AXR4 - officially compatible with macOS Ventura and Apple silicon

Dear all,

The tests have been finalized and we can declare the AXR4 interfaces as officially compatible with Apple’s latest macOS release and their Apple silicon based hardware. The TOOLS for AXR V2.1.0 remain the current release version.

But the 2.1 AXR DspMixFx update universal app does not work for intel Macs due to a coding error. So us users on Intel Macs with an AXR cannot update. This is very poor PR and support for AXR users. Amazed this wasn’t spotted in testing before release, seems Intel Macs are not used in testing as the error is obvious as the app won’t load.
When will this be fixed?
Frustrated longtime Steinberg user.

David

Hi David, I am sorry to read that. We tested the compatibility for both Apple silicon and Intel and did not notice any issues. The dspMixFX works on both platforms.
Which error messages do you see. Is the dspMixFX not accessible at all or does it malfunction?
I just noticed that we still have a support ticket on hold. Let’s continue there (I will reach out to colleagues to see what can be done and we will reach out again).

Thanks for response Ed. The dspMixFx 2.1 app on loading just gives a blank gui.
It just does not run the universal binary appears to assume its is running on a m1 processor and not intel, so fails due to this.
On following up I was initially told that I needed to run Rosetta2 which is not possible as it’s an intel Mac.
I’ve been trying to identify if any other intel Mac users have been successful in installing the 2.1 version for the AXR but have no responses in that regard. On pushing the issue with support I received a response that they had identified an error in the app for intel machines but no time frames to fix. I reverted to v2.0 (Intel) binary which works ok. So all very frustrating.
David

Hi Dave, I’m using dspMixFx 2.1 app without any issue.
I have two AXR4T stacked running under OSX Monterey 12.6.3

These are my specs:

  • Mac Pro Late 2013
  • Processor Name:|12-Core Intel Xeon E5|
  • Processor Speed:|2.7 GHz
  • Memory: 64 GB

Regards,
@Dave

Thanks for that Frank. Could be I m looking for something machine specific then.

Can you advise what version Thunderbolt Control Panel is showing in applications as I just noticed on uninstalling all and reinstalling v2.1 tools that my thunderbolt control panel version has been downgraded from v2.12 to v 1.1?
The reinstall from scratch did not work. dspMxfx v2.1 app just hung when run requiring a force quit.

I am running same OSX as you but on an Intel IMac 2020.

Very odd.

Cheers
David

Joaquin from Germany Steinberg support has emailed today.
Followed all instructions uninstalling everything. DspMixFx 2.1 still fails.
The installer also downgraded my thunderbolt control panel from v2.1 to v1.1
Have sent Joaquin all info I have inc diagnostic log.

Don’t understand why the previously installed thunderbolt control panel and possibly driver has been downgraded. The version I was running was I recall installed as part of a fix for known AXR4 issues.

David

Hola @Dave

My actual Thunderbolt Version shows V 1.13
Firmware V2.00
AXR-ICT V0.54
dspMixFX AXR 2.10

Cheers

Thanks Frank

Makes me wonder what the difference is for the Thunderbolt v2.13 driver and 2.12 control panel. I see the Tools v2.10 installer has both available but by default clearly loads the 1.13 set…
My firmware and AXR-ICT read the same as yours but dspMixFX AXR won’t go to 2.10 for me but 2.00 will still run.

I’ll keep looking for my reason. Thanks again for info.

Cheers
David

A further question if I may.
Steinberg support have discovered the solution to 2.10 hanging my machine.
it appears my User Library / Preferences folder contained two slightly different formatted plist files used by dspMixFx.

These plist files appear to be created on running dspMixFx for the first time.

So at some point the various versions of the dspMixFx app changed the naming format of the file so a later update did not overwrite or delete the previous file.

Im guessing therefore that your installation is a recent install of dspMixFx which hasn’t yet needed an update?

Did you ever user earlier versions of dspMixFx ie v1.2.1 or v2…00?

Cheers
David

Hi Ed.

Joaquin appears to have found the solution. A duplicated plist file in the User Preferences.
As I have been an AXR user since day 1. I have updated dspMixFx at least twice.
At some point the app appears to create the plist name with a slightly different filename format (case different) causing the latest update to not delete or overwrite the old file. The file duplication existing, resulted in the app hanging on load.

Found this error on both my machines which both had the same update path.

Deleting these duplicated files allow the app to run.

Thanks for help.

Cheers
David

1 Like

Thanks for this confirmation.

AXR4t does not work stably on my MacMini M16gb computer, sometimes it happens that when I exit Cubase or Nuendo, the computer freezes and restarts, reports an error with the driver, every day I look to see if a new driver will come out… I open a new one a project that is empty and the asio driver behaves as if it has some vst loaded