New usb or firewire computer interface

[pwfirst]

I have: Windows 7 -32, tascam 1641, Axium 25 keyboard, and Sonar 8 and a fast computer. The tasam 1641 is the problem - Sonar does't like it, and I need to replace it with something better for my recording studio. I need to stay in the $500- $600 range and at least 4 inputs - minimum. Any suggestions? Phil

[bzb]

MOTU Ultralite

[gdougherty]

M-Audio Profire 2626. 8x8 analog, 16x16 ADAT plus spidif coax i/o and Midi. Preamps are nice and it can be had for about $550. I've been happy with mine and even use it for a small SAC system with an expansion ADA8000. That replaced my O1v. For another $700 beyond the Profire (software and ADA), assuming you have a laptop, it'd make a nice 16 channel digital mix setup.

[Israel]

Any presonus firexxxx interface will go guddy on sonar or you can switch to cubase and use the tascam (if you find nuendo it is better)

[pwfirst]

Thanks guys, Moto and M Audio are recomended by Sonar. I may be too old to use 2 DAW. But I was thinking of loading my lite copy of Cubase just to see if it works.
I was wondering about Presonus, I would like a rack mount the best. Thanks again guys Phil

[gdougherty]

Checkout Reaper. I've fallen in love with all the goodies they've built into it. Some complain about the midi side not being as feature rich as they'd like, but I don't use midi and the capabilities in non-linear audio editing are phenomenal. I've seen the light and discovered what all the fanboys rave about. Throw on that it's a $60 license for your average user and it's an amazing bargain. Maybe it was just Adobe Audition, but one of my favorite features is being able to do all kinds of things, including arm an additional track and start recording it, while the app is in record mode and writing other audio to disk.

[pwfirst]

Reaper looks interesting, I think I will try it. We will see how it plays with the tascam. Thanks Phil

[gdougherty]

Reaper looks interesting, I think I will try it. We will see how it plays with the tascam. Thanks Phil

If it's got ASIO drivers it should play nicely.

[gdougherty]

From Harmony Central reviews...

Cubase Studio 4 hasn't worked the best for me. Clicks pops and gaps abound. Reaper on the other hand, is smooth as silk! I would prefer to use Cubase Studio for the extra plugin support (Autotune namely), and will try harder to tweak out my system, but sometimes it's easier to quit and use the simpler product.

Having said all that, if you haven't already downloaded Reaper, go do it now if only for the included plugins. If they fixed the autotune issue I'd be 100% on board.

[gdougherty]

Oh, another thought. It may be the USB not playing nice with other things as well. The Reaper demo is fully functional, non-crippleware so try that first. If that doesn't fix things you may have some tuning to do. I'd start with other USB devices and making sure the Tascam is on its own USB channel and not sharing bandwidth with another device.

[bgavin]

Beware the chipset if you are considering firewire.
The Texas Instrument chipset is the *only* one to have if want to avoid the endless driver/compatibility problems.

Make sure your have TI in your system.
There are a lot of FW interfaces out there with issues. Presonus is one of them.

My research notes follow below:

The winner is the MOTU 8pre
***************************
Texas Instrument fireware chips are the gold standard.

Interface Chipsets:
BeBoB is good
Phonic Helix series is BeBoB-based
Presonus Firepod, FP10 (can be very delicate hardware)
Focusrite Saffire LE
Focusrite Saffire Pro 10 $400

MOTU is good
All MOTU
DO NOT use the newest motu drivers though, they suck badly, use the 3.6.7.x ones

DICE-II is very bad
JetPLL is part of the DICE-II chipset
Mackie Onyx
Presonus FireStudio
TC Electronic,
new M-Audio,
new Focusrite Saffire Pro 10, Pro 26
Alesis IO14, IO26



Firestudio fixed problems with Firepod

1 year warranties, 3 year available

512mb or more


From the Yamaha site:

1394 Chip Set Compatible with Yamaha n12/n8
- TI TSB12LV23 + PHY
- TI TSB12LV26 + TSB41AB03
- TI TSB43AB22/A
- TI TSB43AB23
Use Belkin, Lacie, SiiG known brand cards

- AGERE FW323-05
- AGERE FW323-06
- VIA VT6306

1394 Chip Set NOT Compatible with Yamaha n12/n8
- NEC D72873GC
- NEC D72874GC
- NEC uPD72874

4-pin = mini firewire, auxiliary power required
6-pin = std fireware with power, same as USB bus
9-pin = FW800 with power, down converted with simple cable


Many people who have had problems with DICE II interfaces have been using TI chipsets---the most compatible FireWire chipset out there. The compatibility problems with DICE II devices have nothing to do with FireWire chipset incompatibility....

My guess? It is probably either PCI bus latency timers, IRQ steering, some bus-mastering device being a pig, or something similarly subtle, but AFAIK nobody has really nailed it down yet, and a lot of people have tried.

Ricoh is by far the most noncompliant (many of them are not OHCI compliant at all, and their combo chipsets have massive interrupt latency issues), followed by NEC (buggy as heck), followed by TI Lynx (pre-OHCI). Compared to any of those chipsets, Agere is practically a jewel.

