Power Macintosh Beige G3 - Digi 001 Performance Issues & Requirements

Power Macintosh Beige G3 - Digi 001 Performance Issues & Requirements

During the development of the Pro Tools LE, Digidesign tested the Apple "beige" G3 line (all speeds) with Digi 001. During testing we encountered random occurrences of a particular software error with our DAE (Digidesign Audio Engine) and the beige G3 line. The error, "DAE -6045" would pop-up inexplicably during normal operation of Pro Tools LE. While this error is non-fatal, it will stop playback or record of a Pro Tools LE system. Digidesign engineering spent weeks trying to find the cause of this error without a successful fix.

There is some good news - to continue through the error simply click OK. We suggest saving the session and rebooting the computer to completely clear the error. Although all other aspects of Digi 001 and beige G3 configuration function satisfactory, the repetitive nature of this error caused us concern here at Digidesign. This explains why Digidesign is not formally supporting beige G3 configurations with 001 (we still support beige G3's with Audiomedia III cards and TDM systems). We did not make this decision lightly due to the large installed base of beige G3 customers. However, here at Digidesign, we believe in shipping solid systems that our customers can count on.

Digi 001 Beige G3 Requirements

  • Mac OS 9.0.4 or higher required
  • QuickTime 4.1.2 or higher required with Pro Tools v5.1.1 (QT v4.1.2 included with Mac OS 9.0.4, Pro Tools installation CD, or download the standalone QuickTime 4.1.2 Installer or QuickTime 5.0.2 from Apple)

SCSI HBA Card NOT required: Although Pro Tools LE supports a full 24 tracks of record and playback on a dedicated ATA/IDE hard drive, use of a SCSI HBA card with a SCSI drive can increase some performance aspects of your Digi 001 system: for more information refer to the Audio Storage Requirements page. Optional SCSI HBA cards bundled (by Apple) with Power Macintosh computers are not compatible with this configuration due to the lack of NVRAM to store Pro Tools desired SCSI transfer rate.

The following SCSI HBA cards are qualified for use with Beige G3 models —

ATTO ExpressPCI SCSI HBA cards including:

  • PSC (ExpressPCI Single Channel Ultra/WIDE HBA)
  • EPCI-DC (ExpressPCI Dual Channel Ultra/WIDE HBA, also available in the Digidesign SCSI64 Kit)

With the following requirements:

Adaptec Power Domain SCSI HBA cards including:

  • 2906
  • 2940UW
  • 2940U2W
  • 3940UW

with the following requirements: