Linksys Velop Network. Hard wired to 1 of 6 Velop nodes.
Connected Audio Devices
Denafrips Terminator USB V.3.12
USB (Audioquest Carbon model)
Number of Tracks in Library
40+ thousand AIFF audio.
Qobuz
Description of Issue
Denafrips Terminator DAC loosing USB connection randomly.
Once it starts dropping the connection, it will continuously do it and sounds different and requires a reboot to resolve.
This has never been the case with the MacMini and DAC for well over a years time.
In recent weeks/months this started happening after various Roon and Mac updates. Mac updates are few for Ventura.
I also did the Denefrips firmware update but it made no improvement. Was doing the same prior.
Roon will not always show the DACs “advance settings” sometimes it will and sometimes it wont. Today it will NOT show any advanced settings, Ive powered off/on the Mac and powered off/on the DAC. No Advanced options as Ive seen before.
Its also is asking to identify the device and there is No available choice for Denafrips.
The issues seems to start after a days time after a restart.
The Mac mini is always running, headless mostly. I use an Apple TV for video.
The Mac mini is running very lean, for Audio only.
Bill_Janssen
(Wigwam wool socks now on asymmetrical isolation feet!)
6
Well, something isn’t working great, and it might be the cable. Cables (and the ports they plug into) are subjected to movement flex and consequent failure modes more than anything else in the digital chain.
I’d expect there to be some indication of that in the Roon logs.
And all people who curse God will die. Correlation and causality are two different things.
Hmmm. I wonder if this is related to the various Mac-specific problems people are pointing to. Is there a build-up of RAM usage? There are also a number of other problem reports about USB usage and Ventura in the Forum. Most of them seem to have been closed without a resolution.
Thanks.
I tried other USB cables, even cheap stuff and nothing has changed.
“And all people who curse God will die. Correlation and causality are two different things.”
I have no idea what that means. Sorry.
Mac Specific problems. Yeah, thats what I was thinking. Is this an issue with Ventura? Sonoma okay?
Is it the intel architecture of the Mac mini and if so will it run better on High Sierra?
RAM is 16GB and more than 65% free always. Nothing running except Roon.
Is this an issue with the USB Port in the Mac?
Bill_Janssen
(Wigwam wool socks now on asymmetrical isolation feet!)
8
OK, so cables good. Doubt it’s the USB port per se. Given that there are all these Ventura/USB reports, it seems more likely some Apple engineer found some arcane bit of nonsense in the USB specification and his interpretation of it made its way into the Ventura drivers. If you simply Google “Ventura USB problems” there’s all kinds of hits. For instance,
Thank you for your post. If there’s no indication of a USB bus issue or a failed port, then the most likely culprit is an accumulation of dropout causing RAATServer to initiate the teardown of the Zone. This would occur if there were a sample rate mismatch somewhere in the signal path downstream of Roon.
Do you have any third-party software touching CoreAudio on this Mac Mini, like Zoom, Sonarworks, immersive audio, or internal routing virtual cables?
Have you aggregated the Denafrips with any other devices in Audio Midi Setup at any point?
Do you have an additional Mac with which you can try the Denafrips USB connection? We want to isolate whether there’s an issue affecting Core Audio on this MacMini in particular.
