Hi folks,
just to add to some of the reports of MF 5.1 crashing, here my experience over the last couple of days:
the MasterFader experience has been pretty frustrating in the last couple of days - it keeps crashing on a number of devices when connecting to my DL32R. These devices have been multiple Apple iPad Minis running iOS 12, plus an iPhone running the latest iOS. Also, some crashes with an Adroid tablet. Master Fader starts OK initially, but then, when connecting to the DL32R, it crashes during the loading process.
Multiple forced firmware re-updates didn't solve the issue, so I think we can exclude a firmware glitch.
Some first successes in solving the problem have been through replacing custom mixer picture (PNGs with transparency) with the on-board icons - that allowed the android device and one iPad mini to connect again. But this didn't fix the issue on the last iPad mini and the iPhone.
I finally got the iPad mini going by first selecting an offlíne DL32R in MasterFader and selecting the default snapshot, then selecting the "real" DL32R and connecting. Now, MasterFader told me there was a mismatch in the running shows and asked me to select DL32R or the iPad show. When I selected the DL32R show, the connection went OK without crashing. So it seems that MasterFader needed to be forced to synchronize.
Unfortunately, this way wasn't possible with the iPhone, since MasterFader on the iPhone doesn't allow you to select an offline show or snapshot. So what I did here (on a working iPad) was save my current show on the DL32R, create a new blank one, load it and select the default snapshot - essentially initializing the mixer. Now, I was able to connect the iPhone MasterFader without crashing. Now, I loaded the original show back onto the DL32R - and funny enough, the iPhone didn't crash, and now does connect to the mixer.
Another issue with synchronization: almost every time I try to update a snapshot, I get the message that something went wrong with the snapshot operation, asking me to re-connect to the mixer. After reconnecting, I can then usually update the snapshot correctly. That happens on all devices, Windows, Android, and iOS.
It looks something is fundamentally broken with the caching and synchronization mechanism in MasterFader 5.1 - Mackie needs to kick-start the developer team to take a thorough look at this and make it a top priority to crank out a STABLE version of MasterFader 5.1.1 or whatever. If I can't trust MasterFader to be stable, this isn't a usable product on stage.
Currently, I'm seriously considering switching platforms to something I can trust - Soundcrafts' Ui24R looks like an attractive alternative. A pity, since I've been a happy Mackie DL user (and active defender) from the start with my little DL1608. But now, I'm bitterly disappointed by the experience - it looks like Mackie is leaving their userbase with something that just isn't fit for even semi-professional use...
Hoping for improvements soon! Guess I'll give Mackie a couple of weeks and see if something happens or if they focus their efforts on their other products - I'll definitely make a decision before summer...
Cheers,
Torsten
