Here's a new one.
I've been trying to work out a way to feed 2 digital channels into 2 R44s chained together as Master & Slave and I've found no earthly way to do it.
Right now I run one digital in to channel 1 of the master with the record settings set to "digital and analog" stereo x2. Great.
That takes the digital feed perfectly and channel 2 is analog in with 48p to power another set of mics.
That leaves me with the chained slave R44. And last night I had a thought: what if I just wanted 3 channels and set the slave to digital in stereo x1? Maybe?
Instead I learned that if your system is set to SLAVE, it won't accept a digital input. Even just one R44 set to slave and set to digital in stereo x1 and not chained to anything will not get a signal.
So back to the drawing board. 2 digital preamps, one to channel one of the master R44, the second into a PMD661 digital in, then the RCA jacks out of the 661 to the XLR in for the R44.
The signal is hot and I have to run it with the SENS knob all the way down (-56dbu!) but it takes the source and lines it up with all my other R44 files. The files from the PMD661 run at a different speed and don't line up, but I think that since its all happening during recording at the show in real time, there isn't really any lag.
BUT, is there any degradation in sound?
I don't think so.
Anyway, that's a lot of gear and it sure is heavy!
Just putting this here in case anyone searches for any of this info.
I still can't find a better way to synch 2 digital inputs using 2 R44s.
And you DEFINITELY can't use the digital in when the unit is set to slave.