Erratic Axe-FX behavior!

Enzee

Enzee

Member
I had a strange issue last night on stage with my Axe-FX II and MFC-101...

Intermittently and without reason, my presets were changing as I played. I was not tapping on the MFC-101 or anything. I would be playing and it would switch to another preset. I would switch it back and a few minutes later it would switch to a different present in that bank. Then it would just cycle through the whole bank of 5 presets. I hit the tuner and it changed of of my pedal presets.

Before long I stopped the show to take a few minutes with my tech the preset stayed the same, but the gain kept changing in the preset (it actually sounded like it was changing presets with nothing changing on the MFC-101 screen). I stopped the show and we rebooted the Axe-FX and it was good for the rest of the show, but wow it was scary.

I have used this unit every day for multiple hours without this sort of occurrence.

We are wondering if it might be the CAT5 cable I am using. Could it have been stepped on hard and something in the wire made it "short" out? I will test this with another cable tomorrow, but the cable that I used tonight has worked great before. It is a 50 foot one.

I have the FW 9.0 and the MFC-101 is the latest. I have not upgraded to 9.01 yet.

No MIDI was hooked up other than the CAT5 cable. I was using a Mission SP-1 for wah (CC 16 for wah and 17 for the toe switch). One XLR output was going to the house and one unbalanced 1/4" out was going to our in ear monitors.

Could it be the metal sleeves out of the SP-1 were touching each other and triggering something? (just a crazy thought, but they are right angle plugs...)

Any thoughts on what might cause something like this?
 
could the big 'value' dial on the front panel have caused it?
make sure it 'clicks' into the next increment and don't sit half way between clicks..
 
Clarky,

Thanks so much. That's a great thought and I tried that, but I could not replicate the problem. In fact, that is the frustrating thing now is that I can't repeat the problem. I have went ahead and upgraded the firmware to 9.01 (I doubt it was a FW issue anyway). Strange. Any other thoughts?
 
maybe is was never a real prob as such...
maybe it was your 'value' dial caught in a sort of "in-between" place..

if this happens again...
check the value dial to see if it needs to click into it's setting..
then see if the issue persists..
if it does.. then if nothing else you ruled this possibility out
 
I love that big 'ol value knob. Makes it easy to cruise through presets at light speed. I find myself blowing right past a targeted preset if I'm not careful.
 
Check your CAt 5 cable. I put an ethercon end on my cable to match my Mark II MFC and sometimes the cable is loose and a preset will jump on me.
 
Actually, I think I figured out the problem even though I could not replicate it. I was using a 50 foot CAT5 cable and that is highly NOT recommended. That is the limit due to capacitance that Fractal informed me of. In other words, at that length it is user beware. I cut my cable back to a nice 25 foot one and no problems since. I'll be ordering an 7pin MIDI in 50' length to run those long runs from the front of the stage to behind the back line. I think that fixed the issue (fingers crossed).
 
Enzee said:
Actually, I think I figured out the problem even though I could not replicate it. I was using a 50 foot CAT5 cable and that is highly NOT recommended. That is the limit due to capacitance that Fractal informed me of. In other words, at that length it is user beware. I cut my cable back to a nice 25 foot one and no problems since. I'll be ordering an 7pin MIDI in 50' length to run those long runs from the front of the stage to behind the back line. I think that fixed the issue (fingers crossed).
Click to expand...

I was going to suggest that your cable was a little long. It doesn't mean it won't work but reliability can be compromised. 9.01 was the bug fix firmware so it could have been that too but glad you are back on track.
 
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