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[Jay Ashworth]

My theatre has a small, in-booth Dante net, used primarily to route direct-out audio from our LS9-32 to our Protools rig (PT10 on a Mac Pro cheesegrater, running DVS and Controller).  (There's also a Rednet1, but I've never used it.)

That much has been working fine for 6 years or so; we use it 8 or 10 times a year for concerts.

For our next theatre show, we needed to stuff the band in our scene shop, so we pulled out our backup LS9, never used but a couple times, upgraded it from 1.11 to 1.35 firmware, and cabled it up from the shop to the booth, through our stage network, about 90 feet of in-wall ethernet cable.

Controller sees the MY-AUD cards come up just fine, and after adjusting the patching on the B console -- the one I'm trying to use as, essentially, a stagebox -- I got a burst of audio, maybe 5 seconds, a couple of times.

And that was all.

(My audio source was an open mic, listening to Alexa across the room; I could see the level continuously on the console meters, and via SM2 up the separately cabled ethernet run that put that console on our Production LAN.  The audio I got through was identifiably the smooth jazz I asked Alexa to play, and as clean as you'd expect across a 30 ft room through a Heil PR-22.  Everything is at 48kHz, and I tried a couple permutations of word clocking on the LS9's with no luck.)

A buddy of mine is the FOH mixer at the Berklee Performance Center in Boston, and was kind enough to listen to me yammer and whine about it, but the only suggestion he had that I didn't tell him I'd already done was to loosen the latency knobs for the relevant devices in Controller -- they were at .015 and I opened them to, I think, .05?  4 clicks up instead of 1.  Sadly, that didn't help either.

There don't seem to be a lot of diagnostic tools for Dante networks (that aren't hardware costing 3 grand and up), and Controller doesn't tell you much either...  so I'm at sort of a loss.

Anyone got any suggestions I can try out?  I'll be back in the room 2 or 3 times before tech week starts on Monday, so I'll still have time to apply a bigger hammer, soon's I find out what that is... :-)

[brian maddox]

My theatre has a small, in-booth Dante net, used primarily to route direct-out audio from our LS9-32 to our Protools rig (PT10 on a Mac Pro cheesegrater, running DVS and Controller).  (There's also a Rednet1, but I've never used it.)

That much has been working fine for 6 years or so; we use it 8 or 10 times a year for concerts.

For our next theatre show, we needed to stuff the band in our scene shop, so we pulled out our backup LS9, never used but a couple times, upgraded it from 1.11 to 1.35 firmware, and cabled it up from the shop to the booth, through our stage network, about 90 feet of in-wall ethernet cable.

Controller sees the MY-AUD cards come up just fine, and after adjusting the patching on the B console -- the one I'm trying to use as, essentially, a stagebox -- I got a burst of audio, maybe 5 seconds, a couple of times.

And that was all.

(My audio source was an open mic, listening to Alexa across the room; I could see the level continuously on the console meters, and via SM2 up the separately cabled ethernet run that put that console on our Production LAN.  The audio I got through was identifiably the smooth jazz I asked Alexa to play, and as clean as you'd expect across a 30 ft room through a Heil PR-22.  Everything is at 48kHz, and I tried a couple permutations of word clocking on the LS9's with no luck.)

A buddy of mine is the FOH mixer at the Berklee Performance Center in Boston, and was kind enough to listen to me yammer and whine about it, but the only suggestion he had that I didn't tell him I'd already done was to loosen the latency knobs for the relevant devices in Controller -- they were at .015 and I opened them to, I think, .05?  4 clicks up instead of 1.  Sadly, that didn't help either.

There don't seem to be a lot of diagnostic tools for Dante networks (that aren't hardware costing 3 grand and up), and Controller doesn't tell you much either...  so I'm at sort of a loss.

Anyone got any suggestions I can try out?  I'll be back in the room 2 or 3 times before tech week starts on Monday, so I'll still have time to apply a bigger hammer, soon's I find out what that is... :-)

EDIT: First step in Dante troubleshooting is always to make sure that the only network that is plugged in is the primary network on the hardware devices and that secondary network is not connected to anything. Like literally make sure nothing is plugged into it at all. Full air gap. I've spent way too much time chasing Dante gremlins only to find the issue was one secondary port connected to something that I was SURE didn't go anywhere. So yeah. If you've got anything plugged into them, unplug the secondary ports.


