STDM Connections fail

[luigicampala]

Lately i have a problem which is occuring more often. My 2 Pulsar 2 are connected via STDM Cables and when i switch on the machine it tells stuff like `No STDM connections found`or similar. I open the case and finger around at the cables, set the samplerate from master to slave and then back to master and then it works again. Needless to say that i don´t want to use my computer for live mixing in this state.
What i did so far is:
-Cleaned the contacts
-Bought new cables
-Tried to affix the cables with different kind of stuff (rubberbands and more)

Nothing seemed to help.
Could it be a hardware problem - card broken or something?
Any advice our experiences is welcome

[garyb]

what's in your start project?

[luigicampala]

to stardust:
The cards are connected with two stdm cables at both slots. i have tried several cables.

to garyb:
nothing special: wave source, asio source and dest, micromixer, pulsar2 (1) analog in and out, sequencer source and dest, Pulsar 2 (1) midi in and out.
Pulsar 2 (1) is the host card in the upper pci slot.

i have to say, it does not appear every time it put the machine on, it works for 2 or 3 days once i have opened the case and fingered around at the stdm connectors but it comes back. and normally it does not happen while i have the machine running.

[garyb]

i have seen such messages. they're only truly worrisome if the thing stops working.
if you really want to be thourough, remove the cards, one at a time and remove the i/o plates and then replace(being careful not to break the nylon screws). if you have a contact cleaner, you can use it on the connectors. this should fix it...

[luigicampala]

thanks gary
just to make sure: what do you mean with io plates? the part of the card where the adat aund the cable connections are?

when thw stdm connections fail the cards won´t run as they don´t have any digital-sync - at least the samplerate window remains blank

[garyb]

yes, i mean the i/o daughter card. the part with the whip.

yes, i'm not surprised there's no sound when you get that message. restarting the computer, or at least the app should help.

[luigicampala]

thanks for the replies
unfortunately restarting does not help-
what helps is fingering around at the connectors/cables and then switching from master to slave and back at the samplerate settings. so it looks like the cables are not properly seated and they lose contact once a while. or there is some crooked contact within the card, maybe at the io-plate and the procedure mentioned above does fix it temporarely
shall i give the io-plate issue a try? or is it unlikely?

[dbmac]

I recommend this product:

http://www.posthorn.com/Stab_2.html

I cured my "stdm connection" problems.

/dave

[Lima]

Check out the temperature also. Check if the boards are well winded too.

[luigicampala]

the connector detergent-lubricant seems very promising, thanks dbmac for the hint!
how did you apply it? each contact seperately? or just spray it inti the cableends?
to lima:
i was thinking about temperature too, but it appears at the start of the machine and i have and additional 12´case fan and enough space between the GPU and the cards as well as between the cards themselves.

[garyb]

the stabilant is a good product and may help. Deoxit D5 is excellent as well.

try the i/o plate. it can't hurt if you are careful.

[dbmac]

the connector detergent-lubricant seems very promising, thanks dbmac for the hint!
how did you apply it? each contact seperately? or just spray it inti the cableends?

The stuff comes with a brush. I just applied it to the contacts & reinserted the cables.

/dave

[luigicampala]

ok guys.
did all you said: cleaned the io-plates, applied the stabilant... let´s see what happens.
no news is good news then

[luigicampala]

EPILOGUE

Everything works fine after i cleaned the i/o-plate and applied the stabilant22.
I don´t know what it was, either the plates or the stabilant, but it seems to be solved.
Once again: Thank you guys