Power cycle with a Magma

[ptram]

Dear friends,

So I could finally find a (very old - the white one!) Magma expansion chassis, and am waiting for it.

I would like to ask you which power on/off sequence you use. I wonder if this one is feasible:

- Set the Mac to Sleep
- Turn the Magma off
- Turn the Magma on
- Wake up the Mac

And this other one:

- Set the Mac to Sleep
- Turn the Magma off
- Wake up the Mac, without previously turning the Magma on.

What's your procedure?

Best regards,
Paolo

 

[Giles117 DP]

Both units OFF. Power up Magma wait a few seconds (15 is a good) the power Up MAC.

 

[saint]

You do not want to turn the Magma On and/or Off while the Mac is still running (that includes sleep mode). The Mac (all PCs for that matter) initiliaze the PCI bus at boot up. I definitely would NOT recommend doing either of the items you listed.

Cheers,

:: chuck \"dj saint\" hasek

 

[ptram]

Hi,

Thank you for your kind suggestions.

Paolo

 

[flemming]

Hi Paulo

Yeah, turn on the magma first, then the mac. And vice versa when shutting down. I've got all my external gear (waves apa, powercore FWs, magma, FW harddrives etc) on one mains setup that I just switch on and then wait a little bit before I turn the mac on. With my brand new magma and my G5 I don't need to wait more than 2-3 seconds, but you never know.

What sort of mac do you have? You might have to go thru quite a lot of trial-and-error hoopla to get everything up and running. It seems to matter where you put the magma controller card, etc. Also, some of the older Magma's don't work at all with newer macs. And some only work in a not so great way. Basically, even though Magmas are quite expensive, they are CRAP! Crap builds, crap system, crap crap!

Have fun!

Fl.

 

[replicant]

What sort of mac do you have? You might have to go thru quite a lot of trial-and-error hoopla to get everything up and running. It seems to matter where you put the magma controller card, etc. Also, some of the older Magma's don't work at all with newer macs. And some only work in a not so great way. Basically, even though Magmas are quite expensive, they are CRAP! Crap builds, crap system, crap crap!

Have fun!

Fl.

Care to elaborate? I've got an "old" Magma and am just in the process of upgrading my Mac so I would be interested to know if there are some problems that can be avoided. Anything particular with the Dual 2.7's and Magma??

 

[ptram]

Flemming,

I've a Dual G5 1.8 with PCI slots. The Magma I'm awaiting for is a very old white one (1998, I guess) with two long slots and one short one. Do you know of any issues with this combination?

Paolo

 

[flemming]

To be honest, I'd have my doubts about that one. But I haven't tried it myself, so I can't really tell. I first bought a second hand 7 slot chassis on ebay from 1999 and that one didn't work reliably with my combo of cards and my G5, so I got rid of it (well. It's still just standing here, actually) and bought a spanking new one. That one works flawlessly, though.

Let's know how it goes when you get it, OK?

 

[Giles117 DP]

You do not want to turn the Magma On and/or Off while the Mac is still running (that includes sleep mode). The Mac (all PCs for that matter) initiliaze the PCI bus at boot up. I definitely would NOT recommend doing either of the items you listed.

Cheers,

:: chuck "dj saint" hasek

Turning the magma off while your mac is running willnot damage your mac. It may cause your OS to lock up however.

 

[ptram]

Flemming, do you have a PCI or PCI-X machine? I know there are troubles with older Magmas (5V only) and PCI-X machines (3.3V only).
Paolo

 

[flemming]

I've got the mid2005 dual 2 gig, which is (AFAIK) normal PCI.

 

[Brian W. Ralston]

I've got the mid2005 dual 2 gig, which is (AFAIK) normal PCI.

Almost all of the G5 machines are PCI-X. That could be the problem. Some of the dual 2.0GHz ones were not...but few of them. If it was ever a model that was once the "top of the line" when Apple offered the 1.6 and 1.8 machines under it...then it has PCI-X slots.

 

[flemming]

FWIW: Mine's a bottom of the line one. That was why I got it. To make sure it'd work with the UAD's and the Magma.

 

[replicant]

Still confused, is anyone using a 32-bit/33MHz Magma with PCI-X mac :?

According to Magma's homepage there shouldn't be any issues, or does any one know of any possible problems with using an \"old\" Magma with Dual G5 with PCI-X :?

 

[Giles117 DP]

I am using a magma 32/33 with my G5 PCI-X version. No issues.

I have 2 UAD and 2 Powercore in it. Need that 3rd UAD...Got burned last year on a UAD purcahse....I only have used UAD's that UA was nice enuff to xfr, etc...

 

[replicant]

Excellent, well what's to stop me then :wink:

 

[ptram]

I've a Dual G5 1.8 with PCI slots. The Magma I'm awaiting for is a very old white one (1998, I guess) with two long slots and one short one. Do you know of any issues with this combination?

Well, the Magma is here. It is a 3-slot, "Portable" model made in 1998. The interface card fitted my G5 DP 1.8 PCI slots perfectly, and was immediately seen without any software to install. At the moment, it works perfectly.

The UAD-1 firmly sat in one of the expansion slots. The expansion chassis is small enough to be placed in vertical next to my G5 (slots on the bottom, power supply on the top). The connection cable is semi-flexible, long enough for my setup -- but I would love to find a more compact and flexible one.

The G5 now goes to deep sleep perfectly, either the Magma is turned on or off (obviously, there is no reason to set the G5 asleep while the noisy Magma is turned on...). It wakes-up with no fuss, either. It seems that the UAD-1 is giving troubles only when physically inserted into the G5. Cleverly, the Magma card is non-existant when the box is turned off.

So, I can have the UAD-1 again, when I absolutely need it. What a shame I had to stay without its great sound for months, have to rely on an outdated hardware that can fail at any time, listen to the noisy fans on the Magma (next to the quiet G5), tolerate this box hanging around, shutdown the system each time I want to work with the UAD.

I still pray for the quick release of a native version...

Paolo

 

[polygen]

i've got a dual 1.8 ghz PCI g5 with an old black 7-slot magma containing 4 uad cards. works a lot better than 1 or two uad-1 cards inside a g4 quicksilver ever did (can you spell C_R_A_C_K_L_E ?).

 

[replicant]

So I took the plunge and got myself a G5 Dual 2.7 and it booted up nicely together with my old Magma

Now all I have to do is install from scratch, FCP Studio alone takes an hour