Help, the mothership is sinking (S8)

Finally up(?)graded to an S8, and I can't say I like it.

Well, I like the controller itself, but how awful many crashes I have seen in 3 hours is astonishing. It must be a new record:
25 minutes: Records kept playing, but had a weird tempo bend and cracks all along. Only solved by power cycling the S8 (software kept running)
45 minutes: Same issue, only after power cycle the records started again where they left off...
1 hour: Traktor Pro crashes, all screens and controls freeze. Only solved by manually killing the traktor process, then restart.
1.5 hours : The tempo bend hell again

Ok that's it, switching to a fresh install of windows on my i5 / 16GB / 256GB SSD... I have high hopes of this one:
Disabled all things I don't need, optimisation tips, screen always on, no sleep, background process priority, videocard memory and assignment, etc etc
Well what do you know: same ****!

I literally can't finish even a mix of an hour. Serious? How on earth would I be able to trust this thing to play in front of an audience?

Seeing people like Carl Cox play full sets with it, there must be something to solve this?
* Downgrade firmware to run without Stems?
* Certain hardware (PC / Mac) that will definately work? You at NI should know what to use I might think?
* Competent drivers, that for some magical reason are not made public yet?

 

Check your S8 firmware version. Latest version is firmware 80.

 

Guess which version is on my S8.

I think that was the first thing I did when I got the S8, update the firmware. I think I'd better left the old one on there. Lot's of people say the problems came with the new firmware. So yeah, it's on version 80.

 

I'm in the same boat!! had my S8 for over a month now and not one mix recorded due to crashing and general running issues, been on the phone to Tech and they had me do a few things that in the long run made no difference, its frustrating cos there don't even seem to be a light at the end of the tunnel, I have even emailed NI for a refund but guess what no reply.
I have tried every setting possible and have even set Traktor up as just two decks and turrned the latency to the lowest point and still I get issues.
My argument is I bought my laptop after I bought the S8 and went by the recommendations on the NI site, even the Tech guy I spoke to said my laptop was up to the job so why do I have so many problems?
Anybody want swap an S4 mk2 plus 2 F1s for my S8 get in touch!

 

It is strange, i have almost the exact setup i5 etc etc and i have never had a breakdown or a freeze, i had one problem that was caused by a faulty usb cable and have a small glitch in the effects when selecting them for the first time but other then that its smooth sailing..

I use it in combination with a F1 with tekkens effects mapping and a xdj/1000 for controlling a deck in hid mode ore as standalone player. since update 2.8 no problems except for the small effects glitch.

 

Last Night I decided to roll back my windows 10 to 8, opted for a custom setup and made sure every auto update feature was turned off in windows, fully updated windows and hardware drivers, carried out all the usual speed up tweeks. Then installed Traktor software and the updated S8 drivers.
Then went to bed (importal part)
Just tried it out now and can see a vast improvement in fact I actually managed to record a little mix using 2 decks and 2 remix decks along with 4 FX units, one little glitch when I first started up one of the remix slots but nothing after that.
Got a real feel of how great the S8 is after a month of owning it, bout time.
Hope this helps anyone having similar problems.

 

Yeah. On my side it even got worse. I spoke to NI support and they (surprise!) couldn't fix it. Same old babble: update driver, press the usb in firmly (yeah, really), try fresh install, try latency checks, etc. Up to the point the only advise was from NI: buy new hardware. What?!

I think they meant to say buy Serato controller hardware, but I was stupid enough to buy a brand new laptop according to their advice on what to buy.

And...it did improve. It doesn't crash...within 2.5 hours. (I haven't decided if it's something to celebrate) But, whenever I select an effect, the sound distorts very badly so can't use effects other than the ones pre-loaded in advance. And ofcourse the odd crash still remains. Still not reliable

You've got to admire the ignorance of NI, that they leave this much people with non-working setups. I think when at least one person reacts with "Oh, but my setup works perfectly, so I don't know what you are talking about"... they trash the complaint as "another stupid user".

 

Yeh they are good at turning a blind eye.

 

Yep i agree NI is truly ignorant and good at Turning a blind eye. Return It and get your money back.

 

I have got the same problem, only joined this forum tonight to hopefully get this sorted. Sounds like nobody knows what to do

 

It seems that you at least need a dedicated laptop, which not much on it.
And you definitely must not run windows 10 to at least have a chance to make it run properly. I don't think I've ever seen anyone on this forum running an S8 off a windows 10 laptop without issues.
It can also differ with the USB port. My USB 3.0 ports give really **** performance, and the USB 2.0 is fairly ok.

 

I would say contact support. report back on what the tell you.

If they do not help you. Than return or sell the unit as it seems NI is in a huge decline. I been a loyal NI customer for over 6 years and to me they are at an all time low in support. Many long time users like myself are now looking at other options. The issues with the S8 is just on of many examples and problems NI choose to ignore.

