Oh Man, I FRIED IT...

  • Thread starter Thread starter mindbuzz
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mindbuzz

mindbuzz

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Ahem, I've written a stupid poem out of rhyming couplets.

I had the most beautiful, wonderful pre.
I used the thing less than a day --
My precious Focusrite Voicemaster Pro.
And now it's gone. Fried. Totally done fo'.
Kaput. Kicked the can. Playing a harp in the clouds.
I ran phantom power through one of the outs.
It was an accident. I swear. Dammit.
I was getting a ton of feedback, and I panicked.

And now it's gone. :(
 
OWCH!!!

:(

Nice peom, though.

Is it still under warranty? You can just say "I plugged it in and it didn't work? I smelled smoke, though. Is it suppose to smell like that? HELP!"

-C
 
No, no warranty. I bought it used.

I should write a cookbook.
Simple and Easy Ways to Cook a Pre.

Recipe #1 "Focusrite Capacitor Fondu"

1 Focusrite Class-A Pre
1 XLR cable
1 High End Mic
48V Phantom Power
Cheese (optional)

Simply plug your XLR cable into an outboard Phantom Power source, route the other end of the cable into the back of your Focusrite. Allow the Focusrite ample time to overload, and voila, you're done. Serves at least one band.
 
wonderful poem, but it sucks that your pre had to be fried for inspiration. where in NorCal are you by the way?
 
op amps ! that's one reason why i stay away from that kind of gear. chances are you've fried some output buffers. then maybe a regulator or two or three etc.
transfomer coupled outputs wouldn't necessarily fry like that. they would survive
 
Up near Sacramento. Why?
Sorry, I really don't want to adopt any cats if that's what you're thinking.

I'll crack open the Focusrite tomorrow after I gut the studio to prep for the new setup. I'd like to fix it if I can.
 
now whats the difference between an opamp and a transformer?
 
earworm said:
now whats the difference between an opamp and a transformer?
Click to expand...

A transformer is a passive component--it's a couple of coils of wire wrapped around some pieces of metal. Transformers block DC, so the 48V of phantom wouldn't have gotten through to other components.

Opamps ("operational amplifiers") are active components--integrated circuits (ICs), with a few transistors & some other stuff on a chip. They don't like voltage outside their ratings. Opamps actually do the work of amplification, whereas transformers do not--they can swap voltage for current, but that's about it. The two other amplification choices are tubes and discrete transistors.

It wouldn't be unusual for a pre to have both--like my M80, that has input transformers (but not output), and uses opamps for gain.

However, in non-transformer gear, it's typical for the outputs to have DC blocking caps to remove any DC offset coming off the opamps. But they might not be rated for 48V, and more importantly, you probably hit them backwards, since they are probably polar electrolytic units. That's where I would look first.

Another choice would be resistors near the output, could have exceeded their wattage rating.
 
Aren't we ignoring the fact the the unit has +48v phantom power in it? Why use an external one? That's just fucking stupidity on your part. Sorry, but I'm not sorry.
 
You're not gonna throw it away are you? If so, throw it my way.
Sorry it happened, can't say I haven't done stupider things than that.

-RD

(Nice empathy HangDawg)
 
The Focusrite only has one mic input. I ran the XLR out to XLR input #2 on my Edirol DA2496 breakout box (it has 2 XLR in's on the front). Then I ran a microphone direct into the Edirol XLR input #1 and flipped the phantom power directly on the patchbay/breakout box. It has a weak preamp itself (nothing compared to the FF). When I unplugged and set up again, I forgot to disable the ph48v on the direct box input #1, ran the FF pre into the #1 in, and my signal cracked out. It took me only seconds after that to realize what I'd done, but by that time it was fried. It cooked my DA2496 too.

No way am I throwing these things away. If you want the breakout box/soundcard combo, I could pack it up and send it your way. The PCI soundcard still works. Edirol ASIO and WDM drivers on the card are awesome. Only the inputs on the outbox are messed up.

BTW, what's rep power?
 
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mindbuzz said:
It cooked my DA2496 too.
Click to expand...

That doesn't make sense. There are current limiting resistors in a phantom supply. You can short phantom to ground and it shouldn't hurt.
 
?

Okay, maybe something else happened.
If it still works that would be awesome.
I'll plug it in again today. See if it works.
Gimmee a day to trouble shoot.
 
Well, there's something definitely wrong with it. I can't get hear any audio from my DA2496, either through the headphones or the speakers when I try to input through the breakout box. I dropped in the ASIO settings from the control panel. The settings always worked for me in the past with Sonar. But now I get intermittent little jumps on the green meters, still only an air sound at max vol. and nothing audible. But if I double click an mp3 from the hard disk it plays just fine. :rolleyes:

The Focusrite dies after a few seconds of weak signal and will fade in and out kind of like it heats up and works poorly for a little while and then fizzles out. The meter leds don't jump and light up like they should, and it's just sad to listen to. So I'm unplugging it now. :(

I dunno. Maybe a power surge? I have surge protectors. The phantom power switch was surely the thing that did it. I can't think of anything else that might have contributed to the death of both my patchbay and the pre at the same time.
 
Only the audio interface got crisped.

So... update. I've been saving and building since then, when I turned my Edirol unit into burnt toast. Now I got all new equipment. New computer, new card, new mixer, dual mons, stereo nearfields, etc. Plugged in the Focusrite. It works BEAUTIFULLY. Coolest thing ever. :o

Anybody thinking about getting a Yamaha 01V96/RME/Cubase setup, should.

:)
 
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Yep. (apparently a reply needs to be more than 10 characters. never knew that. good to know. basically, all I wanted to say was, "Yep.") :)
 
The Focusrite folks are very supportive and will probably fix that for little $
 
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