What is external sync?

[earthboundrec]

As a feature on software (specifically Tracktion 2)? I imagine it's to keep sync to a word clock or another digital peice of hardware or software's sample rate?

Reason I ask, I currently have an issue with recording the SPDIF output on my Roland XV5050. Signal chain is Controller >>midi>> XV5050 >>SPDIF>> PreSonus FirePod >>firewire>> computer running Tracktion. When I set the FirePod's clock source to SPDIF it then lowers the tone (slows down) of my synth and anything that's being played back. Even when not recording, if I pop a cd in something it will also slow the music down. Kinda strange... Will external sync fix this for recording? Any other ideas?

Lately I just haven't been bothering with recording a digital signal and instead just do two line ins from the synth, but it'd be nice if I could get the SPDIF to work properly. Thanks.

 

[AlexW]

Not real familiar with all of that gear, but in general, when you're running multiple digital devices together--one unit needs to be the master clock source for everything else, and clocks in the other devices need to be slaved to that. Where does Traktion get it's clock signal? You may be able to use the clock in the Firepod and slave the XV5050 and PC to that.