RME Intelligent Audio Solutions Hammerfall Series New MME functions in driver version 2.60 (Windows 98SE/ME) 1. DVD Playback 2. Buffer size adjustment ------------------------------------------- 1. DVD PLayback When using popular DVD software player like WinDVD and PowerDVD you can now send the audio data stream using the SPDIF output of the Hammerfall and of the DIGI96 series cards to any AC-3/DTS capable receiver. For this to work the SPDIF output wave device of the card has to be selected in 'Control Panel/Sounds and Multimedia/Audio'. Also check 'use preferred device only'. You will notice that the DVD software's audio properties now allow to use 'SPDIF Out' or to 'activate SPDIF output'. When selecting these the software will transfer the non-decoded digital multichannel data stream using the RME card. Warning: This 'SPDIF' signal sounds like chopped noise at highest level. Therefore check 'Non-audio' in the card's Settings dialog, to prevent most SPDIF receivers from accepting the signal. Additionally the analog outputs of the RME cards are muted automatically, to prevent any attached equipment from being damaged. Note 1: Setting the card to be used as system playback device is against common sense, as such 'Pro' cards are not specialized to playback system sounds and such. To prevent this be sure to re-assign this setting after usage, or to disable ANY system sounds (Tab Sounds, Scheme 'No audio'). Note 2: The DVD player will be synced backwards from the RME card. This means when using AutoSync and/or word clock the playback speed and pitch is detuned according to the incoming clock signal. ------------------------------------------- 2. Buffer size adjustment When we began to write our drivers the MME buffer size was nothing to worry about. Latencies below 46 ms were impossible. We therefore decided to implement a fixed size buffer of 2048 samples into the Hammerfall. This is the simple reason that each setting below 4 x 1024 in SAWStudio, 4 x 1024 in Samplitude/Sequoia or the lowest settings in WaveLab glitch or distort. Meanwhile a lot has changed. The computers and OS have become VERY powerful, and since Win 98SE latencies far lower can be used. Windows 2000 also seems to include special support for MME, making it better than ever before. Still ASIO has a superior performance/reliability at lowest settings, but sometimes MME is all you have... SAWStudio and Sonar allowed to use such low settings from the start. Sequoia was updated in version 5.91, WaveLab in version 3.04. The 2.60 driver no longer uses 2048, but 512 sample DMA buffer. On our machines even 64 samples can be used without clicks or other problems. Note that this setting does only specify the lowest possible latency on hardware side. The real latency is set within the MME application! Note also that the DMA buffers can't be larger than the application's buffers. So when you set the Hammerfall to 512 you can't use 128 in any program. But setting DMA to 128 allows to use 128 and all higher values within the software. In 2.60 the MME buffersize is set with the same settings as the ASIO buffer size. DMA can be changed in the range of 64 to 512 samples. All settings higher will only affect ASIO, MME will stay at 512. PLease note that this is a 'you're welcome to try' feature. We can't guarantee that you will be able to use 3 or 6 ms with MME. Simply check out by yourself which lowest setting your system and software allows. If you don't care about this, or suffer from crackling under MME, be sure to set the buffer size to 512. ------------------------------------------ RME website: http://www.rme-audio.com Copyright RME 03/2001 All rights reserved. Windows 2000 is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. RME, DIGI96 and Hammerfall are registered trademarks of RME Intelligent Audio Solutions. ASIO is a trademark of Steinberg Media Technologies AG.Download Driver Pack
After your driver has been downloaded, follow these simple steps to install it.
Expand the archive file (if the download file is in zip or rar format).
If the expanded file has an .exe extension, double click it and follow the installation instructions.
Otherwise, open Device Manager by right-clicking the Start menu and selecting Device Manager.
Find the device and model you want to update in the device list.
Double-click on it to open the Properties dialog box.
From the Properties dialog box, select the Driver tab.
Click the Update Driver button, then follow the instructions.
Very important: You must reboot your system to ensure that any driver updates have taken effect.
For more help, visit our Driver Support section for step-by-step videos on how to install drivers for every file type.