I'd put Agere in the same quality level as VIA. Everybody tests their devices against TI chipsets, so you are least likely to have compatibility problems with TI chipsets, but VIA and Agere are still mostly reliable with most devices.

If you are planning to use DICE II hardware, you're screwed with the Agere chipset (but then, you're probably screwed trying to use DICE II stuff anyway). For most other interfaces, just make sure you have the latest versions of the drivers for the Agere FireWire chipset and the latest driver versions and firmware versions for your FireWire interface and you'll probably be okay.

I found Agere to be problematic with Dice-II, MOTU, and RME. That covers a good majority of interfaces on the market these days (including Presonus, TC Electronic, new M-Audio, new Focusrite, and others).


******


Jim Roseberry weighs in

"As a point of reference, the best PCI/PCIe units deliver a total round-trip latency of 5ms at 64-sample buffer/44.1k.
That 5ms is the sum total of the following:
1. ASIO input buffer - 1,5ms
2. ASIO output buffer - 1.5ms
3. A/D and D/A converters

As you can see, the A/D D/A converters can account for ~2ms of latency.

If the Yamaha mixer was delivering 6ms total round-trip latency at 256-sample buffer/44.1k, it would be delivering 1.5ms total round-trip latency at 64-sample buffer/44.1k.
The A/D D/A converters will introduce that amount of latency.
Thus, it's simply not possible..."


******



USB interfaces tend to be much less reliable than FireWire because they depend on the CPU being able to rapidly respond to interrupts to copy large chunks of isochronous data into memory before the buffer overruns (which cause pops, crackles, etc.). FireWire, by contrast, does the most time-critical part of the heavy lifting in the host silicon itself, leaving the CPU free to do other things. FireWire cards are more expensive than USB cards because they basically have a small CPU on them


******


FIREPOD: lots of FireWire port failures.
FireStudio: Dice II-based interface with buggy drivers (unusable on many systems).

Given a choice, I'd pick the FIREPOD, but be exceptionally careful with the thing.

1. Don't ever unplug the FireWire connection while the unit is running, and frankly, I'd be tempted to fasten the FireWire cable to the top of your rack with a cable clamp so you can't accidentally flex it in any way.

2. Do not under any circumstances upgrade the firmware. Some FIREPODs suddenly lose S/PDIF functionality when the firmware is updated and don't get it back even after a downgrade.

If you do those things, odds are, the FIREPOD will be a usable interface. That said, I'd pick a MOTU 8Pre over it any day of the week and twice on Sunday. Just my $0.02 as somebody who used to own a FIREPOD and currently owns two 8Pres.

******


FP10 = Firepod II
400F,1200F = Mackie, DICE-II platform

[BrentEvans]

Something of note, OP is using Windows 7. Win 7 drivers are new for anything out there, and better performance might be achieved with an OS downgrade as well. Even with the RME gear, which is as rock-solid as it comes, some of the SAC'ers are having trouble achieving usable latency in Win 7.

Fireface UC (while expensive) is one of few USB interfaces that can achieve low latency. I own and use a Lexicon Alpha, and have used with some frequency a lexicon Omega, and they can get very low for "normal" USB interfaces, down to 128 or 256 buffer sizes. This is "usable" but not ideal. Also, not a large channel count on either.

You also didn't mention if you're on a desktop or laptop. If you're on a desktop, you could pick up a used MOTU 424/828 combo on ebay for $300-400, which can give you 24ch with 1 828 box, and up to 3 828s are supported. You'll need ADAT preamps (up to 3 8 channel pres per 828, ADA8000 can be had for less than $175, which is 8 i/o) unless you get an 828mk2 or mk3, which have 8 1/4" i/o but no preamps, so you'd need an external mixer. Doing this would give you a very low-latency expandable system at reasonable cost.

[pwfirst]

Thanks for all of the great information.
Operating system: I have often hated the change from XP, 7 seems OK, Vista was a real pain.
My recording studio is a desk top with most of the best bells and whistle as of 1 1/2 years ago.
I did down load the trial of Reaper and am still in the learning curve, should have it going with in a day or so.( I am Old and learn slow.) I am fast with Sonar Producer and have been using it for 5 years and I like all the bells with that it has as a DAW.
Drivers: all upgraded to the Windows 7 versions.
I am leaning toward a rack mount firewire system probably, m audio or moto, have not ruled out the presonus yet. Need a little more research.
I am tired of glitches. At the end of the day Sonar may have to go too.
Thanks again for all the help. Phil

[BrentEvans]

Phil, since you have a desktop, and are rack mounting anyway, give some serious thought to a PCI or PCIe based system - they will knock the socks off a USB or Firewire system every time, and can be had quite reasonably (like the MOTU stuff I mentioned earlier).

[bgavin]

I have a pair of Aardvark Q20 that are PCI based.
Bad news is, they went broke before releasing drivers for XP/SP3. I am stuck at SP2 forever.
This is a non-problem when the machine is used only as a recording workstation.
Stuck.. is one of the downsides to any proprietary interface.