[DilettantParticipant]

It is completely unclear for me at the Moment if the Problem here is the drive or the NVME to USB Adapter in that Drive Box. The Realtek Chipset seems to belong to the Box.

OTOH since I can successfully record hours of 32 Tracks in 24/48 to that USB disk using a Notebook and Ardour even while streaming the Channels from SQ6 USB Port B and even over an USB 2.0 host, the broken part here from my point of view is clearly not the drive but the Mixing Desk.

[DilettantParticipant]

You might be best to post your question within the SQ users section as this is for the QU user

If that is the case, there is a wrong ling pinned in the SQ Forum. Although that looks intentional for me since both Mixers seem to work similar on that point.

[DilettantParticipant]

Hmm has anybody managed to get a 1TB or larger SSD in an USB 3.1 drive box to work for multitracking?

I would like to use that on Concert Journeys to make some Live Recordings and it would be good to have 6-8 hours of Capacity in 32 Tracks because then i would not have to travel with a notebook or could leave the data on the recorder disk as a backup copy.

Tried a brand new Samsung 1TB NVME SSD in a USB 3.1 housing. The drive is working absolutely fine on the USB Port of my my ubuntu desktop, no lags, really fast.

The SQ6 recogized it on first time using. Then i tried to format it – and after that it wasn’t recognized any more. Just “Checking” forever, even several hours.

After repartitioning and formatting again with VFAT on Linux i got te mixer ro re-recognize it but trying to record gave a hangig error (just the recording hangs, not the Mixer) after some minutes. And after that the drive isn’t recognized anymore. On Linux i can see the filesystem is still there, just the dirty flag of filesystem was set.

Afer i tried to create a new DOS partition table with a primary DOS FAT32 Partition and format that with VFAT, the SQ6 seemed to recognize the Drive again. But as i tried to record on it, the recording hung again after some 5 Minutes with an endles “Error” that kept being there for hours. After Shutdown and Reboot of the Mixer, it was “Checking” the drive forever again.

Is there any drive size limit i hit or any known incompatibility with USB Drives that use NVME SSDs or with a special vendor of that external USB Disk boxes? Or did i just use the “wrong” drive vendor?

The Linux Kernel identifies the device as follows:

usb 3-4: new high-speed USB device number 82 using xhci_hcd
usb 3-4: New USB device found, idVendor=0bda, idProduct=9210
usb 3-4: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
Product: RTL9210B-CG
Manufacturer: Realtek
SerialNumber: 012345679167
usb-storage 3-4:1.0: USB Mass Storage device detected
scsi host20: usb-storage 3-4:1.0

scsi 23:0:0:0: Direct-Access     Realtek  RTL9210B NVME    1.00 PQ: 0 ANSI: 6
sd 23:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg6 type 0
sd 23:0:0:0: [sdf] 2000409264 512-byte logical blocks: (1.02 TB/954 GiB)
sd 23:0:0:0: [sdf] Write Protect is off
sd 23:0:0:0: [sdf] Mode Sense: 37 00 00 08
sd 23:0:0:0: [sdf] Write cache: disabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
sd 23:0:0:0: [sdf] Attached SCSI disk

[DilettantParticipant]

midi scene control seems to be a little rudimentary when it comes to scenenes at least according to the MIDI Guide.

Change local and global Scene Filters and Scene Safes seem to miss, to. And there is no management of scenes (rename, store, delete, copy paste scene).

SQ Mixpad can do these things so there must be a way to do it remote. Maybe there are already some MIDI Commands just missing in the MIDI Reference or it would be possible to provide that with an upgrade of the Network MIDI Driver?

[DilettantParticipant]

connect to what?

Eeven to the same things that the Preamps or their A/D Converters are connected to, too: digital inputs of the FPGA or some Bus that delivers the signals there. It would make sense to have the AD-Converters on the Modules since digital input Modules wouldn’t need them.

Or as a simple List:
remove: 16 Preamps
remove: 16 A/D Converters
remove: 16 XLR Jacks
remove: 16 XLR Jack holes in the case including screw mounts

add: holes for the module and its mounting screws
add: one multipin connector per slot to anyway
available lines/voltage supplies inside the Mixer
add: some kind of dust cover for the empty slot

The modules of course would bring back the removed parts somehow – at least, if they are XLR. Many Users wouldn’t need them because they have Stageboxes for most inputs anyway.

8 Preamps at the FoH are enough for some playback devices or wireless receivers in many setups. And there are already a lot of additional input options.

If you need more receivers, you could buy an additional Input Module or connect them to a Stagebox. There could even be Input Modules already containing wireless multichannel Receivers instead of XLR Jacks – would be an interesting Option for touring musicians especially looking for a compact but sophisticated Mixer – one siderack less in the luggage.