Well, the first thing I suspect is clocking. You tried " a couple of permutations of clocking" but that's not really troubleshooting.

Once you get past a couple of digital audio devices, it's important to understand how your devices are clocking together so you can configure it properly. The central principle is always the same. One device is the leader, and everything else has to follow that device.

In your case, you have 4 Dante hardware devices [assuming the rednet is not plugged in], the two LS9s and the 2 -MY-AUD cards. You also have one software device, the Protools rig. Software devices cannot be clock leaders, so you need to choose which of the hardware devices to make the leader and then ensure that all the other devices are following that.

This is not the only way to configure your system, but this is how I would do it. I would designate the MY-AUD card in the booth as the preferred leader. you can do this in Dante controller by checking the "preferred leader" box on the clock status tab. The other MY-AUD card will default to clocking from the Dante network, so there's nothing you'll need to do there. DVS for your ProTools rig will do the same.

However, your LS9s will need to be set to clock from their respective MY-AUD cards. This is in the word clock page as part of the setup section in the console.

I'm not positive this will fix your issue, but it's a very important first step in configuring your Dante network.

[Jay Ashworth]

EDIT: First step in Dante troubleshooting is always to make sure that the only network that is plugged in is the primary network on the hardware devices and that secondary network is not connected to anything. Like literally make sure nothing is plugged into it at all. Full air gap. I've spent way too much time chasing Dante gremlins only to find the issue was one secondary port connected to something that I was SURE didn't go anywhere. So yeah. If you've got anything plugged into them, unplug the secondary ports.

Yup; I don't have a secondary switch, and none of my hardware devices which have secondary ports have anything plugged into them.  There's an 8-port Gig Switch at the B console to combine the lo and hi primary ports onto the cable, and both lo and hi at the A console upstairs are plugged into the Dante core switch, in the rack with the Mac Pro.

Well, the first thing I suspect is clocking. You tried " a couple of permutations of clocking" but that's not really troubleshooting.

Once you get past a couple of digital audio devices, it's important to understand how your devices are clocking together so you can configure it properly. The central principle is always the same. One device is the leader, and everything else has to follow that device.

In your case, you have 4 Dante hardware devices [assuming the rednet is not plugged in], the two LS9s and the 2 -MY-AUD cards.

Perhaps I phrased it wrong.  The LS9 has 2 card slots.  Each has a 16x16 Dante card plugged into it.  No native-chassis Dante on the LS9.

You also have one software device, the Protools rig. Software devices cannot be clock leaders, so you need to choose which of the hardware devices to make the leader and then ensure that all the other devices are following that.

This is not the only way to configure your system, but this is how I would do it. I would designate the MY-AUD card in the booth as the preferred leader. you can do this in Dante controller by checking the "preferred leader" box on the clock status tab. The other MY-AUD card will default to clocking from the Dante network, so there's nothing you'll need to do there. DVS for your ProTools rig will do the same.

The MY-AUD cards are what it usually tries to set as the Clock Master, but I've had the network come apart on me in the past when I tried to pick one with Preferred.  I'll give that another shot...

However, your LS9s will need to be set to clock from their respective MY-AUD cards. This is in the word clock page as part of the setup section in the console.

... after making this change.  The upstairs A console is -- and has been -- set to it's internal Master Clock at 48k FWIW, and that's always worked, even though you suggest it shouldn't.

I'm not positive this will fix your issue, but it's a very important first step in configuring your Dante network.

It sure is.  I'll try it tonight.

So, pick one MY-AUD card as the clock master in Controller, and set *both* desks to slave off of {a/that} slot clock, do I have that right?

[Helge A Bentsen]

What happens if you disconnect the switch in the second console?

[brian maddox]

Yup; I don't have a secondary switch, and none of my hardware devices which have secondary ports have anything plugged into them.  There's an 8-port Gig Switch at the B console to combine the lo and hi primary ports onto the cable, and both lo and hi at the A console upstairs are plugged into the Dante core switch, in the rack with the Mac Pro.

