Help - USB DAC drops out after resuming from sleep

[SpittinFax]

Hi. I've go the same issue with my Zen Dac V2.
It's good to know that Ifi is aware of this problem.

My platform is AMD Ryzen 3800 on B450 chipset (Msi B450M Mortar Max). Problem was present on Windows 10pro, and i've recenty updated it to Win11pro.

I don't want to use hibernation, because I think it's no good for SSD (on each hibernatie all RAM is written to SSD).

Yesterday I've installed firmware 7.40 for Zen Dac, I'm curious if it will help.

Yeah that's interesting, it must be a Ryzen quirk then. Seems to be a more obscure issue related to the USB connectivity woes everyone had a few years ago.

Hibernate does use the SSD, but the amount of wear on a 1TB SSD is like.....who cares. It's no different to using a scratch drive for video editing or something. At least I've been having no issues with hibernate for days now and I'll just go back to using Sleep mode when it's fixed.

The v7.40 firmware wasn't available when I was troubleshooting, might give it a go.....

EDIT: Looks like v7.40 doesn't fix it. The DAC dropped out on the second wake-up.

 

[Deleted member 24505]

Yeah that's interesting, it must be a Ryzen quirk then. Seems to be a more obscure issue related to the USB connectivity woes everyone had a few years ago.

Hibernate does use the SSD, but the amount of wear on a 1TB SSD is like.....who cares. It's no different to using a scratch drive for video editing or something. At least I've been having no issues with hibernate for days now and I'll just go back to using Sleep mode when it's fixed.

The v7.40 firmware wasn't available when I was troubleshooting, might give it a go.....

EDIT: Looks like v7.40 doesn't fix it. The DAC dropped out on the second wake-up.

Just buy a Cambridge Audio DAC instead. might cost a bit more, but no problems.

 

[SpittinFax]

Just buy a Cambridge Audio DAC instead. might cost a bit more, but no problems.

Appreciate the advice, but nah. Reasons.

• Significantly more expensive (around 50%) more than the Ifi DAC I've already got. Pricing and availability in Australia is completely different.
• You've got an Intel system, so there's still no guarantee I won't have problems on Ryzen with the Cambridge DAC
• Actually I'm quite happy with my DAC setup, the problem (of which there is only one) is far from a dealbreaker
• Audio gear is my lowest priority for spending money right now. Gotta have priorities. Rent and loans don't pay themselves.

This being a known and repeatable issue means that Ifi needs to fix the issue on their end, they can't ignore it. It'll be patched soon enough.

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
I generally do not use sleep of any type
I just use a screen saver on the monitor and be done with it it's not like you're using a laptop where sleep/ hibernation would be useful features.

 

[Aquinus]

Almost certainly the DAC itself is the problem - seems like it isn't properly responding to the system resume event, most likely because its firmware and/or driver is/are buggy. So contacting anyone except the DAC's manufacturer is going to be a waste of time. (It could even be a potential hardware fault with your DAC unit itself.)

It could also be an incompatibility between the DAC and your PC - you could verify this by connecting the DAC to a different PC and seeing if the same problem occurs.

^ This. I have an external headphone DAC/Amp that's on USB (FIIO Alpen 2) and it has no issues resuming on any of my devices. Granted I haven't tried it on my wife's Ryzen laptop, but behavior between my Macbook Pro, iPad, and Tower (3930k w/ Linux,) all behave the same. The device essentially disconnects when the computer goes to sleep, then locks back on when it comes out of sleep, regardless of MacOS, iOS, or Linux.

Disabling USB charging when the machine is off might help. I know that having that setting turned on on my tower will sometimes cause funky behavior with USB devices when the machine goes to sleep or gets turned off since the device is still being powered on. I mainly experienced this with the add-on USB 3.0 ports on the board since X79 doesn't have 3.0 native.

If you have a native 2.0 port, try using that. Not all DACs play nicely with USB 3.x hubs for some weird reason.

 

[SpittinFax]

Hi,
I generally do not use sleep of any type
I just use a screen saver on the monitor and be done with it it's not like you're using a laptop where sleep/ hibernation would be useful features.

Different strokes for different folks. Some people like myself can't stand it unless their computer is on standby when not in use, others can happily sleep with their computer tower consuming 60 watts all day and night. Personally I treat electricity as a limited resource that costs real money and it doesn't take much effort to click the button.

 

[MarekRMac]

EDIT: Looks like v7.40 doesn't fix it. The DAC dropped out on the second wake-up.

