Major Problems with My TI2 Polar

  • Hello everyone!


    First off, I've been discussing this with technical support--I'm just wondering if anyone else is experiencing any of these issues.


    I bought a new TI2 Polar a few months ago. Since I bought it, I have had some major issues with crashing and glitching and such. I've tried installing every OS from 3.0 to the most recent public beta, but it seems to be unusable regardless. I also have owned the Snow until recently and never have had any issues with it.



    When playing in single mode (not connected to the computer via USB), every 2-5 minutes the Polar either:


    1) Crashes and will not receive any more keyboard input, though the display reacts to knobs being turned. Usually it begins emitting a very high pitched and loud noise tone until sleeping the Virus or unplugging it. Upon waking the Polar again, normal functionality returns.


    2) Sounds are somewhat garbled or play out of only side's channel (both headphones and out 1). This sounds almost like a serious bitcrushed effect or distortion of some kind. This is fixed when the Polar is slept and woken again.



    When playing in "TI mode" with Logic 8, after a minute or so:


    1) The Polar stops responding to MIDI input and either sustains a note or begins emitting a loud high-pitched noise sound. Functionality returns after sleeping and waking. The Virus Control plug-in does not detect that the Polar has been disconnected.


    2) The Virus suddenly emits a loud burst of noise and sort of reboots.


    3) Playing the Polar's keyboard results in very unstable MIDI--jerky, delayed, "stuck notes," etc.



    Does anyone else have any of these problems with a TI2--are they OS bugs or could it be a problem with my hardware (I sure hope not?) I'd really love to be able to use this without issue as I know from experience that the Virus is an AWESOME piece of hardware! Right now, it's pretty much completely unusable.



    Thanks for any suggestions or thoughts! :)

  • Sounds like a hardware issue to me... especially since it also crashes in standalone mode : everything you describe used to happen in the early (2005 ish) TI OS versions, hardly anymore in 3.0 ...



    But anyway, I think tech support will give you a better answer than anyone of us here :)

  • Another thing that occurred to me that makes me think the issues are software related: The problems do not always happen the same way--they happen differently at different times. For example, I don't always get the distortion, and I don't always get a crash after 2 minutes. Also, I never have these issues right when I turn on the Polar. It seems likely that if it was solely a hardware issue that it would happen pretty much right after booting the Virus... right?

  • Hey man


    I'm so glad you posted this! I have a TI Polar and I'm having exactly the same problems. I would really like to hear how you get on with tech support.


    I'm Running:-


    mac book pro with OS X 10.5.8


    Logic 8


    and Virus TI Polar


    Cheers

  • simonbura,


    basically, when the TI's DSP crash, it might not receive MIDI well, produce stuck notes and play only on odd or even parts. but pretty much everything in this list can also be a USB data transmission problem. therefore it's pretty hard to help unless we get more info.


    obviously the TI should never crash. from 3.0 - 3.0.3 there were bugs which made it crash. those bugs should be ironed out, at least, we cannot make it crash here under normal circumstances. if your TI crashes frequently, even when you don't even touch it or you just play in single mode, i'd say there is a good chance that we're dealing with a hardware problem. if it crashes only when you work with it we need to take a closer look.


    simonbura and circuite_damage - are you both using 3.1?


    best, marc


  • simonbura and circuite_damage - are you both using 3.1?


    best, marc


    Hi Marc, yes I'm using 3.1. I can't be sure, but I think it may be crashing less at least. It still crashes in single mode occasionally though, which seems to indicate a hardware issue.


    Tech support has been fantastic. Very easy to work with--we are in the process of setting up a repair of my unit. Hopefully the problems will be sorted out soon.

  • as far as crashing/noise bursts


    before i was told to use 128/256 and no higher while using the virus as main audio interface. for a while seemed to work great. now, at 128 i seem to be running into the same problems. i hope this is not a hardware issue and is an issue that may be resolved with software update.


    circuit how long is your virus on before it began to do this? i have been up for a while and only now is it starting to malfunction. (could be due to song progress, which is only running 10-15% cpu)


    i also know that sometimes more than 8 voices will throw my virus off. when i have more than 8 voices total running including "mono 1-4", number of voices "off/2-8 unison", and playing chords this will sometimes result with shh.


    anyway, hope your problems have been resolved i am still looking for solutions!

  • same here! It sucks.


    I don't get the crashes though. It just hangs on a square wave note and the only thing that will stop it is powering off... That or the sound will fart and go out until i power off/on again. It usually happens in sequence mode for me. I really think it's a hardware problem since I have reinstalled the latest os - 3.3.4.00... 5 times already. I reported it to Access but I don't look forward to any reply... So I just requested that the shop I bought it from replace it right away. I just hope that they will soon come to their senses, admit it is defective and replace it, because I'm losing patience.

  • why don't you look forward to a reply?


    marc

    Well, Marc... from what I have read on the internet, Access has a "rep" of being hard to contact when it comes to support...But I want to give the benefit of the doubt. Can they prove me wrong? It might be difficult in my case because I strongly believe it is a hardware issue and I want the dealer to replace it ASAP before I fall out of their "15 day limit" and I have had the Polar in my hands for 10 days. Also, I work a 9-5 so I did not have all the time in the world to test this unit to be able to return it immediately... But the fact that it glitches out at least once if not 5 times every hour of operation, in the middle of a good sounding jam sequence is depressing.

