Followup on Apogee Ensemble, Logic, and Skype: Making Them All Work Together

So, in this previous blog entry I talked about Apogee Ensemble, Logic, and Skype: Making Them All Work Together and included a bunch of drawings and screen-shots and what not.

After upgrading to Lion -- which was an ugly mess, in that I had a lot of plug-ins that wouldn't work right under Lion -- one problem remained, which was that I could not get bidirectional S/PDIF audio to work on the digital optical connectors. In other words, the setup that worked fine under Snow Leopard didn't seem to work under Lion.

The problem seems to be the way the Ensemble and its control panel application, Maestro, refer to the S/PDIF coaxial and optical ports. Under the previous version of Maestro, it seemed to work OK to configure the S/PDIF optical in to route to software inputs 9 and 10, so I could use 10x10 routing -- even though this wasn't actually clearly shown in Maestro -- and to route software outputs 9 and 10 to the S/PDIF optical outs.

Under Maestro 2 and the Lion drivers, this doesn't seem to work, as far as the inputs go. It seems now that the software is more clearly convinced that the coax and optical digital inputs are separate. In order to even be able to select the optical digital input for software inputs 9 and 10, you have to have the Ensemble in 18x18 mode. Like so (click the images to enlarge) -- inputs:

and outputs:

Note that what I'd really like to do is configure software inputs 11-18 as "no mapping" -- that is, I'm not using them, and similarly for the hardware outputs: I don't want any logical output channels on the coax digital out, or the three "N.A." hardware outputs (whatever that means). But whatever -- this configuration works! I can do two-way digital I/O.

However, the bigger problem is that I don't really want to run the Ensemble at 18x18 -- it uses up extra FireWire bandwidth. This means that I probably can't use my iSight camera along with the Ensemble to record a video while I'm recording audio (and I could, in the 10x10 configuration under Snow Leopard). So does it work to switch back to 10x10 after making this configuration? On the theory that I've told it what the routing should be, but I only want to route data for channels 1-10?

Nope. At least in my test, while the input to the Ensemble works fine (so, for example, I can listen via Logic to input 9/10 and hear music from my iTunes library playing from my Mac), when I try to send audio out channels 9/10 I get white noise (or what sounds mostly white noise) out of the Ensemble's digital optical S/PDIF outputs. And I can't even access the S/PDIF optical inputs or outputs in the input and output configuration windows to try to change them:

So, there you have it. A feature that was semi-working under Snow Leopard, now broken under Lion. It looks like I will have to run my Ensemble in 18x18 mode if I want to use the S/PDIF digital optical inputs and outputs.

It would be kind of nice if this were not the case -- assuming the unit is transmitting and receiving 10 channels of data, why can't it send ten arbitrary software data sources to any or multiple hardware outputs, and vice-versa? Maybe there's a reason -- I write DSP software, and sometimes for performance reasons you have to rely on a DMA, that blasts data into our out of memory in a specific ordered pattern and you can't change the pattern -- but in this case I don't think that's what is happening; I think the data is being copied out of DMA buffers into user space in arbitrary order, since you can map (say) a software output to multiple hardware outputs. And also, it worked under the previous version of MacOS X. I think the issue is just not adequately testing and supporting an edge case. Maestro has never really been the most stable and solid of applications. It seems better now, but I still managed to crash it and lock it up several times today while testing. Not what I really hope for the "flagship" audio interface for the Mac Pro, even though it is not the highest-end product in Apogee's lineup.

I spent time with Apogee's tech support chat, and although I was not able to resolve the issue while engaged in the live chat, the conversation did serve to point me in the right direction (18x18 versus 10x10 routing). Here is an (edited) transcript:

You are now chatting with 'Patricia'
Patricia: Hello! I'm an Apogee customer success representative here to assist you with your tech support needs. Let me take a look at the issue you've described, one moment please.

(Bleh -- customer "success" representative? Please...)