Yes, 7.40 doesn't solve the problem. Today it dropped out once.

 

[Deleted member 24505]

I nearly bought an IFI instead of the Cambridge, so glad i never now.

 

[SpittinFax]

I nearly bought an IFI instead of the Cambridge, so glad i never now.

Jesus Christ mate, you must be fun at parties. All you talk about is Cambridge.

 

[thewan]

Did you try with the chipset drivers uninstalled? Or specifically the USB Filter Drivers not installed. I don't have a Ryzen system on me, but an older AMD FX PC, and the USB Filter Driver was causing issues with certain USB devices, uninstalling it did fixed it back to normal. So I wondered if newer Ryzen systems have the same driver and maybe have the same issues with that driver. Uninstalling the driver doesn't seem to break anything so far.

 

[SpittinFax]

Did you try with the chipset drivers uninstalled? Or specifically the USB Filter Drivers not installed. I don't have a Ryzen system on me, but an older AMD FX PC, and the USB Filter Driver was causing issues with certain USB devices, uninstalling it did fixed it back to normal. So I wondered if newer Ryzen systems have the same driver and maybe have the same issues with that driver. Uninstalling the driver doesn't seem to break anything so far.

Interestingly I had the chance to test this on someone else's Ryzen computer (Ryzen 3 3100 & Gigabyte B550M-S2H board) and I DID manage to replicate the drop-out issue. So this definitely isn't a software or a config issue or a bios issue that is unique to one device. It's something more fundamental with the Ryzen platform and how the USB devices receive information. Intel systems have been immune to the issue so far. It's not a problem I can resolve on my end.

 

[Deleted member 24505]

Jesus Christ mate, you must be fun at parties. All you talk about is Cambridge.

Wow spot on, read through my 14500 other posts have you, how did you know.

 

[SpittinFax]

Wow spot on, read through my 14500 other posts have you, how did you know.

I was going to reply that it's more of a general audio discussion and that there's a time and place for being a disciple, but just now I noticed that there aren't any active "general audio" threads to talk about this stuff elsewhere. So knowing that, I actually don't mind if you go off topic on other audio stuff. My bad.

 

[thewan]

Interestingly I had the chance to test this on someone else's Ryzen computer (Ryzen 3 3100 & Gigabyte B550M-S2H board) and I DID manage to replicate the drop-out issue. So this definitely isn't a software or a config issue or a bios issue that is unique to one device. It's something more fundamental with the Ryzen platform and how the USB devices receive information. Intel systems have been immune to the issue so far. It's not a problem I can resolve on my end.

You did not answer my question. Did you try without the chipset drivers installed or specifically, the USB Filter Drivers. Drivers are how Devices communicate with the rest of the PC and the OS. The AMD USB Filter Drivers are unique to AMD motherboards and has nothing to do with Intel. According to its description, its supposed to help with detection of USB devices, but it maybe causing the opposite effect on other USB devices instead, so uninstalling it and relying on the built in USB device detection for Windows may work better. It worked better for me. I had problems with my usb fingerprint reader and Logitech wireless mouse not being detected by their respective software. Uninstalling it fixed them. Once again. Did you try without the USB Filter Drivers installed?

 

[ThrashZone]

Different strokes for different folks. Some people like myself can't stand it unless their computer is on standby when not in use, others can happily sleep with their computer tower consuming 60 watts all day and night. Personally I treat electricity as a limited resource that costs real money and it doesn't take much effort to click the button.

Hi,
60w ? maybe this is why sleep doesn't work.

ATM I'm only using 20watts with 28 thread cpu and 1080ti all bone stock total so how in the world are you coming up with 60w for idle

I agree different strokes.

 

[SpittinFax]

You did not answer my question. Did you try without the chipset drivers installed or specifically, the USB Filter Drivers. Drivers are how Devices communicate with the rest of the PC and the OS. The AMD USB Filter Drivers are unique to AMD motherboards and has nothing to do with Intel. According to its description, its supposed to help with detection of USB devices, but it maybe causing the opposite effect on other USB devices instead, so uninstalling it and relying on the built in USB device detection for Windows may work better. It worked better for me. I had problems with my usb fingerprint reader and Logitech wireless mouse not being detected by their respective software. Uninstalling it fixed them. Once again. Did you try without the USB Filter Drivers installed?

