# REW 4 and OS X Snow Leopard



## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

*REW 4 and OS X Snow Leopard or other Operating System with Firewire*

he guys,

i have a short question. have anyone tried to use rew on mac os 10.6 (snow leopard)? im on the way to measure my homestudio but i cant calibrate the soundcard. first there is a problem with the level. the second is that i have a error message over and over again.



> "impulse peak is not where it should be, the measurement may have been corrupted.
> 
> check the input response and the captured data plots"


i read something about problems with rew, java, mac and firewire soundcards. so could that the problem? 

sorry for this weak explanation, but my english is no the best for this way of communication. at the real life i can use hand and feets to talk. :R

so i hope i note all your forum rules proper and you could help me. thx and..

by

sebastian

:wave:

edit: sorry i forget to say, i use a 13" macbook pro with osx snow leopard and a rme fireface 400 soundinterface.


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## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

ok, sorry i should look first and than talk. i found the answer by my self.



> Unfortunately, Macs with firewire connected soundcards can't be used with REW. It must be USB....


thx, because thats was my assumption. but there is another question. the next step is to use rew via boot camp with windows 7. is there the same problem with firewire and java? the rme fireface is the only interface at my homestudio, so i cant try another. are there some other kinds of things that i must to consider in use of win 7 and rew 4?

thx a lot

seb


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## brucek (Apr 11, 2006)

I think we've only had one person use REW with Windows 7, and it was OK, so the best thing for you to do is simply try it.

The telltale is whether the soundcard cal routine works (and that you get both output and input levels OK in the setup procedure).

There should be no problem with REW and firewire if you use Windows..

brucek


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## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

ok, thx man - sounds good. i will try it and give you a response.

g


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## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

he i found a tool called mandolane. this is the link -> http://www.mandolane.co.uk/

so is it possible that i will work with this tool?


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## brucek (Apr 11, 2006)

In what regard?


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## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

in regard of java sound and firewire?


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## JohnM (Apr 11, 2006)

No, the Mandolane mixer is for sound output - that already works with REW on the Mac, the problem is with input. It would be worth trying to use the Presonus for output and the Macbook Pro's onboard in/out connection for input.


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## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

ok, thx for your help. i tried to use it with win7 (native with bootcamp) on my macbook pro but there was a similar problem with the input.

the thing is that i have only a RME Fireface400 soundcard with firewire conection. the new macbook pro have only a combined input/output so i can not use the internal soundcard. the next problem is that my calibrated measuring mic needs phantom power and i have no other preamps mit phatom power as the built in preamps on my firewire interface.
so here are my question. is it possible to use the firewire soundcard in anyway way for measuring on a operating system like win xp. or is the only way to use REW with a built in soundcard or a usb soundcard. if i need a usb soundcard would they work with mac osx snow leopard or only with windows.
i need the measuring for my homerecording studio and gradual become desperate with the installation of REW. so i hope someone can help me that i can fix that problems.

thx

sebastian


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## brucek (Apr 11, 2006)

> if i need a usb soundcard would they work with mac osx snow leopard


Yes, the problem is with firewire, not USB.

brucek


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## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

ok, thx. than i have to look for a cheap usb soundcard with a mic preamp with phantom power. i think something like m-audio fasttrak.

http://www.ukeland.com/pages/reviews/other/fasttrack/inputs.jpg

the second option is to use a old pentium 4 laptop with win xp (i found this pc in my dads old office and i think he will never use him again  ). i could put in a pcmcia card with firewire conectors to plug in my firewire soundcard. would this work? or is firewire in any case NOT possible. the pcmcia firewira adapter is much cheaper than a usb soundcard so i could safe some money and use my own soundcard.

thx

ps.: sorry for this, maybe, dumb question again. but i dont understand which operating system supports firewire and which not. or firewire is a no go?

edit:

another question. what means this in the online help for rew? 



> Note that microphone inputs are NOT suitable and should not be used (they have too much gain and most suffer from high noise levels and limited bandwidth).


i have no external preamp because i use the preamps of my soundcard for the mic. is this ok or must i use a externel preamp for the mic and than go to the soundcard with a line signal?


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## JohnM (Apr 11, 2006)

Sebastian, you can also try FuzzMeasure, which is written for OS X - the trial version is free but it is a paid app.


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## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

i know, and of course i tried fuzzmeasure. but i thougt that REW is a nice tool to and it seem like that it have some more options than fuzzmeasure? can someone explain me the doifference?

30min ago i wrote a mail to supermegaultragroovy and ask for a edu version. so i think i will use this app, 90$ are ok.


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## brucek (Apr 11, 2006)

> ps.: sorry for this, maybe, dumb question again. but i dont understand which operating system supports firewire and which not. or firewire is a no go?


Macs and firewire are a no go. Windows is OK.



> i have no external preamp because i use the preamps of my soundcard for the mic. is this ok


Yes, mic preamps in external soundcards are OK, the caution regarding mic inputs are for laptops that have mic input jacks. They are not suitable - only line input jacks are suitable.
An external soundcard with a proper microphone preamp with phantom voltage are fine.

brucek


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## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

ok, thanks john and bruce. tomorrow i will buy a pcmcia firewire adapter for the old dell notebook with windows xp and connect it to my audio interface. would be nice if it works.

g


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## bballer123 (Mar 26, 2009)

Just wanted to post something. I am using a firewire connection with little issue. I was getting that message yesterday when I was playing around, but today I hooked it up and there is no issue at all. I am using a 15" Macbook Pro (about 2.5 years old) with an MBOX 2 Pro. Works great for me (as far as I can tell.) Hope this doesn't confuse you. Just trying to give my input.

-Matt


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## Jarrod (Sep 29, 2009)

I'll be upgrading my MBP to Snow Leopard tomorrow. I hope that my REW setup continues to work as well as it has been. I expect it will be fine, but I'll post something to let everybody know for sure.

Edit: Got Snow Leopard installed and REW 4.11 seems to work just fine....


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## sebastian (Sep 21, 2009)

bballer123 said:


> Just wanted to post something. I am using a firewire connection with little issue. I was getting that message yesterday when I was playing around, but today I hooked it up and there is no issue at all. I am using a 15" Macbook Pro (about 2.5 years old) with an MBOX 2 Pro. Works great for me (as far as I can tell.) Hope this doesn't confuse you. Just trying to give my input.
> 
> -Matt



this is confusing me 

for me it just work under xp with bootcamp. is it possible to use it via paralles or vmware? or is the latency a problem for the measuring system. so maybe i could use my virtual win 7 in parallels. is this possible? firewire work under win 7?

oh but i have to say, reqw is a realy cool tool. it helps me so much at the moment and this all for free. thx!!!


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