Perhaps I phrased it wrong.  The LS9 has 2 card slots.  Each has a 16x16 Dante card plugged into it.  No native-chassis Dante on the LS9.

The MY-AUD cards are what it usually tries to set as the Clock Master, but I've had the network come apart on me in the past when I tried to pick one with Preferred.  I'll give that another shot...

... after making this change.  The upstairs A console is -- and has been -- set to it's internal Master Clock at 48k FWIW, and that's always worked, even though you suggest it shouldn't.

It sure is.  I'll try it tonight.

So, pick one MY-AUD card as the clock master in Controller, and set *both* desks to slave off of {a/that} slot clock, do I have that right?

Just making sure we're on the same page. You have 2 LS9s. Each has an MY-AUD card in it. The two MY-AUD cards are connected via in house network [or is it a dedicated ethernet cable point to point?]. And you have a ProTools DVS on the same network. Is that correct?

Your previous configuration "just worked" with the internal LS9 clock because the card clocked to the LS9 [which is it's default behaviour] and DVS clocked to the Card. The wrinkle you've introduced [assuming I have your configuration correct in my head] is that you've added another MY-AUD card [which would by default clock to your existing network], but you've added a second LS9 and that device HAS TO clock to the MY-AUD card inserted into it or you will have clock issues.

You can continue to use your main LS9 internal clock as your primary clock and just make sure you clock your second LS9 to it's card. Completely valid approach. As I said, my configuration isn't the only one that will work.

FWIW, I am aware that the LS9 does not have Dante native. However, just for anyone else that might be reading this thread in the future, what I'm describing would STILL be true if it did have "Dante native" [Like a QL or CL console] because all that actually means is that there is an Audinate Brooklyn Dante card permanently installed inside the chassis rather than on a removable card. The Brooklyn card and the console are still separate devices, and you still need to think through the clocking of them as if they were two separate devices.

[Glen Kelley]

Anyone got any suggestions I can try out?  I'll be back in the room 2 or 3 times before tech week starts on Monday, so I'll still have time to apply a bigger hammer, soon's I find out what that is... :-)

Check the clock status tab in controller. Do you see more than 1 leader, or is the leader bouncing between devices? We have seen both of these things occur when IGMP was incorrectly configured on the network switches.

There is also this note in the help file:

Enable Sync To External
A Dante device set to 'Enable Sync To External' will use the external word clock from its host equipment to tune its onboard VCXO. A Dante device with this attribute set will become the PTP Leader Clock, unless there is another Dante device present with 'Preferred Leader' set.

Preferred Leader
Sometimes it may be necessary to force a particular device to provide the PTP Leader Clock. A Dante device with 'Preferred Leader' set will always be chosen as the PTP Leader Clock. If more than one device has 'Preferred Leader' set, the device with the lowest MAC address will be chosen.

Note:  If device A is deriving its clock from an external word clock source ('Enable Sync To External'), but device B is set as Preferred Leader, device A will lose sync with the Dante network and will eventually be muted - unless device B is also deriving its clock from the same external source as device A.

Maybe check to make sure you don't have this situation, with both "sync to external" and "preferred leader" enabled on different devices.

[Riley Casey]

Controller can be more informative than it appears if you poke it with a sharp stick. Have you checked the device and event tabs for any details?

...

There don't seem to be a lot of diagnostic tools for Dante networks (that aren't hardware costing 3 grand and up), and Controller doesn't tell you much either...  so I'm at sort of a loss.

[Dave Garoutte]

Is it possible that the upstairs switch is not set correctly for dante?

[Jay Ashworth]

Is it possible that the upstairs switch is not set correctly for dante?

It's been working for our 32 channel protools recording for 6 years, even without the (permanent, A, upstairs) LS9 syncing to the dante card properly.  (By which I mean it was in Internal.)

To answer some other questions, I have *two* MY16 cards in each desk, as each only does half the channel space.