 

I think I will see if I get any luck with NI support before I revert back to Windows 8. Will let you know reply......if I get one

 

Windows 7 is the way to go. You can contact support, but believe me.... downgrade to windows 7 solves 80% of the issues.

My issues are less now, but still not solved. Support is repeating the same old ****... like Troy says. I've been a loyal customer, but I think I will sell their crap off and see if there are alternatives.

 

Windows 10 is more than capable of running Traktor and the S8 perfectly well if you have the knowledge to set up your laptop correctly for audio!

I had upgraded from a Windows 7 laptop to a Windows 8 machine for Traktor and then I got the S8, which had previously been faultless in regards to audio, but then admittedly I had some very small, occasional glitches using the S8. Straight after finding that out I upgraded to Windows 8.1 and the random audio glitches disappeared completely and everything ran smoothly again.

When Windows 10 was in it's beta phase a number of forum members commented on here as to how stable their results were and so on that basis as soon as the official release came out I experimented on two different laptops. A now very long in the tooth dual core Toshiba Satellite, which has no right to be running as well as it does, given it's age and measly specs and my gigging rig details of which can be found in my signature.

Since installing Windows 10 I can most definitely say that both the test laptop and my DJ rig run Traktor Scratch Pro 2 smoother than both 7 or 8.1 ever did. I play out every Friday night for 4+ hours without any issues or fear of the S8 or the software letting me down since installing W10 at the beginning of September.

If you do a clean install (which in my opinion you should always do for the very best performance) after upgrading to W10 that will also help greatly in improving your experience as well as all the usual audio tuning tips.

 

Thanks for your info FloydB
Maybe I will stick with Windows 10 then.
If you have the time would you be able to note down what your audio settings are on and let me know please. I am not the most knowledgeable person when it comes to the settings of computers/laptops etc.
Didn't have to know much to set up Technics and a mixer

 

Well what can I say. My experience is the opposite.

You basically say that non-functioning windows 10 machines are the fault of the user who has no knowledge about setting up their audio? Weird that those same people can set their audio perfectly correct under windows 7, but they completely forgot after installing windows 10 right?

Just because your setup luckily works, doesn't mean others must be doing something wrong. Maybe you are just lucky.

Good to hear your setup works, but it doesn't make my problem any less real. I tried 2 different sets of hardware, both with windows 10 and windows 7, and it won't work longer than 20 minutes under Windows 10.

 

Okay so I bought the s5 as my intro to mixing. Brand new and really like the idea of Stems and remix decks. I'm also having the issues with the latency and unreliability. Do all of the experts feel like this could be solved by a software update/traktor 3? Or would you recommend getting my $$ back and getting a hybrid set up of 2 x1, f1, and high end mixer?

The creative aspect is important to me but for my money I prefer reliability and no glitches! I also want to believe this can get better, but I don't want to be out of luck after my warranty expires.

Thanks in advance for any advice!

 

Well latency problems are not solved in traktor 3.0 its likely your laptop/desktop were the problem resides, check your settings, do a latency check and see if you can change anything..your s5 is just a midi controller changing that wont solve your problem..

 

@D Smulders If you were to go back and read my post more carefully you will see that all I am stating is that Windows 10 is more than capable of running Traktor 100% if set up correctly. You yourself claim that Windows 7 is the "way to go" yet you also say that it only solves 80% of the issues that you have been having. That suggests that you still have not got your set up running correctly even on Windows 7.

There was no luck involved in getting my set up to work and again , if you were to read what I wrote more carefully you will see that I have had Traktor running glitch free on: Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and now also on Windows 10. The reason for that being that I have put a lot of time and effort over the years into making sure that the laptop I use in front of an audience is fully optimised solely for running Traktor and now also the S8.

In order to achieve this on Windows 10 you NEED to start with a Clean Install of Windows (the stripped back install which will only load the very minimum of apps/drivers etc) and not just do the upgrade install. You may also find that selecting "Background Processes" is another option that hinders not helps your set up. That option seemed to work on Windows 7 for me, but from 8 on wards the opposite has been true. Not all set ups respond exactly the same so there is a lot of trial and error with settings.

From my own experience and I might add with three different makes of Windows laptops, the trial and error period for me was many years ago on Windows 7. Windows 8.1 got easier, Windows 10 is a breeze and out performs both previous versions with far less work involved to get things running 100% glitch free, that is FACT and not luck!

@MarKaS I could tell you what my audio settings are on, but it will not really help you to set up your own machine unless it is the exact same laptop/specs as the one I use. The audio buffer/latency you will ultimately need to set will depend on many other variables and tuning tips that need to be sorted out first, as previously stated.
As a starting point though, try setting it on maximum latency to see if the audio issues disappear and then gradually reducing latency settings until the audio issues re-appear. Somewhere in-between is where you need to be setting your audio buffers, also allowing a small safety margin.
If you still get audio issues on the maximum latency settings your issue is elsewhere and will need further trouble shooting to track it down.

See how you go on and if you need any further help, then just post back here and I will offer any advice that I can.