    
Patricia: Hi paul
Paul: Hello
Patricia: can you open apogee maestro
Patricia: and tell me your version numbers?

(Chat about software version numbers and Ensemble serial numbers, and more possibly confusing explanation of my issues, removed -- actually I was impressed with how much time the representative spent with me).

Paul: Right now it is working - I have a mic in to my Ensemble, a Logic project that processes it and routes it to 9/10 out, and an optical cable going into my Mac Pro. The sound control panel is set to Mac audio in from the optical port, and the meter reacts, and I can (for example) use this mic as a source for a Skype call this way
Paul: But it does not work in the opposite direction (I have a separate cable, the Mac audio out is set to the optical out, and I'm monitoring inputs 9/10 in Logic). I think I have Maestro configured properly although some of these settings are not that clear, like SRC Select and SRC rate. In any case they don't seem to fix it. Clock is sets to internal
Paul: Like I said this worked under Snow Leopard (with Maestro 1 and the previous drivers).
Patricia: Should it be set to 11/12?
Paul: What?
Paul: 11/12 out instead of 9/10 out?
Patricia: my apologies
Paul: The I/O allocation is set up as 10x10 -- I think that's what worked before
Patricia: on the output routing page
Patricia: ah
Patricia: then no 11/12
Paul: 9/10 are the highest numbers that show up in Logic
Patricia: that is correct if your allocation is 10x10
Paul: Was there maybe a change where the coax and S/PDIF digital outputs are separate now? I never really understood how those were counted, how it decides which ones to send/receive on?
Paul: I guess maybe that is the Optical In/ Optical Out setting. They are set to SPDIF Optical now
Patricia: In order to utilize the spidif optical you will need to use 18x18
Patricia: and use 11 and 12
Paul: But it is working one way already for the output from Logic to the mac on 9/10?
Patricia: spdif coax is 9/10
Patricia: optical is 11 and 12
Paul: Let me try that
Paul: Did that change? Because I don't think I ever had to use it at 18x18
Patricia: I am pretty sure that has always been the case

(Note that I think this is not entirely true -- or, at least, even though it may have been an unsupported configuration, I was able to get "11 and 12" optical I/O working when routing 10x10).

Paul: OK, I am changing my Logic setup... one moment
Patricia: okay
Patricia: you may have to reopen logic and re-choose the ensemble
Patricia: changing io allocations can make logic see it as a new interface
Paul: Yes I shut it down and restarted Logic
Patricia: okay
Paul: OK, Logic knows that I have more channels now, but if I output to 11/12 the Mac does not see audio on the S/PDIF in. If I output to 9/10, it does
Paul: So literally, the Sound control panel with the input set to Digital In, the meter doesn't register if Logic is sending on 11/12
Paul: As for the other direction, I'm playing music from iTunes to the Mac audio out, set to digital out, and the Ensemble front panel still shows activity on the last meter when it is playing, but I can't get anything in Logic from either 9/10 or 11/12

(Note that if I had looked at the input and output routings under the 18/18 configuration, I probably would have seen the problem at this point, but I was kind of hung up on how it had been working with a 10x10 routing).

Patricia: Well unfortunately, I don't have an ensemble here to troubleshoot with you, so I am going to have to ask you to call in for further assistance.
Patricia: 310.584.9394
Patricia: they should be able to give you more insight
Patricia: I apologize for the inconvenience
Paul: OK, well, thanks anyway
Paul: I appreciate you taking the time
Patricia: You are welcome
Patricia: they will be able to replicate your set up
Patricia: no problem!
Patricia: thank you for choosing Apogee!

Anyway, I am happy with Apogee's tech support, and could take it to the next stage and call, but since my issue is solved, I don't really have a bug to report per se. I just wish Apple (and Apogee's) audio routing was more flexible. If I could specify the exact hardware that conforms to "system audio in" and "system audio out" at the Core Audio level, with an Apple-provided GUI, this whole workaround would be largely unnecessary.