My controller is 3.2.4.1.  I see that 4.2 is current, but I need an account to get it, and i suspect I'll need to produce a license code or something that came with the MY cards when we bought the desks... 12 years ago.  :-}  [ I didn't, but 4.6 requires 10.15 or greater, and this box will never have that.  I LOVE Apple.

And that machine is on 10.8.6, and can't practically be upgraded--at least not in time to solve my current problem, and possibly not ever; it's a Pro5,1.  So I might not be able to run it if I can get it.

I've seen a couple suggestions to update the FW in the MY cards, but I can't even find a way in the desk control panel to see what they are running now.

I *did* upgrade the B desk Yamaha FW from 1.10 to 1.35, current; the other desk was already running that.

And:

Your previous configuration "just worked" with the internal LS9 clock because the card clocked to the LS9 [which is it's default behaviour] and DVS clocked to the Card. The wrinkle you've introduced [assuming I have your configuration correct in my head] is that you've added another MY-AUD card [which would by default clock to your existing network], but you've added a second LS9 and that device HAS TO clock to the MY-AUD card inserted into it or you will have clock issues.

Actually, the original configuration had *two* MY's in the same LS9, lower 16 and upper.  The current configuration has 4, 2 in each desk.  Controller 3.2 sees all 4, and has the 32 necessary patches for what I want.

I have some photos of the config screens, but I can't conveniently get them out of my phone and into the thread til I get home from here.  In short, I told LS9's to word-clock from Card1-Slot1, and told Controller to Prefer DeskA-Card1 (which is already was), but that hasn't helped either.

So far as I can tell.  :-}

[brian maddox]

It's been working for our 32 channel protools recording for 6 years, even without the (permanent, A, upstairs) LS9 syncing to the dante card properly.  (By which I mean it was in Internal.)

To answer some other questions, I have *two* MY16 cards in each desk, as each only does half the channel space.

My controller is 3.2.4.1.  I see that 4.2 is current, but I need an account to get it, and i suspect I'll need to produce a license code or something that came with the MY cards when we bought the desks... 12 years ago.  :-}  [ I didn't, but 4.6 requires 10.15 or greater, and this box will never have that.  I LOVE Apple.

And that machine is on 10.8.6, and can't practically be upgraded--at least not in time to solve my current problem, and possibly not ever; it's a Pro5,1.  So I might not be able to run it if I can get it.

I've seen a couple suggestions to update the FW in the MY cards, but I can't even find a way in the desk control panel to see what they are running now.

I *did* upgrade the B desk Yamaha FW from 1.10 to 1.35, current; the other desk was already running that.

And:
Actually, the original configuration had *two* MY's in the same LS9, lower 16 and upper.  The current configuration has 4, 2 in each desk.  Controller 3.2 sees all 4, and has the 32 necessary patches for what I want.

I have some photos of the config screens, but I can't conveniently get them out of my phone and into the thread til I get home from here.  In short, I told LS9's to word-clock from Card1-Slot1, and told Controller to Prefer DeskA-Card1 (which is already was), but that hasn't helped either.

So far as I can tell.  :-}

Cool. Great info.

Dante controller is free and doesn't require any codes. If Audinate is requiring an account, it's just a free sign up. You can run it on any computer on the network, so even if you just attach your personal laptop [windows or Mac] just for diagnostic purposes, it'll work just fine. I would recommend trying to get to a later version of Dante Controller via some means just to get better diagnostics and take that variable out of the equation.

The way you are clocking things SHOULD work fine, so I think we can maybe set aside clocking as the cause. Although I'd love to see what a Dante Controller has to say about that just to be sure.

Your MY-AUD cards can be updated using Dante Updater which I believe is now a part of Dante Controller. It makes updating the cards pretty straightforward.  Although I think it may get slightly stupid with Yamaha products IIRC. Still, I would pursue getting those on the latest firmware as well. Mostly we're trying to eliminate variables so we can whittle down to what is causing your issue.

Then we turn to networking issues. If you're piggybacking on an existing in house network there are switch configuration and other issues that can cause a bunch of headaches. But we need to know a bit more about how your network is configured and what else is on that network to better help you sleuth through those issues.

[ProSoundWeb Community]