Important Hints for Clara E driver version 4.42 for Windows™
1. System Requirements
2. Installation
3. Driver Uninstall
4. What's new?
5. Samplerate Considerations
6. MME, WDM-Audio and DirectSound
- Windows™ 10 (each 64 bit or 32 bit), Windows™ 11 and related server systems.
- Unzip the driver update package for Windows 10/11 "mabs_w10_4421.zip" with the
included subdirectory structure to any folder.
- Execute "setup.exe" in the driver installation folder. Done.
- Directly after the installation, Windows executes
extensive audio tests with each audio device / channel pair of the installed audio interface. During this time
almost every audio functionality with this audio interface is blocked by Windows. Thus, we recommend to start
working with the audio interface and every related software first when these audio tests have been finished.
It take appr. 1-2 minutes but takes place just once directly after the driver installation or if just once, if you
setup a new sample format in "Driver Settings | WDM Audio".
-
Uninstalling the driver software is not normally necessary as the driver software installation program automatically uninstalls other driver versions.
If uninstallation is nevertheless necessary, run the "setup.exe" installation program in the installation directory of the driver software.
Under "Details | Options", activate the option "Only remove the driver software ..." and start the uninstallation process with "Proceed".
4. What's new?
Version 4.42:
-
Support for firmware revision 6 which comes with an optimized DMA machine.
Version 4.41:
-
The driver package comes with firmware version Rev 5.
Fixed issues:
- Dante Core doesn't start at some systems.
- Unable to activate redundancy at secondary port.
-
GUI: New firmware page in driver settings. Follow the steps described there to install the new firmware..
-
Settings | WDM Audio: number of maximum Windows Wave Devices increased to 256 stereo inputs and 256 stereo outputs.
Attention:
Windows is quite busy during registration/deregistration of such an amount of Wave Devices. And also with changes of the sample format. Please wait with the start of any audio application until the WDM Audio Page of Driver Settings signals, that all changes are commited to the Windows Audio System. Alternativly you may restart Windows after you made huge changes at the Wdm Audio Configuraton. Your changes are processed during the next start of Windows. Also this takes some time and may lead in a delayed start of the Windows Audio Service. Stay patient ...
-
Settings | Performance | DMA Buffersize: the red area to be avoided is now outside 0.5-50ms.
-
Settings | Performance | DMA Buffersize: the maximum value can now be changed. This makes it easier to set buffer sizes in the lower range.
-
Settings | WDM Audio: After making changes to the settings, the settings page waits until your changes have reached the Windows audio system. Further changes are only possible afterwards.
Depending on the number of Windows Wave Devices used, this process can take up to several minutes.
-
ASIO: Stopping/discarding an ASIO instance by an ASIO application is now synchronized with the execution of the ASIO processing of the ASIO application. This prevents a possible crash of some ASIO applications.
-
Kernel WDM Audio: Optimizations for Windows Wave Devices registration/unregistration.
-
The driver package and its installation now follows Microsoft's Driver Encapsulation Policy. The driver package now consists of two parts. The base package and the software component package. The base package provides only the audio functionality (ASIO, WDM audio). The software component package provides all other part (service, manager application, firmware, documentations).
This does not change the installation process.
In the Windows Device Manager you will also find the entry "MARIAN Clara E Control Software" under "Software Components". This stands for the components of the software component package.
If, for example, you only want to install the basic package for server installations, please contact support@marian.de, who will provide you with the basic package.
The driver package files are installed by Windows in the following locations:
Base package: \Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\mabase.inf_[amd64|x86]_xxxxxxxxxxxx
Software package: \Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\mabase_comp.inf_[amd64|x86]_xxxxxxxxxxxx
Version 4.39:
-
First official release for Clara E - the PCIe Audio Interface for Dante™ Networks.
5. Samplerate Considerations
On recent versions of Windows™, audio applications are able to set a certain sample format only, if they use
ASIO or WASAPI in exclusive mode. In all other cases Windows handles the audio devices in so called "Shared Mode" and the sample format is set in the advanced settings of an audio device (Windows™ control panel) or in the driver settings "WDM Audio". If the desired sample format of an audio application is not equal to the sample format of an audio device, a sample fomrat conversion with possibly an audible loss of quality will be the result!
Audio applications, who do not use ASIO or direct WDM-Audio,
now communicate with Microsoft MME or Microsoft WDM Audio drivers instead
of communicate with the MARIAN drivers directly. The Microsoft drivers in
turn communicate with the MARIAN drivers.
For audio applications, who use these Microsoft drivers, apply:
- They can playback simultaneously using one playback device.
The Microsoft Kernel Mixer mixes the playback signals of the applications
into one stereo stream and routes it to one physical output device.
- The number of the available recording and playback devices Windows™ 7 is
limited to 32 devices each (64 channels)
This limitation applies to the number of all audio devices installed
in the system.
You can use ASIO to walk around this limitation.
- The minimum possible latency is limited to app. 20..30ms through the Microsoft
Kernel Mixer architecture.
Use ASIO to walk around this limitation.
- Some audio applications show additional audio devices with
theirs names appended by "(3+4)" or "(5+6)". This is caused by an anomaly
of the Microsoft MME/DirectSound system. Please ignore these devices and
do not use them.
(c)
MARIAN GmbH Digital Audio Electronics, Leipzig 12/21/2023