Octatrack Freezing

I bet for this, with a Mac !

I had problems with a full card, but I don’t remember it caused freezes…

It’s been a while since I did it (obviously, I DONT do it anymore :rofl:). But I am on a Mac if that helps.

It’s definitely the USB cable.
Unplug from the computer or the OT when not in USB mode.
It happens to me all the time.

Bad news: Elektron has still not found out why this happens.
Good news: nothing is broken :smiley:

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With a Mac. :wink:

Never happened to me with a PC, not saying it’s better, thinking of Linux again…:sketchy:

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I worry that if i switch from mac to pc, I would install so many pc-only games that i would stop having time to play the OT. So there’s more than one trade off to consider. :stuck_out_tongue:

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The big advantage of PCs is that if you’re using mostly hardware anyhow and just need your computer to run DAW with some good reverb, EQ and compressors but no CPU-heavy VSTis or anything, you can probably find something powerful enough to run your entire studio for like $50 (if you don’t find it on the sidewalk).

I do all my recording on an old Dell rack server from something like 2010. It was starting to show it’s age a couple years ago so I spent $40 on a second revision motherboard and another $100 for a pair of the fastest CPUs that motehrboard would support, and now I’m back to rarely breaking 5% total CPU and 25% realtime CPU (usually less). I could have bought a whole new computer of the same model with all the upgrades I installed already in it for LESS than what the parts cost me, but shipping would have been way too much.

If you need to run complex Ableton projects or Reaktor or something then get the best thing you can afford, but if you just need to run Reaper you can easily handle 50+ tracks with multiple plugins on every track on a sub-$200 PC (and less if you’re recording hardware and only doing low-overhead mixing and mastering in the box). Use the money you saved to buy more hardware, since it will never be obsolete.

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Put a coat on it.

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DUDE! Do you have your desk cut so the OT is angled into it? The angle of that shot makes it look like the front end is down in the desk? If so, that looks like that would be a nice way to have it.

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Started to happen to my MKII Gray as well. Found Octatrack MK2 blackout & yellow leds which described the same issue, where the author ended up sending it to Elektron. I wrote to support describing the same thing + linking that thread, they confirmed the issue and now I’m waiting for DHL to come and pick it up. Seems the CPU might be wonky for you as well.

Only had my Octatrack connected via USB once (for transferring the firmware for an upgrade) otherwise it has remained unconnected since I first got it.

Is there a sure method to force and trigger the problem while the machine is still under warranty, instead of waiting for it to happen one day? Elektron should know by now who could be impacted potentially and let the people know via a simple email? Peace of mind, while making beats…

Edit: or maybe it is not a batch, but a random occurrence.

I’ve had CF card problems while connecting with USB to a Mac. Since then I just bought an external CF card reader and I transfer samples like that. I didn’t like that the USB disk mode somehow corrupted my card.

One thing that was never clear to me from the OT manual was the order of operations for USB disk mode – do you connect everything and then power it on? Or do you power it on and then connect USB cables and then put it in USB disk mode? Or some other permutation?

From the manual:

8.5.1 USB DISK MODE
Enables the USB connection. Connect the Octatrack MKII to a computer using a USB cable, select USB
DISK MODE and press [YES] to make the Compact Flash card appear as an external mass storage
device to the computer. When the Octatrack MKII is connected to a computer via USB audio pools can
be filled with content. For more information, please see “7.2.1 ADDING CONTENT TO THE AUDIO POOL”
on page 27.

It’s not very clear on the order of things, so I simply don’t do it :slight_smile:

Help. My octatrack is f freezing
Expensive machine
They they said
Send a video
Cant they help me
without a video

Help. My octatrack is f freezing
By Yitzi

snaps

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But to attempt to be helpful @Yitzi - have you tried running debug mode?

Have you got a different memory card you can try?

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Yes for TEST mode (Hold Func then Power on) and CF Card.

It would be intesting to have more details than complains.

Some users have freeze issues with USB connected (mostly to a Mac).
It’s common.

If it not the case, you can also check your midi routing, try with no midi plugged.

I got some freeze 10min ago.
I rebooted a few times and got a few more freezes, finally ended up unpluging the USB from my mac as that was one of the only changes I made in this time frame…
Seems to work so far (hopefully as my machine is just a few months old and I barely used it so far). :confused:

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I sent my ot 2 elektron
They sent it back very quickly
Fixed !!
Thanks. I love u elektron

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Mmmmine froze a couple of times this last weeks. Today I seem to be able to correlate it with a nasty macOS freeze… (spontaneous reboot). Everything is connected to a mid level quality USB-c hub, and the computer is a MacBook Air M1 2020 running Sonoma (so , beta)
OT firmware = 1.40B
I don’t worry though :slight_smile:

Any report of OT freezing without USB connected (to a Mac ?)

Summary

I had freezes with midi loopback, because I wanted to use a midi channel different from audio tracks. Midi loopback is safe otherwise (midi tracks channels have to be shared with audio tracks if you plug a midi cable between midi in and out)

haven’t happened yet… I forgot to mention the USB i am using to connect to mac is m-audio UNO. It has to be re-plugged every time the mac comes out of sleep. So, there’s lot of elements which might be the fault’s cause…