Audio Interface

[Markus Wolf]

This thread and some replies got me to read a little more on D/A conversion, altho im quite happy with my interface (RME UC) it was interesting nonetheless. Sound on Sound Article comparing different D/A converters.

http://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/3-s ... s-compared

[Lost to the Void]

Yeah that article is half audiophile and half actual science, as all sound on sound articles, you have to take them with a little pinch of salt as they tend to avoid the real science sometimes in favour of timeless industry heresay.
We`ve been through this subject and the detailed science behind it many times on this forum now, and there is a thread dedicated to it.

Needless to say, if you are using prosumer and above then your audio will be high quality and fine, the tiny incremental differences will be inaudible in your average project studio where the monitoring is only nearfield and not full range, and the room setup is barely optimised.
There are other places you can spend your money to get far greater gains than plumping for lavry converters and such (and I have been guilty of going down that road when I was less experienced and less knowledgeable).

[Markus Wolf]

I thought it was an interesting article. I dont intend to upgrade anytime soon TBH. I would like better monitors tho......Budget, Budget, Budget

[Lost to the Void]

I just spent an age deciding on and buying new nearfields for the production room.
I ended up turning my back on pro-audio, as when I was buying my new mastering monitors everyone pushed me to go research high end hi-fi, so I did for a year and got my awesome speakers.
Anyway, did the same for my new nearfields, I wanted to go passive as the weak link in studio nearfields is the amplification in actives, it`s very rarely decent due to space and cooling and other factors, so they tend to go with gainclone type digi amps etc and the crossovers are never as good. I decided passives were a better way to go, that way the money is going on the crossovers and the actual speakers etc. Pro audio is pretty slim pickins for passive monitoring at the nearfield level, and I wanted something semi full range too.
Anyway, did a ton of research and spoke to a load of companies, went to some shows, tried a load out, got some demo sets. Settled on my decision, and holy cow what a smart move. My new nearfields are translating unbelievably well, when I take my own stuff to the mastering room it really translates to the big towers.
So yeah, fuck pro audio, the hi end hi fi market is a bigger market, with more competition, and this drives innovation and development much more quickly, in some cases the tech is way more up to date than pro audio land.

I`m going to do a post about my findings and the new nearfields I got at some point on here, as others might find it helpful.

[terryfalafel]

All interfaces sound pretty much the same, your money is going on inputs, drivers, support, build quality and preamps. Output wise they all sound pretty much the same, I have had utterly ridiculous mastering grade stuff and decent prosumer stuff and the differences are neglible, and that`s on full range mastering speakers in a purpose built mastering room..

Agree, but I'm not sure that blowing more than 1k on something without seeing / hearing / touching it first is a good idea. Caveat emptor and all that.

[terryfalafel]

I just spent an age deciding on and buying new nearfields for the production room.
I ended up turning my back on pro-audio, as when I was buying my new mastering monitors everyone pushed me to go research high end hi-fi, so I did for a year and got my awesome speakers.
Anyway, did the same for my new nearfields, I wanted to go passive as the weak link in studio nearfields is the amplification in actives, it`s very rarely decent due to space and cooling and other factors, so they tend to go with gainclone type digi amps etc and the crossovers are never as good. I decided passives were a better way to go, that way the money is going on the crossovers and the actual speakers etc. Pro audio is pretty slim pickins for passive monitoring at the nearfield level, and I wanted something semi full range too.
Anyway, did a ton of research and spoke to a load of companies, went to some shows, tried a load out, got some demo sets. Settled on my decision, and holy cow what a smart move. My new nearfields are translating unbelievably well, when I take my own stuff to the mastering room it really translates to the big towers.
So yeah, fuck pro audio, the hi end hi fi market is a bigger market, with more competition, and this drives innovation and development much more quickly, in some cases the tech is way more up to date than pro audio land.

I`m going to do a post about my findings and the new nearfields I got at some point on here, as others might find it helpful.

