Soundcard : MAYA 44 USB

DJ Gear & Hardware Hardware: Controllers, Mods and Gear
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Soundcard : MAYA 44 USB

Hey guys !
I just wanted to give my feedback about the maya 44 usb which I recently purshased (and send back almosr right away).
The surprinsing thing about it at this first sight is that it is REALLY light ! So much that I first thought the package was empty !
It was plug and play on my macbook.
So far so good…but then comes the trouble…
The sound is awfull, my on board macbook soundcard has almost better quality. I also had lots of cracks and pops even with high latency. And I tried to use the inputs with traktor (with a cd player), and It sounded really really bad…To me this device is complety unuseable ! So I decided to put a bit more money, and i’m going for a presonus firebox !

Hopes this help !

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Hey Peter, can you specify which computer and OS you were running?

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I can read macbook, but what OSx?

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I’m running Tiger (10.4.11), on a 2 ghz, 2 go macbook

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lawl I purchased this card today, but i guess I won’t have these problems on Windows.

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I hope this will work out well for you..keep us updated !

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I’m counting to receive it in the following hours, I will edit this post then and tell you my first experiences

€: Whoop there it is

I need to try it out, I will give you feedback soon

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Alright I just had a gig with it on a party with about 30 people dancing, there were absolutely no problems!
I choosed the Maya 44 USB Asio Driver and set the latency to “fast” which is about 3 ms I think. All effects working fine (which I think needs the most processing).
One thing I did:
I didn’t put the headphones into the “Headphone”-Output, but instead into the “analog 3/4”-Output. That’s because thats the only way to get them working with the cueing/monitoring way that’s inside Traktor. I don’t like the monitoring system that comes with it and is always active when you put the headphones in the headphone-output. I think it’s the way that normal mixers are monitoring, except that you only can control it inside the Asio-Settings which is very uncomfortable I think.

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I just ordered the Maya44 off ebay. How do I hook it up with Traktor so I can headphone cue the next track? Thanks!

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what you need to buy is a RCA male to a female hosa or RCA to a 3.5mm female (for smaller jack), now you can plug your headphones into the maya 44, and setup traktor to the right outputs for cueing. Done!
Radio Shack is your friend!

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I’ve just got one of these myself, and I’m finding that the sound quality of the outputs is nice and crisp…

… but because I’m mainly Shoutcast DJing (on a non-commercial Internet Radio station) and running Vista on my laptop, the shoutcast encoder doesn’t detect any input from the analogue-in ports on the box. Oh well such is life - I can get by with the line-in on the laptop, so it’s only a minor disappointment.

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bad computer feedback noise

I’m getting a lot of noise through my laptop to the output of my Maya 44 USB. I know this because the noise changes when my hard drive spins and when I drag windows around my desktop. I am using windows xp pro.
I’ve got the latest drivers, 2.8.11. I am using Virtual DJ, but this happens before and after I configure anything with either VDJ, ASIO4ALL, or the maya control panel. The problem is worse when I hook up my second turntable to 3,4.

For my setup I have two numark turntables connecting the output to inputs 1-4 on Maya. And the respecting outputs going to the tape inputs on my Behringer VMX200 mixer. Turntable one works with VDJ and I can hear music alright but it’s only covering up the noise coming from my computer. When I try to play music from Turntable 2 the noise is so bad it masks the music. I dont know what going on but this is big let down. I’m hoping it’s just something with this usb card and not my laptop.

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@Resonant Freq

I have the Maya 44 and don’t have any of that kind of problem. I can hear the hard drive’s sound thru the internal sound card in the laptop, but not from the maya 44. Are the turntables on your desk where the laptop is also? Just a guess, but are you sure that it isn’t actually the turntables that capture the resonance of the hard disk? A bit of a long shot, but worth a try. :slight_smile:

And does this happen with all the latency settings as well?

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check the latency of the sofware

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Problem Found!

Alright I found the problem! :smiley: I’m for sure getting dirty power from the wall - as soon as I unplug the power to run on batteries the noise goes away. For reference purposes I’m uploading a recording of that sound. In the recording you can hear me minimizing and maximizing windows, I wasn’t able to capture the harddrive spinning but you get the idea.

I emailed ESI earlier and here’s what they replied with for anyone else who’s not having grounding issues:

Dear Sean

There are a number of things that can create the problem you show
and can be difficult to track down

However

Can you read through and try the below suggestions
and re- check the use of the Maya 44 USB

(Please let me know any results you find)

…

a)
when running a system for dedicated audio work

Disable/Stop any virus checkers/spyware/disk management software

You can always renable before going back to email and internet use
…

b)

Disable any on board sound device in the system bios

And onboard Lan in the bios

Also any WLan

(You can always re enable them later )

…
c)

Ty changing “power saving schemes” if possible
And check if it makes a difference

Switch Off Power Schemes
Start > Settings > Control Panel > Power Options > Always On > Turn off monitor and turn off hard discs and system standby to Never

…
d)

You may also wish to try these tweaks

Set Processor scheduling to background services and not Programs
Start > Settings > Control Panel > System > Advanced > Performance Settings > Advanced Tab > Background Services

Set Visual effects to a minimum.
Start > Settings > Control Panel > System > Advanced > Performance Settings > Visual Effects Tab > Adjust for best performance

…

Also

If there is a problem with popping /hissing and noises etc when using a laptop
Then If you disconnect the laptops PSU
and run the laptop on battery power only
And the noises disappear or reduce in any way?

This would relate to issues with the laptops PSU

The problem doe,s not relate to the audio device

You would need to connect and use a DI box or ground loop isolators
between the outputs of the audio device and external monitor system/mixer etc
to eliminate the problem

…
A common cause is…
This occurs with use of external audio devices when using a laptop with it’s own PSU connected
If the noises etc disappear or reduce when the Laptop is being used on battery power only
It would relate to a grounding issue

You may wish to investigate and checkout information on the subject
Such as information shown on the Sound on Sound forum
That you may find of use

In the drop down Forum menu select Go to Forum /Discussion Groups/PC Music
Click on the subject “Click here if your laptop contains strange noise”
Then click on the links in the page