its the cabling or what, I guess I'll have to swap the cables around, I suspect its my bad soldering work though.

I also soldered XLRs onto my 1/4" to RCA snake (in place of the XLRs of course) for the outputs. It seems like some of those are bad too. When I patched them into the board, monitoring off the input, some of the channels weren't passing much signal, it was very low and distorted. Again, I guess I also suspect bad solder work, but what do you guys think? what would a bad output sound like on this thing?

I may also call the dude that sold me this thing and find out how extensively he tested it...
 
oh yeah, one more question... what is the surface of the pinch roller supposed to be like? is it supposed to be just slightly sticky? the pinch roller on this deck is just slightly sticky on top and I can't tell if the rubber is gumming up and deteriorating or if it is supposed to be like that to grip the tape... any help?
 
The pinch roller shouldn't be sticky at all. Try taking some Windex and some paper towels to clean it. Using alcohol on the rubber will dry it out and crack it.

-MD
 
OK yeah, I dunno about that the pinch roller, I talked to the dude a little bit ago and he said its only a couple years old and it should be fine. it feels a little weird though. like there is some kind of adhesive, and it leaves a slight gummy residue or something on my fingers if I touch it. I really dunno what to do there. I did use some glass cleaner on it, didn't make much of a difference though, although it cleaned off some oxide from some sticky shed tape...

next question... I got my snake for the outs all wired up. While setting it up and testing it, I noticed the line output level switches on the back were a little scratchy, like there is some dust in there. Is it OK to spray something like a little Deoxit into the switches on the back? I'm getting some weird level differences between channels in playback and record. Since I solved the output/playback level problem and got them all pretty much even using the built in oscillator and jiggling the line output level switches back and forth, I'm thinking it may solve the line input level discrepancies as well.

I'm a little bit scared of damaging something back there by spraying deoxit, but there is definitely some dust contamination back there, I know the unit had been sitting uncovered for awhile. Is there a way to clean some of electronics in the back without replacing stuff?
 
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