[DilettantParticipant]

shows have up to 100 scenes dont they?

At least the Scene List on my Sq6 has Slots up to number 300. So they don’t – they have up to 300 scenes 🙂

[DilettantParticipant]

If the files were in a non proprietary format I could easily write some code in less than an hour to batch update the lot.

If that files were XML, A&H or a friendly guy on the net could give you a XSLT file that makes basic transformations for such things. You could edit that and insert your personal needs as well. Maybe there would even be a Library of such files for several purposes out there. You wouldn’t even have to bother much about parsing that files – a XSLT Transformation can for example be done within 5 simple lines of Code in Java.

[DilettantParticipant]

The SQ MixPad app is available for Win, Mac, Android and iOS and works with Linux (Wine) and it is indeed capable to work without a console connected. Some call this “offline”.
And of course the app can store scenes.

Being able to store Scenes is not offline editing.

SQ Mixpad is a very nice App for remote control and it even can store and load Shows. But for an Offline Editor there is missing some functionality, though. It cannot change the Channel Strip assignment on the Mixer for example.

Things like printing Documentation (connection lists for the Techies? Project Documentation?), manage User Accounts between Shows/Mixers, exchanging parts (scenes, patching, fx settings, channel settings) between shows make not much sense in Mixpad, but in an sophisticated Offline Editor they do.

Reorganize channels and busses (to move unused ones to the end of the in put Channel List for example), edit single Settings of Scenes. would be more things to have there.

So: no, i was obviously not talking about things already there.

[DilettantParticipant]

Well, that may be a little unfair, but:

A&H Marketing claims (surely with a bit of right to do so) to put genuine, great, valuable and expensive preamps into the Mixer. Only the best of the best, aren’t they?

Assuming that is correct Information, reducing the number of Preamps by 2/3 should reduce the cost of the Mixer significantly.

An empty Module slot on the other side is mainly a rectangle-shaped hole in the Backplane with some kind of cover, some connector behind that and some screw holes to fix the module.

How can that be as expensive as 16 high valuable exclusive-made hand-selected Ant-Leather-covered Preamps?

SCNR

[DilettantParticipant]

You suggest things already in place…

Are they? Where can I download the free Offline Scene Editor for SQ Series Mixers then? Must have missed that, sorry.

and btw XML is not a document management tool

Of course it is not. It is a universal and open method to define data structures, maybe with storage, processing and transmission as main target use cases.

But it is often mentioned mainly as a Document Management / Data transmission tool. Maybe because the root of XML was SGML which AFAIK was invented first to manage technical Documentation for Airplane production. Or because most people have heard of HTML being an XML Language (which is not completely correct, XHTML is, HTML below Version 5 is SGML).

However, using XML to store configuration data is a widespread technique in many applications including some DAW. The whole Ardour configuration for example seems to be a bunch of XML files.

Scene and Show Files of most Digital Mixing hardware seem to not use it so widespread, at least not documented. Maybe vendors fear to leak knowhow that way, maybe they are just in lack of the knowledge, have other priorities or too low engineering capacity (that topic may be not so widespread beyond Engineers of embedded Systems as it is for Application developers).

The point is: up to now, there is no complete offline editor for SQ. The SQ Mix Pad App does that only partially and is not really user-friendly for desktop Use (it was never intended to, on a tablet it is nearly perfect).

That could be a perfect field to spin off some free software. With a little luck that could generate huge developing dynamics after some time and give a better tool than a single vendor ever could make on its own.

[DilettantParticipant]

First of all you should beware that there is a Maximum of 3 parallel SQ Mixpad Connections on the Mixer. So making Monitor Mixes by Tablets works fine but has its limits.

Second there are robust cat5 cables with PUR-Mantle that can be used for stage purposes in any length. For Example:
https://www.thomann.de/de/pro_snake_cat5e_cable_10m.htm

Can easily be used with these:
https://www.thomann.de/de/the_sssnake_cat_snake_3mc.htm

However, if you have to use a standard patch field for part of the connection you may have to use Adapters from Ethercon to standard RJ45 there or use a cable with a standard RJ45 Connector on one side (field Connectors may be an Option as a replacement). The cheapest non-invasive way would be a short patch cable and these:
https://www.thomann.de/de/seetronic_se8fd05_01_rj45_ip65.htm

They are meant to be used in a housing or 19″ plate but they are robust enough to be used for “flying wiring”. Neutrik has more expensive Versions for explicit “flying” use, but they also will need a patch cable:
https://www.thomann.de/de/neutrik_ne8ffx6_w.htm
https://www.thomann.de/de/neutrik_ne8ff.htm

A cheap Adapter from Ethercon female to RJ45 male seems not to be really available.