Looking forward to this. I've tended to feel more that very high end hi-fi stuff was more snake oil and marketing than pro-audio, but im not hugely experienced in either domain to be honest. Certainly I was under the impression that high end speakers and crossovers were not desgined to have a flat frequency response; more that they are pleasing to the ear...

I know a chap who goes in for the top level audiophile stuff and his hi-fi sounds absolutely incredible, but I tend to glaze over when he talks about the nuances in sound between different usb cables and IEC connectors

[Lost to the Void]

I've tended to feel more that very high end hi-fi stuff was more snake oil and marketing than pro-audio, but im not hugely experienced in either domain to be honest. Certainly I was under the impression that high end speakers and crossovers were not desgined to have a flat frequency response; more that they are pleasing to the ear...

I know a chap who goes in for the top level audiophile stuff and his hi-fi sounds absolutely incredible, but I tend to glaze over when he talks about the nuances in sound between different usb cables and IEC connectors

Completely the opposite, high end hi-fi is all about pure translation.
You won`t find that many pro mastering studios using "pro audio" monitors, the majority go for high end hi end hi-fi (abbey road use B&W, Air studios use pioneer, masterdisk use Dunlavey, Digital Domain use Revel, etc etc)
Quality crossovers are all about eliminating filtering problems (present in a lot of active studio monitors)
Of course there is bullshit to cut through (there is just the same in pro audio land really) so you have to do your research.
CHEAP hi-fi is about "sweetening" the sound, covering up short cuts trying to flatter the ear to disguise bad manufacturing etc, but then pro audio has it`s snake oil, like the whole Adam audio trying to sell folded ribbon tweaters as a "better" option in their 2 way speakers (mainly because they use them on their higher level 3 way stuff), when ribbon tweaters aren`t really the best option for a 2 way system BUT, the product blurb worked and everyone bought adams when they were the hot ticket.
So pro audio land has it`s fair share of misleading kaka.

Yeah audiophools are just dumb asses. Jazz cables man, they make jazz sound better... purrrrlease.

[Alume]

All interfaces sound pretty much the same, your money is going on inputs, drivers, support, build quality and preamps. Output wise they all sound pretty much the same, I have had utterly ridiculous mastering grade stuff and decent prosumer stuff and the differences are neglible, and that`s on full range mastering speakers in a purpose built mastering room..

Agree, but I'm not sure that blowing more than 1k on something without seeing / hearing / touching it first is a good idea. Caveat emptor and all that.

Yeah, I should learn that habit.

I usually just buy and go with it. Different story with synths though obviously.

[CubiK Mass]

Those focusrite Clarret's look the dogs, I've got a saffire but I have thought about upgrading to the clarret 4, once they release the windows drivers, currently only Mac I believe.

youtu.be/ZGgSXYletkg

[Alume]

Ok i watched that and i can honestly say i didnt understand any of it haha

No offence ofcource, bu i dont know why those guys would have any credibility over other dudes.

[Lost to the Void]

Preamps. Focusrite know their shit when it comes to preamps.

[CubiK Mass]

Ok i watched that and i can honestly say i didnt understand any of it haha

No offence ofcource, bu i dont know why those guys would have any credibility over other dudes.

The clarrets have great reviews all over the net mate.

[PERIAL]

https://ask.audio/articles/these-two-mo ... nnectivity

[Dolorum]

If you have the money, I would really recommend dropping it on an Apollo 8p. The reason being is that the UAD preamps are firstly extremely clean and neutral. The magic comes from their preamp modelling for Neve and UAD pres. I have a Twin Duo that I recently purchased, and for tracking and monitoring (zero latency through UAD plugins), it's fucking magical.

[Hades]

If you have the money, I would really recommend dropping it on an Apollo 8p. The reason being is that the UAD preamps are firstly extremely clean and neutral. The magic comes from their preamp modelling for Neve and UAD pres. I have a Twin Duo that I recently purchased, and for tracking and monitoring (zero latency through UAD plugins), it's fucking magical.

this was my first choice for a while,
but the pricetag is just too much if you ask me.
I don't really need pre-amps (already have a big mixer),
so the only reason I'd still be interested is for the plugins you get.

which one of the UAD plugins can you recommend ?