No programs installed with that name. There's an "AMD USB Filter Driver" buried in the chipset driver release notes, I followed their instructions using Command Prompt to uninstall it but no feature with that name could be found (image). This issue was present prior to installing the chipset drivers anyway.

That answer your question?

 

[oobymach]

Wow spot on, read through my 14500 other posts have you, how did you know.

5 posts in this thread alone you've talked about your Cambridge.

OP have you tried turning off power saving for usb? In device manager open usb list and turn off power saving by unchecking the box for every usb hub in the list.

I have an Ifi Nano and it doesn't have the sleep issue (put my machine to sleep for a few minutes to test).

 

[SpittinFax]

5 posts in this thread alone you've talked about your Cambridge.

OP have you tried turning off power saving for usb? In device manager open usb list and turn off power saving by unchecking the box for every usb hub in the list.

I have an Ifi Nano and it doesn't have the sleep issue (put my machine to sleep for a few minutes to test).

View attachment 241543

Yeah thanks for the info, but I tried that already. Pretty much every website tells you to do that and it's one of the first things I tried.

I will say that the drop-outs don't always happen straight away. It could be the first wakeup, the second or the third etc, but regardless I've always been able to get it to drop out within 8 or so attempts. The time between sleep and wake-up seems to be a non-factor.

 

[erocker]

Any static shocks/electricity? Many DAC's have pretty sensitive protections against it and will do that. Mine did once or twice in the peak of winter when it was really dry. Besides that I haven't seen any issues, though my DAC uses both USB power and a separate wall outlet connection.

 

[MarekRMac]

Yeah thanks for the info, but I tried that already. Pretty much every website tells you to do that and it's one of the first things I tried.

I will say that the drop-outs don't always happen straight away. It could be the first wakeup, the second or the third etc, but regardless I've always been able to get it to drop out within 8 or so attempts. The time between sleep and wake-up seems to be a non-factor.

Yes, it's completely random. I've just tried the solution of turning off "selective USB suspend" in power plan settings. I thought that it helped, PC went to sleep and back maybe 8 times, but today it happened again once.
BTW, I don't use an external power supply for Zen Dac, just a USB cable.

 

[mackan73]

I have the same issue with my Pro-ject Pre Box S2 Digital. It often disconnects after sleep.
In my case I think it started after an upgrade to Windows 11.

I have the latest drivers and firmware installed for the DAC.
Also turned off power savings for usb in the device manager.

Processor: Intel Core i5 7600K
Motherboard: ASRock Fatal1ty Z270 Gaming

Another problem is that the DAC prevents the screensaver to start. But, this started after an Windows update a couple of years ago...

 

[MarekRMac]

EDIT: Just got a response from Ifi. "This is a known issue that we are looking into, we have passed this information to our development team to look into for a possible future firmware update to fix this issue".

Hi, I reported this issue to IFI support, and that's their funny answer:
"Thank you for your ticket regarding the Zen Dac V2. This is standard behaviour for the device when a PC is in sleep mode, Hope this helps with your inquiry."

 

[Mussels]

Hi, I reported this issue to IFI support, and that's their funny answer:
"Thank you for your ticket regarding the Zen Dac V2. This is standard behaviour for the device when a PC is in sleep mode, Hope this helps with your inquiry."

report it again and tell them if standard behaviour is to crash and cease operating, you expect a full refund

 

[SpittinFax]

Hi, I reported this issue to IFI support, and that's their funny answer:
"Thank you for your ticket regarding the Zen Dac V2. This is standard behaviour for the device when a PC is in sleep mode, Hope this helps with your inquiry."

I hate it, absolutely HATE IT, when manufacturers play the "normal behaviour" card. Noctua pulled the same stunt on me when I contacted support with video evidence that my A14 fan is resonating and unreasonably loud. Their explanation was that some people are more sensitive to certain frequencies (ignoring the fact that even a shitty microphone could pick it up!). So basically just ignore it.

I had hope when Ifi said the developers are working on it but it's been over a month now with no patch. Yet another legitimate customer support problem falling on deaf ears.

 

[R0H1T]

Depending on where you bought it you can still return it with some of their generous return policies. As for system sleep that's a major issue on various platforms (i.e. chipsets) with Zen. My ethernet goes into zombie mode whenever I use hybrid sleep for extended periods of time or resume from hybrid sleep. Ethernet is Realtek though & have no issues with integrated (Intel) Wifi

If you haven't you probably should also try with AMD to see if they can get to the root of it.