Or you can use this at available cat5 Patch Panels and XLR from there to the Mic or whatever signal you wand to transport:
https://www.thomann.de/de/stairville_adapter_pro_xlr_m_rj45.htm

There is also a AR2412 Stagebox that has 12 Outputs or the possibility to cascade two AB168 to get 16 Outputs at two places (for example left and right or front and rear of the stage area). which can allow to use some shorter cables for Mics and other gear as well. That is not much more expensive than the 168 – maybe it would have been the better Product for you.

[DilettantParticipant]

A cheap Odys Space 1 LTE 10″ bought from Conrad Electronic for 120€ last year works fine.

I would at least want a 10″ Screen. Memory and CPU demands are not significantly high.

[DilettantParticipant]

The touch and hold a mix button on an iPad would not work too well.

Well, there is no need for identical behaviour of the physical buttons on the Mixer and the virtual ones in the App in that point. Wouldn’t make sense since you have to scroll around in the App but not on the real console (although you could change layers but thats much different haptics).

[DilettantParticipant]

A little OT here, but maybe it helps A&H:

No, we are not working on an offline editor for Qu at this time. That’s not to say we never will, and it will definitely be considered again in future (as it has been a number of times in the past).

Instead of developing an offline Editor for all the consoles in the house, A&H could try to make use of the Internet Community in that point by creating an open and mostly standardized Show File Format that the Mixers can store and load (if necessary even by using the Mixpad App for that so there’s no need to implement the format itself on the FPGA).

I am relatively shure that there are enough Qu and SQ Users with software development know-how out there. So if an Open Source Editor Project could be founded this likely could get by far more dynamic than A&H could ever reach by doing all the work alone.

Just have a little look outside your “corner” into the XML World. There are already many things there that could be useful.

Starting with XSD to not only simply (and if necessary by using already available development tools) define sophisticated XML Sublanguages that can represent almost any data, but also validate and analyze any Data to conform to such a Definition with common Services, free tools and freely available libraries. That means: you don’t have to develop a check for correctnes of an Input File – there is already widespread available free Software can do that for you (even in your own App, in a Webservice or as a batch tool).

Further on, XSLT could be used to migrate show files and functional block templates between Mixer Models. So Customers can upgrade their hardware and import existing Shows on the new one. Or Bands can E-Mail their Show to the Sound Engineer without knowing the exact mixer Model and I/O Modules he has – the Sound Engineer can migrate the Show to his Hardware by using a provided XSLT Stylesheet (which contains nothing more than transformation rules for the different XML Nodes) and check what additional gear may be necessary or what features/plugins might be missing or if he needs a bigger Console – long before the Event.

Oh, and of course XSLT could also be used to generate Documentations – for Customers, for Discussion, for archiving or whatever needs a documentation about the used audio processing. Or to generate a Monitor Mixer Config Template from an FoH Configuration (and vice versa). Or check if both can be used together on one splitting Stagebox. All you nedd is the corresponding processing rule file.

DOM Libraries like xalan, libxml or JAXB (almost any software development environment has at least 2 or 3 of it available) can be used to load XML Files into Memory as Object Trees or processing Streams and to store such Data into XML Files within a handful lines of Code. So you won’t have to write a Parser for the files – that is already done!

XInclude can be used to manage modularization (like creating Libraries of Channel Templates to combine into Show Files or splitting Show Files up to several logical parts) – and there are Converters from/to JSON which can be used mostly (but not completely) equivalent to XML.

The most common ressentiment against such things is “we will not be able to support Users with Shows created by unknown Software” – but in an XML World, that is not really true. XML was made to address especially such a case by having a simple contract: what validates must be processed correctly without Crash. So any Show File either validates – then your App/Console /has/ to process it in a senseful manner (it may of course give an unwanted result because of dumb settings in it, there is no User IQ Filter 😉 – or it doesn’t validate, then the Software that created the file has to be fixed before your mixer/app can be blamend for anything.

It may look a bit strange on the first sight for a Company that depends heavy on its intellectual property to release such things. But the first Manufacturer that manages to set a widely accepted open Standard here could gain massive benefits since the whole Rest of the Market will obviously get in strategical pressure to support that Standard too – likely within a short time.

Also you might wonder about suggesting XML (which is more known as a Document Management Tool) for a more technical Software. But in structure, the Show and Configuration Data of your mixer can be seen as nothing different but a kind of hierarchically structured Document or a Tree of Data Objects. So that is perfectly the thing that XML was made for.

[DilettantParticipant]

Also, long unbalance runs of TS/TS perhaps,

You alway could use the balanced input with an external DI Box then. Where’s the Problem?

[Author]

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