  • Glad I found this post as I have had similar issues ever since purchasing my TI2 Polar 3 months ago.


    I have always wanted a decent Synth, and when I found out about the Virus TI, I just had to get one, as it would integrate fully with software. But the problems I am having are really hampering my productivity, as I when I have to keep on closing my DAW (cubase 5)to restart my Virus you lose the flow :(


    I get Various issues with my TI, but the most common issue is random sound crashes(sounds like a high pitched saw tooth wave most of the time) on the Virus channels. If I restart my DAW and the Virus it usually works fine again for a while, and sometimes I can work for an hour or so without an issue, but other times it can happens every few minutes. This happens with only 1 sound open, but appears to happen more frequently when I have more than 1 virus midi channel in use. (panic doesn't stop the sound) So I am also concerned about this damaging my speakers, as the sound gets quite loud. Had headphones on the other day, and it wasn't pleasant.


    Also, when I have a cubase project open that is using the Virus, when I close this project and open another which is using the virus, the Virus nearly 100% of the time stops working. So if I change projects, I have to close Cubase totally, and reset the Virus.


    I have found recently, that say for example I have an instrument on VIrus Midi 2, and the instrument gets the high pitch noise, usually the other midi channels are ok, so if I drag my instrument within VC to Midi 3, and then configure the channel on my daw from 2 to 3, it works again. But channel 2 remains messed up until both my daw and the Virus are restarted.


    Sometimes when this happens, it causes the other channels to act very strangely, and the lights on the LFO section on the Virus flash really fast and not in temp. And other times, I get no sound at all from the virus until I restart.


    It also just locks up sometimes, with the virus TI display frozen, only way to get around this is to remove the power from the Virus. Sometimes on a fresh reboot of my pc and Virus, it doesn't work at all, and i have to restart the virus again to get any sound.


    I also get issues with the Atomizer, it works for a few mins, then stops. Both in single mode and via USB. Keys stop changing the effects randomly.


    I thought this was most likely a USB issue, or an issue with my old DAW Cubase SX 3. But I have tried setting up the virus on all USB ports, and with only my Mouse/Keyboard and Cubase Dongle plugged into USB, but the issue still occurs.


    I thought it was down to my PC/daw, so upgraded at Christmas, and updated to Cubase 5, but the issue hasn't gone away:(


    Does this sound like a hardware issue? I am almost regretting spending so much money on my TI, as although I love it when it works, the issues I have are killing my productivity.


    I have 2 PC's in the house, a dual core with XP 32bit, and a quad core with Windows 7 64. I get the same issue with both PC's. All drivers up to date etc.



    I have tried all OS available on the site, including the latest, but the problem just won't go away, any help would be greatly appreciated.


    Many thanks

  • so i just spent a week trying to talk to Access support.
    The guy handling my case was just throwing bones at me to chew on. And then for 3 days he had nothing to say to me so I asked him to just say it's a hardware problem and that in doing so, it would expedite my return/exchange process with my dealer. All he could say was


    "Dear xxxxx,In this case I simply can't exclude this being a hardware issue with this unit.





    Best wishes,
    xxxx xxxxxxx
    "


    What kind of support is that.
    If it's not a hardware problem then what is it? Well whatever it is, it is a manufacturer's defect... Because I have re-updated the os to 3.3.4.00 5 times!! What else can I do on my side? All I needed was for him to help me a little by admitting the unit is defective. But of course nobody will admit anything because it will make somebody look bad, so I understand... But to leave me with "Best wishes," and no other helpful advice is very disappointing.


    Well I now have several videos of the glitch happening.
    I actually went and bought a new hd camera just so I could capture this polar's defects.
    My dealer is now willing to accept my return. But the time wasted and the don't care attitude of this one person working for Access support is a bummer.

  • My dealer is now willing to accept my return. But the time wasted and the don't care attitude of this one person working for Access support is a bummer.

    if it crashes all the time, return it. wording aside, you need to understand that tech support cannot remotely troubleshoot your system with 100% accuracy. they try to help but when it comes to possible hardware defects things get complicated: imagine it is not a hardware defect but something else. imagine you return the product, get a new one and run into the same problem. how annoying would that be? and when you read "best wishes" - that's probably just because it is a part of the signature.


    best, marc

  • Marc, I don't expect tech support to be gods.
    But the way this person has handled my case... seems like he lacks any concern for my situation. Do I have to repost my email conversation here?
    No, because I'm not out to get anybody. If I was... I would have dropped the guy's name already, along with the name of the dealer I got it from for making me wait this long to return it... I have had this defunct polar for over 2 weeks. I don't blame them for shipping me a defective product. I don't blame Access for rolling out a defective product... S#!t happens. It just sucks how cold this tech support person is to me, and how much time I have wasted.


    If I return this polar and get the same thing back I will return it again and never buy an Access product again.
    I now have over 15 videos of the glitch happening. A few of those videos show me powering on the polar only to have it glitch and powering it off all in less than 2 minutes time. If this was a common problem then a lot more people would be unhappy... But I don't think this is the case. So I must be the unlucky bastard this time. Somehow, I have some faith that my 2nd polar will not be the same.


    Yeah, you are right "best wishes" or "best" or "whatever" is just a signature and means nothing. Thank you for reminding me why I don't have a signature.

  • btw, does anyone how long the usb cord that ships with the polar is?
    because i have like 3 usb cords in my room same color, but all different lengths...