FW-1884 All Lights On

[retromax75]

Hi Everyone, I recently picked up a FW-1884 and as you may have read from the title all the lights are on when you power it up, also the firewire light flashes as does the stop button light. I have done extensive googling this past week but cant seem to find anything that tells me for sure what this is exactly. I'm thinking maybe from all that searching it may be the firewire chip inside the unit that is gone?.
Does anyone know if those symptoms can mean anything else?.
As it's the first one of these i've seen could someone also tell me what it should do when powered on? and what it should do when powered on but not connected up to a computer.
So many questions I know but i'm pulling my hair out here (and there's not much of that left these days), I can see that someone is selling that firewire chip on ebay which looks a bit out of my soldering skills but maybe I could get someone to swap it for me (64 pins 1 cm in size sounds like a heat gun job).
There seems to be conflicting reasons for the symptoms mine has, some say bad firmware update and some say the firewire chip.
Any info anyone?

 

[DeeringAmps]

On power up:
All lights come on, then off, and the "clock" and "firewire" should light.
Do all lights stay on when not connected to your computer? They shouldn't.
Have you tried the factory "reset"?
There are several procedures that come up when you google:
"Tascam FW-1884 full reset".
Replacing the U9 chip is "advanced" solder work, just as you have surmised.
Try the "reset" (resets). If someone tried to update the firmware (with the same
firmware version) that will cause problems.
Reset is supposed to remedy that.
Good luck!
T

 

[retromax75]

Hi Thanks for the reply, yeah I tried the 4 button reset at power up and the lights blink for a second then all light up the same as before. Doesn't matter if connected to the computer or not they all stay lit, I thought i'd have a look at the firmware update but the Tascam isn't recognized at all by the computer!.
I'm using the same firewire card that worked for me on my Tascam Fireone which was also picky about firewire cards. Popped the Fireone on yesterday to see if that still worked and it was fine.
I've tried the 1884 on another computer but it simply isn't recognized. I had a DJ controller a while back that the firmware chip had become corrupt during a firmware update and the unit wasn't recognized by a computer, in that case I was able to take out the little firmware chip and reprogram it. That was more simple though as it was a little chip with 8 legs that plugged into a socket on the board and I got a cheap programmer for it off ebay, quite suprized myself I was able to fix that one actually!

The 1884 however is a whole different ball game!

 

[retromax75]

I also saw this when searching for a reset:-

"Hold down SHIFT, CONTROL, and F8 at the same time when the FW1884 is already turned on (you do NOT need to turn it off and power it up while holding buttons)."

Is that describing buttons on the FW-1884? I don't see them?

Edit: Oops now I see those buttons

Edit again: Those buttons do nothing either, don't even make the lights blink like the other reset combination.

 

[retromax75]

A bit more information about the lights on (not that it probably means much) but when I said the firewire light flashes well I just noticed what it actually does is blink 3 times then goes out for a second then blinks 5 times and goes out for a second then repeats. The stop button light is just a constant blinking.

Edit:
The blinking light must be some sort of engineer code?, there is a video on youtube showing the firewire light on someones that blinks 7 times then 2,
here:-

as I said mine goes 5 then 3
Exactly like the one in this youtube video:-

 

[DeeringAmps]

The "3 and 5" is probably an error code.
Unfortunately I've never been able to find a Tascam doc that explains the codes.
If the unit is not working as a mixer when not connected to the computer you've
got more than just a U9 issue.
What is the serial number?
Wish I had more for you...

T

 

[retromax75]

0090899

 

[DeeringAmps]

You get no audio in or out when NOT connected to the computer?

 

[retromax75]

Does it have to be in a certain "mode" to do that? or would I simply hook up a few things and see if anything goes in and out?
I see the mon mix button but obviously I can't select anything as nothing responds!
Thanks for the replies BTW

 

[DeeringAmps]

Hook something up.
At least we'll know where you are at audio wise.
Something more than just U9 is a problem here.

 

[retromax75]

Right, so I plugged a drum machine into one of the inputs and nothing, Do you have to select a mode first? if so can't do anything?
Sounds like what I described with that dj controller where it couldn't load the firmware as it booted as the chip was corrupt?
Surely if the firewire (U9) chip was the issue it would at least boot properly and just have no firewire capabilities?

 

[DeeringAmps]

I don't have any good ideas for you.
Hopefully someone will chime in...

