I’m getting very frustrated trying to connect my new Dell 5510 Mobile Workstation and my Focusrite  Liquid Saffire 56.  The laptop has a Thunderbolt 3 port.  It even has the little lightning bolt insignia.  The 56 uses Firewire connectors.  I checked with Focusrite support and they told me that I could use a Firewire 400 to 800 cable connected to a Apple Firewire to Thunderbolt 2 adaptor which is connected to a Thunderbolt 3 adaptor.  Well right now that doesn’t work.  The Dell is seeing the 2 adaptors, but not the device.  I checked with Focusrite support yesterday to see if there was any installation software besides the Mix Control.  He said no.  I already have the Saffire Mix Control 3.7 installed, but it says that there is no device connected.  The only other thing I can think of is that I am not sure whether I previously put the 56 in stand-alone mode.  If so, would that prevent the Mix Control from seeing the device?   I would really appreciate any advice.  I just want to start making music again, but this is sapping my creative drive bigtime.  Thanks for the therapy session.  

I don't know if this will help but with my Saffire 24 pro and pro 40 mixcontrol 3.7 didn't work good. Had simular problems. 3.4 always worked the best. I assume the Liquid 56 will work with 3.4. Worth a try if it's the drive causing the problem.

Thanks for the suggestion, I will try anything at this point.

Hi,
 
I have a 56 and it has been very reliable. When I was researching fire wire interfaces, I learned that the Texas Instruments chip set was the most reliable (might want to check that). There is a switch to set the L56 back to factory defaults from Mix Control, but since you can't see the unit, that will not help you - maybe Focusrite has a "back door" method for that and not sure if the stand alone mode will cause problems.
 
Some thoughts:
 
You might want to try to swap out the fire wire cable. I had a few times when the 56 did not connect and I found that restarting everything usually did the trick. Shut down the 56 and your PC then restart the 56, then the PC. If they talk, the FW active LED will illuminate green on the front of the 56 (right side - above the headphone pot). You also probably know that you should not pull the fire wire cable out of either the PC or 56 while they are on (shutdown everything first). Sorry if I am repeating something you already tired :-)
 
Looks like you already checked with Focusrite, but there is also a troubleshooting guide for the 56 at:
https://support.focusrite...-Troubleshooting-Guide

Thanks, I will try a different cable, it's a generic. I can't really do anything about the chipset because it is a mobile workstation, so nothing is replaceable. I did try shutting everything down and restarting. What OS are you using, I'm using Windows 10 pro. Thanks for the suggestions.

Mosvalve, I checked on the prior version of Mix Control, 3.4, but it didn't list windows 10 support. I'm using Win 10 pro. Will that work with 3.4?

I would say the problem is with the adapters rather than the Focusrite Mix Control.  If the device is not being recognized and installed by Windows, nothing else will work.
 
Our resident DAW builder guru hopefully will chime in and set you straight with the adapters.  I recall something about only certain Apple approved adapters will work. 

Fireberd thanks for the feedback and I appreciate any assistance you can give me. For the record of the adapters I'm using or actually Apple brand

Also my laptop is recognizing both of the Apple adapters but it doesn't seem to go beyond that. In other words it's not seeing the device so I'm wondering if the firewire part of the connection is what it's not recognizing rather than the adaptors which it does see.

Hi again,
 
I am using Windows 10 pro too and generic fire wire board with the TI chip set (Asus motherboard - Intel Core i&-3770K CPU @ 3.5GHz) . I agree that it is probably the adapters.
 
Couple of other thoughts - can you try another PC just to rule out the 56 or the cable? Also, do you have the latest fire wire drivers installed on the Dell?
 
Hope it works out for you, the 56 is a great preamp !