is buying a MASTERLINK a bit risky at this point??

[Cratinus]

dagnabbitt!! i've been saving my cash for several months for a Masterlink and now Alesis is tottering on the brink of electronic obscurity. i own SEVERAL Alesis products that i've been VERY happy with. the Masterlink has always appealed to me because i really DISLIKE involving my computer with my recording work. i just wonder if purchasing one NOW is a bad idea. perhaps the Alesis/Numark deal (or whatever it is) will go perfectly but i 'tremble' at the thought of dropping a grand (or more) on a piece of equipment that will have NO "tech-support" back-up and "uncertain" warranty coverage. any thoughts?

[mnicoletti]

Purchase away!!

We are here and functioning: sales, tech support, service, warranty repairs, you name it.

thanks,

Mike

[skippy]

Just as a counterpoint- I have two of them now, and I find them to be very useful indeed. Hey, Ed- what I write here is just another data point for the original correspondent, and it is most assuredly not intended to piss you off. Might do it anyway, though- in which case, I apologize in advance.

If you really want to hook up other limiters, compressors, EQsm and so on at the inputs to the unit: you certainly can. Nothing prevents this, of course. The Masterlink will just print whatever is coming in either via analog, S/PDIF, or AES/EBU. Shoot, you could do that with computer DAW stuff, if you like. To read Ed's article above, you might believe that all you'll ever be able to do with the unit is use its internal processing. Not so. You can print to it, fly the data digitally onto a DAW, fly it _back_ to the Masterlink, burn with it.
_
All it really is is a standalone 2-track HDR with certain editing and processing capabilities, which you can use or bypass as you see fit. Ed is absolutely right in one respect: anything it can do in terms of processing, you can do equally well or better by buying computers and soundcards and recording software and plugins and screwing around for hours. Here's the catch: some people like that, others don't. I'm a "don't".

If, on the other hand, what you need is to be able to record 2 tracks, do reasonable amounts of processing on the tracks, assemble and burn CD-Rs, AND you don't want to spend the next 6 months dealing with the blue screen of death every time something unexpected crops up, it is actually a very good unit.

I was printing tracks and making money with mine in less time than it took to read the "getting started" manual for Cubase. I do use Cubase now, and Wavelab, and I now spend lots of time learning to do the forward-thinking, general-purpose, expandable, future-proof stuff that Ed mentions. I love my plugins. Hooray for DAW work!

However, having said that: Cubase also eats my tracks sometimes. Unfortunately, sometimes I work live where a second take is not an option, so that completely disqualifies computer recording for me right up front. The talent (and audience) will not wait while I sort out a driver conflict... My working style is such that sometimes I just want to record, and not worry about the blue screen, or Cubase deciding to drop out of record in mid-take, or any of the other various unpleasant and frustrating things that not-fully-sorted computer recording rigs are heir to. Someday I may change my mind on this topic, but I doubt it. I'm a dinosaur. I want to record, not type at the keyboard. So I use dedicated HDRs to get the tracks, and then play with them much later with the DAW.

Don't get me wrong: Ed and I probably agree on far more items than we disagree on, and I have a world of respect for his experience and chops. But where we clearly differ is in working styles. My personal style is such that a dedicated box that does only a few things, and does them stone-reliably, may offer serious advantages over the completely future-proof but fragile approach. Ed falls on the other side, and his working style is perfectly adapted to doing whatever he finds is necessary to get the job done. In short, he's not wrong. And neither am I: we just have radically different expectations and working styles, which means different hardware to get the same job done.

Which is why your mileage may vary. I'm not worried about my Masterlinks becoming obsolete: there are specific tasks for which they are perfectly well adapted. If in a year I load up external converters and megabuck outboard digital processing gear in front of it, that'll be amusing- but I know that what I want the most (for 2 tracks to get converted to bits that are then striped reliably onto a disk, and not sent into the bucket) will still happen. That's what I bought *mine* for.

[drstawl]

>Masterlink = limited proprietary box that will be outdated in a year.
>PC Solution = unlimited OPEN format that can be upgraded and expanded to suit future needs and wants.

You have to throw in (if only for journalistic integrity) that while the Masterlink box may be "outdated" in a year, the PC will go the same route in 18 months. You'll be wanting to get a new MB. And all the crap that can be transferred from one PC to the next in such an upgrade probably won't be, because the components have aged to the same degree and need to be upgraded to avoid bogging down the faster platform.

Aside: what do we mean by outdated? You can buy the same power for less money or more power for the same money at the point in the future when the machine can be considered outdated.

So it's important (especially for purchasers of one box solutions) to focus on whether the machine does what you need it to do right now AND further into the future than the 12 or 18 months.

"Outdated" and "Useless" aren't synonymous.

[Tonewoods]

Originally posted by sonusman
But a high quality PC is VERY easy to set up now, and offers a competitive price point in comparison, and again, is so much more versatile. For the same money, you get so much more. Most around here are looking for the best bang for the buck, and I don't think the limited Masterlink is that by a long shot!!!

Ed

Great discussion guys...I needed to hear both sides on this topic, even though I sprung for a Masterlink a few months ago, and have been happy with it...

Ed, excuse my ignorance here (I haven't really sat down and priced this stuff out), but what kind of bucks are we looking at to set up a system similar to the one you're describing *including computer*? You say that a PC system offers a competitive price point, but is that including the PC, or does it assume one already owns a suitable computer?

What's a total package that will do two-track editing, etc. going for these days?

[skippy]

drstawl really touches on my main point, back there. The Masterlink does indeed do exactly what I need it to do, right out of the box, with no setup overhead or argument required. My needs are pretty simple, really, and I fall into the dying category of "tapeless-tape-machine-style" users. My needs have been simple from back in the days when my 2-track _was_ a tape machine, and they promise to keep on being simple: my working style evolved a long time ago. And the Masterlink threatens to keep on doing just what I need, despite the relentless march of technology. Which is why I'm well content.

As I said, your mileage may vary. But the original poster asked his question in the context of not wanting to involve his computer in his recording, and boy, can I understand that!

[MISTERQCUE]

A most excellent, informative thread!! I'm still gonna' get me 1 of those MasterLink thingy's! So far I have saved alomost $183.46 cents! I'm Almost there!!!