T

 

[retromax75]

Hopefully, I guess it would be good for more than myself
Thanks

 

[wkrbee]

Look at the Firewire connectors on the back of the unit.There is a metal shield around each connector.At one end-pointed- there is seam.Is there a gap between the seam.Yes? That means someone forced the Firewire cable in upside down which fries -puts power to the data lines -U9 and takes out the 56 ohm pullup/pulldown resistors on the data lines.

 

[retromax]

Hi thanks for the reply both FireWire sockets a perfect and don't look like they have been forced at all by an upside down plug, I guess I can rule that out then.

 

[Ben Dardoufas]

I'm afraid it sounds like your unit is toast, this happened to an 1884 we had in my old studio when a "friend" plugged in the FW cable upside down into the mac.

This basically short circuits the 1884 and fries the motherboard.

10 years ago it cost 450 euro to fix.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

 

[Steve Fogal]

For the archives...
MAKE SURE YOU HAVE THE CORRECT 1.8 DRIVER FOR YOUR PARTICULAR TASAM FW UNIT. (there's one each for the FW-1884, FW-1082 & FW-1804).

I bought a used Tascam FW-1884 from ebay several months ago. After installing the 1.8 driver (as it tuned out in the end, I had installed the wrong 1.8 driver/read more below), when I hooked up everything the 1st time the lights seemed normal, but the unit didn't appear to be working. After fiddling with things & trying to get it working, somehow all the lights were coming on. I tried unplugging, re-plugging, turning off & on, to get the lights to go back to normal. This was with my Lenvovo ThinkStation PC.

Then for the hell of it, I tried it on my Dell laptop, which only has a 4-wire firewire, so I used a 6-pin to 4-pin cable (my FW-1082 worked with the Dell before this way, though with a 4-wire connection it can take about 30 min to warm up/remain stable), same issue, all lights on and not working. So I thought maybe I should delete & reinstall the 1.8 driver again with the Dell, still no luck.

I went to the Tascam site again to re-download the 1.8 driver hoping thos may help, even though the one I had saved worked fine with my FW-1082. As it turned out, I had been trying to use the 1.8 driver version for the FW-1082 on my FW-1884! I had thought there was only ONE 1.8 driver version for ALL the FW line, NOT THE CASE! After downloading the proper 1.8 driver version 'specifically' for the FW-1884, and installing on my Dell laptop, BINGO the FW-1884 lights were normal, and the unit started working!

I then went and installed the correct FW-1884's 1.8 driver on my main DAW, the Lenovo ThinkStation, and BINGO again!!! the FW-1884 worked! It was like I just won the lottery. It's been working like a charm ever since, and I've never had the all light on issue since.

 

[retromax75]

Gave up on the Tascam and it's now in the attic, I don't usually get rid of stuff so it will probably stay there until the end of time!. My issue wasn't about the driver as the unit isn't recognised by any computer, it should be available as a stand alone device but isn't as it does nothing but all the lights on. Thanks for the reply.

 

[Steve Fogal]

Hi Retreo, in your particular case your Tascam may indeed unfortunately be toast.

And in my case, the 'all lights on' issue on my FW-1884 also happened whether connected to a computer or not. Neither of my PC's would recognize my FW-1884 with the incorrect FW-1082 1.8 driver . However, the second I had the correct 1.8 driver installed on both PC's specifically for the FW-1884, each PC recognized the Tascam instantly, and everything was normal.

At least worth mentioning for anyone else who may be unknowingly attempting to use the incorrect 1.8 FW unit driver version.

I read a lot of talk on the internet about using the latest 1.8 driver for these units, but not a single mention of caution that there's any distinction of a 'specific' driver for each of the three Tascam FW series (1884, 1082, 1804) units. Some may have understood this already, but I had made the mistake of attempting to use my FW-1082's 1.8 driver with my FW-1884.

Actually as I recall now, I believe it was only after this wrong driver attempt, when my lights began to go haywire, as if the wrong driver had caused the issue. Because when I 1st had plugged in and turned it on, I did not have the all lights on issue. After connecting it to my PC with the wrong driver, is when all lights started staying on. Disconnecting from my PC afterwards still had the all lights on issue remaining. This issue persisted no matter what I did, until the correct driver was installed on my PC, connected the FW-1884 again, which instantly recognized the Tascam, and the all lights on issue suddenly stopped, as if it automatically reset something.

PS, I may have also done a reset like has been mentioned here, at some point during my troubleshooting process, but I don;t recall.

 

[Buck]

I vaguely remember people reporting these symptoms (flashing lights, etc) some years back when they mis-applied a firmware update in some way. The solution as I recall was to send it to Tascam for repair. Probably not an option anymore...