Help Choosing an Audio Interface

[guitarmadman85]

I am upgrading my Adobe Audition,and it requires, or is highly recommended, to get an interface that supports an ASIO Driver. As of right now I am experiencing some major lag problems,and this should solve them. Some boxes would include the m-audio fast track, and the presonus boxes. I record on my laptop(pc), and it does support firewire. If it is worth it, I would got for an mbox 2, because I can get it for the student discount price, but I would like to stick with adobe, because I really like it. I love the noise reduction, as well as the mastering plug in. I feel like I can get exactly the quality I want when I record , and I am very familiar with the program. The interface that I like the most so far is made by TC Electronics, and it is a firewire style box. It is the
Konnekt6. It gets the best reviews, but only has one mic input, and I would really prefer two. I just want something that will sound great, and that I will be happy with for a long time. I don't record drums, so more than two mic inputs arn't necessary. Thanks fellow fretters!

http://www.guitarcenter.com/TC-Electronic-Desktop-Konnekt-6-Firewire-Audio-Interface-104924485-i1388067.

[deeaa]

I've had both the M-Audio boxes (um, 410 or 4 something...two mic inputs and two plugs for four simultaneous) and currently have a Presonus box (Firepod, 8 in). In my experience both have been very good boxes and I could recommend either one no problem.

However, can't say why but if I was looking for another 2-mic input box, I'd probably go with Presonus again. I like 'em.

[guitarmadman85]

Thanks! That really helps. It feels like there are lots of mixed reviews on everything out there, mbox, m audio, presonus ect. I did find another that I like a lot, probably more than the TC, and that is the focusrite pro 24. It's firewire, with 16 in and and 8 out. It has two mic inputs too. Is firewire really that much faster than usb 2.0? My other question, is that if the focusrite has 16 in, does that mean you can potentially have up to 16 track simultaneous? The focusrite seems get the best reviews, have the best mic preamps, the most ins and outs, the least amount of lag at 1.4ms. And it's only $300. My only issue is that it's a company I've never heard of. Anyone with any knowledge or experience with focusrite that could chime in would be awesome.

[deeaa]

That Focusrite has 2 inputs for mics plus two for line stuff, just like my M-Audio, so basically it can likely be used as a 4-in device as is, but all the other inputs require more gear to use; an ADAT interface, or digital device, or whatever.

But basically it's still 2-in.

I have no first-hand experience on Focusrite but they have a pretty good rep.

One thing I'd consider if I were you is the Zoom R-16. It may not have quite the quality of preamps that Focusrite has, but it is 8-in and also works as a portable device even on batteries, works as a control surface for your DAW, records on SD cards, and has pretty damned good microphones built in as well. I have one of those and it's mindbogglingly handy.

Unless you really want the best mic pre's 300 can buy, or definitely won't need to record on location/8 in, I suggest you at least check out the Zoom R-16.

USB / Firewire in general use, matters not which is it, USB seems to be more compatible while most pro gear stick with firewire standard. But in your average home studio, I'd say there is no performance difference.

I chose firewire for my main DAW simply because I already have about a dozen USB devices hooked up and no firewires...but the Zoom uses USB.

Mind you, while I love the R-16, I don't think there are Win7 drivers out for the Zoom R-16 as of yet...so if it's a static DAW and you want great preamp quality&real low latency, real studio pro stuff, go for something like the Focusrite. But the Zoom certainly is more than good enough to record unbelievably good home studio stuff.

[otaypanky]

I now have a Presonus Firestudio Project and I think it's great. But when I started goofing around with recording I got an M-Audio Firewire Solo for free from a friend and used it with good results for a year or two. It also had only one XLR microphone input and one 1/4" guitar input in front. But in back it had two 1/4" unbalanced inputs. In order to get another XLR input I used 2 Art Tube preamps and plugged them into the 1/4" inputs on the back of the Firewire. The Art Tubes were only $29. each and sounded good. I have also used one as a preamp going into an Ampeg B100R bass amp to warm up the tone a bit.
It was an inexpensive way to add some versatility to the Firewire I got for free.

[Monkus]

I use both the Presonus firepod and the firebox. ADDA converter's have reached the same levels across brand names, so most work with most of the the drivers. I did have some issues getting UbuntuStudio to see the firebox, but I dont use that anymore.

If you are comfortable with a software package then by all means stick with it your interface should be seamless. Lag issues are usually DAW and RAM related. Max out your ram slots, anything above 4Gb should be more than adequate. Another workaround is to lock your tracks, especially software instruments, so that it frees up more ram. Locking the tracks saves a temporary audio file to your hd, saving the cpu and ram from doing all the midi work. Hope that helps.

:digit

[deeaa]

...and concering that RAM thing, remember to run a 64-bit system or the DAW can't really use more than 3GB and the rest goes to waste whether you had 4 or 16 gigs.

Also concerning record lag - I rather have large buffers for large projects and don't care about some lag at all - I just arrange monitoring directly, not via the DAW but thru a separate mixer, and then I have zero lag anyway, regardless of the DAW lag. I think mine is set to something like 12ms now.

That won't help though, if you're for instance playing midi triggered drum samples off the DAW or something.