[Hades]

If you think 8 ins and outs will always be enough, that's a decent option I'm sure. I've never heard RME kit but people seem to rate it highly.

What I can recommend is MOTU 16A. 16 in and out plus all the normal adat / optical expansion. Sounds amazing.

If there's any chance you'll ever want to sell 8 in / 8 out and get more, I would say defo save for longer and get 16 in / 16 out now. It'll save money in the long run...

all this talk about audio interfaces really makes me feel like getting a new one.

I have to admit I'm really tempted to get the MOTU 16A,
I could even go with the 8 inputs version,
but one of the things I like about it is the fact that if my mixer would ever break down,
I could still just use my soundcard and be able to use 80 or 90% of my gear.

I still got my Ensemble, but the FW is getting on my nerves.
It still works more than fine for recording, but it's the weak link in my studio at the moment if you consider my laptop can handle a whole lot more,
and switching to Thunderbolt would make things work a lot more faster.

[Hades]

I'm even tempted to sell my Sherman 2x2.
I mean, it's kind of ridiculous, I almost never use it,
I guess I mostly keep it out of a certain strange pride (being Belgian) and because I like Herman so much.
But I use my soundcard every day, so yeah...

[Dolorum]

If you have the money, I would really recommend dropping it on an Apollo 8p. The reason being is that the UAD preamps are firstly extremely clean and neutral. The magic comes from their preamp modelling for Neve and UAD pres. I have a Twin Duo that I recently purchased, and for tracking and monitoring (zero latency through UAD plugins), it's fucking magical.

this was my first choice for a while,
but the pricetag is just too much if you ask me.
I don't really need pre-amps (already have a big mixer),
so the only reason I'd still be interested is for the plugins you get.

which one of the UAD plugins can you recommend ?

I honestly haven't used many. I've been using the Neve 1073 preamp, it suits my vocals pretty nicely and sounds awesome when you drive it.

The Fairchild limiters are great as well. There's also the API 2500 bus compressor and channel strips, great stuff. You can get a good idea for what's good by checking the popular plugins on their page. SSL is good, but I'm not sure where you'd use it for a dance track.

Also great for the effects, there are a couple of good tape delays that are particularly effective, including their stock delay and reverb plugins.

[collide]

I did not dig deep into the differences between pro and high-end stuff - it's totally out of my range anyways but... I used to think it might only make sense when recording lots of acoustic and or quite stuff, which is not the case when using loud drummachines and synths all the time. I can't prove that with technical knowledge, it's just me thinking about this topic that way.

I use a Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 2nd Generation and want to invest into better monitors. My room is small and not treated to so far. I've only read the best about the Neumann's KH 120 A. Sometimes I still wonder if they'll offer enough bass frequencies. Despite the thoughts I've posted above I still ask myself if the Scarlett would be "good enough" to drive the Neumann's with it.

Any thoughts would be appreciated!

[Hades]

I did not dig deep into the differences between pro and high-end stuff - it's totally out of my range anyways but... I used to think it might only make sense when recording lots of acoustic and or quite stuff, which is not the case when using loud drummachines and synths all the time. I can't prove that with technical knowledge, it's just me thinking about this topic that way.

I use a Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 2nd Generation and want to invest into better monitors. My room is small and not treated to so far. I've only read the best about the Neumann's KH 120 A. Sometimes I still wonder if they'll offer enough bass frequencies. Despite the thoughts I've posted above I still ask myself if the Scarlett would be "good enough" to drive the Neumann's with it.

Any thoughts would be appreciated!

I've been reading this pretty interesting book about mixing ("Mixing with your mind"),
and one of the first tips the guy gives you is if you're still building your studio, that you should make your room totally empty,
have a friend hold 1 speaker and walk around you at the same distance, and you should mark where your sound comes across best.
This is so you should get to learn your sound stage.
After you have marked several spots on the floor where you can sit best, you can start building the whole room around that.

Too late for me now to do that, but it does seem like a decent idea.