Apogee Ensemble - Firewire 800 to 400 question

[maxmatthewsmusic]

Hey guys,

I have one of the older Apogee ensemble models that uses firewire.
I have a mac tower with what looks to me like 2 firewire 400 ports.
The mac also has optical ports.
I am wondering if there is any way I can use the ensemble with my Mac?
Would a 400 to 800 firewire converter work or could I use the optical ports perhaps?

All the best,

Max

Imgur links to images of ensemble + Mac:
https://imgur.com/a/AZ9ew93

[Wonks]

All you need is a FW400 to FW800 cable. No special converter required. My FW400 MOTU Traveller works fine connected to a FW800 card.

It should also work the other way round as you don't need the extra bandwidth that FW800 gives for audio, as long as there's no FW chain, unless the Apogee refuses to play.

[maxmatthewsmusic]

Wow that's awesome thanks for the reply,
Is there any limitation to the Ensemble using the 400 instead of the 800?

All the best

Max

[Eddy Deegan]

You can use a 400 to 800 adaptor with a firewire Ensemble, I was doing this for some time myself without problems.

However, Apogee did not ship their own firewire drivers for the Ensemble and relied on the ones built into OS X.

If you are running El Capitan or older then I believe it should work (according to https://knowledgebase.apogeedigital.com ... -firewire/) but if a later version then I suspect you may have trouble.

There may be 'hacky' or other ways of getting it to work with later versions of OS X but when Apogee announced they had dropped support for it because they relied on deprecated Apple drivers I replaced my Ensemble with a digital mixing desk, so I never looked into it further.

[maxmatthewsmusic]

Hmmm thank you for the reply as well,
I'm using 10.12.6 (Sierra) if you have any knowledge about this

All the best

Max

[ConcertinaChap]

but when Apogee announced they had dropped support for it because they relied on deprecated Apple drivers I replaced my Ensemble with a digital mixing desk, so I never looked into it further.

Exactly the same for me (except I went UAD). I was really annoyed when Apogee did this because of the short period between the Ensemble being on sale and support being dropped. I've had a personal boycott of Apogee products ever since - OK, that's not going to bankrupt or even slightly bother Apogee but it gives me a little satisfaction.

CC

[Sam Spoons]

Hmmm thank you for the reply as well,
I'm using 10.12.6 (Sierra) if you have any knowledge about this

All the best

Max

You will do no harm just plugging it in and seeing if it works.

[maxmatthewsmusic]

Hmmm thank you for the reply as well,
I'm using 10.12.6 (Sierra) if you have any knowledge about this

All the best

Max

You will do no harm just plugging it in and seeing if it works.

I plan to but unfortunately don't have the required cable yet,

Thanks for the awesome feedback from everyone

Max

[Eddy Deegan]

but when Apogee announced they had dropped support for it because they relied on deprecated Apple drivers I replaced my Ensemble with a digital mixing desk, so I never looked into it further.

Exactly the same for me (except I went UAD). I was really annoyed when Apogee did this because of the short period between the Ensemble being on sale and support being dropped. I've had a personal boycott of Apogee products ever since - OK, that's not going to bankrupt or even slightly bother Apogee but it gives me a little satisfaction.

Yes, I too have boycotted Apogee ever since. I know it's possibly a bit petty but at the price point of the Ensemble I felt it was a step too far and when they subsequently sent me a 'we understand you might not be happy so have a £100 coupon off this £1800 product of ours you can use instead' email I told them exactly what I thought of that and won't buy from them again. Not cool

I heard some other manufacturers shipped their own firewire drivers after Apple dropped core support. There was nothing stopping Apogee from doing the same should they have wanted to and I felt (and still do feel) insulted as a customer.

I was so annoyed at the time that I also gave the Ensemble for free to an electronics-orientated mate of mine to strip down for parts!

To the OP though, don't let that affect you at all. The Ensemble is a fine product and if you can get it to work you should be very happy with it. I do not think it will work for anything later than El Capitan though. You can use it as a standalone convertor if it's configured correctly but it's possible you need firewire to configure it that way (not sure!).

[ConcertinaChap]

You can use it as a standalone convertor if it's configured correctly but it's possible you need firewire to configure it that way (not sure!).

I does. It maintains the last configuration set up on it using the Maestro software, if memory serves me right.

CC

[ken long]

I does. It maintains the last configuration set up on it using the Maestro software, if memory serves me right.

This is correct. Wondering now whether it can be configured to use the ADAT in standalone.

[maxmatthewsmusic]

Hey everyone,

To anyone who is interested it seems as though the Apogee works perfectly fine on Sierra 10.12.6
I'm using a simple firewire 800 to 400 cable,

Thank you all for your help

Max

Imgur link:
https://imgur.com/a/rnpJCzO

[Eddy Deegan]

Hey everyone,

To anyone who is interested it seems as though the Apogee works perfectly fine on Sierra 10.12.6
I'm using a simple firewire 800 to 400 cable,

Thank you all for your help

Max

Imgur link:
https://imgur.com/a/rnpJCzO

That's good to know, thanks for the update

[ken long]

Hey everyone,

To anyone who is interested it seems as though the Apogee works perfectly fine on Sierra 10.12.6
I'm using a simple firewire 800 to 400 cable,

Thank you all for your help

Max

Imgur link:
https://imgur.com/a/rnpJCzO

Thanks for that!

[maxmatthewsmusic]

Hey everyone,

To anyone who is interested it seems as though the Apogee works perfectly fine on Sierra 10.12.6
I'm using a simple firewire 800 to 400 cable,

Thank you all for your help

Max

Imgur link:
https://imgur.com/a/rnpJCzO

Thanks for that!

No prob!