could any of you suggest an interface for me?

N

nosignal

New member
okay i record with my g4 powerbook and with garageband, and usually i just take the tape outs on my behringer pmh2000 into the line in on my computer, and im sure if i get some kind of usb or firewire interface it would sound better than what it does now, so could you all help me and reccomend a relativeley cheap, nice, single or double channel interface that would enhance my recordings a bit? that would be really nice, thanks a bunch.
 
I'll recommend the US122L also. I had the US-428 and the only thing i didn't like about it was the lack of a built-in preamp. tascam and frontier design group work well together.
 
Caution: from the little I've seen on the www, the 0404 USB 2.0 is perhaps "a work in progress." Great specs, but needs a revision or three before unleashing it on the public.
However, that's taken from a very few references.
 
A couple of guys who post on the SOS board seem to be having some difficulties with the USB 0404. But still very few user reviews out there.

I have been looking for info on the new Tascam USB 2 interfaces. What do you guys like about them? Pres, sound of the converters, etc? Do they seem stable?
 
omtayslick said:
I have been looking for info on the new Tascam USB 2 interfaces. What do you guys like about them? Pres, sound of the converters, etc? Do they seem stable?
Click to expand...
I only have personal experience with the original 122 which was USB1.1. My most impressive outing with it was a location recording of a Baldwin baby grand piano recorded via Rode NT4 (coinicdent pair SDC) through the 122 into Audition running on a laptop.

I was quite pleasantly suprised with the sound of the mic pres; cleaner and less veiled than one would expect from such a device. They blew away the pres on a Mackie 1604VLZ which we also had with us at the time,a nd would take them over anythng mAudio or Presonus in that class, hands down. (IMHO, YMMV, ETC.)

Also, the setup/installation was fast and flawless, and the box itself could be driven over with a Hummer without even being bruised. The session ran a good 8-hours (not counting lunch, whiich made it longer), and the setup was flawless the entire time with not a glitch or hiccup anywhere.

While I have not personally used the new L-series or the new big brother to it, I'd suspect that both the pres and the installation quality would probably remain the same, and as loneg as the boxes are still constructed in a similar manner with just as reliable components, they'd be 3-for-3.

G.
 
Glen - would you think that unit was better than the Firebox ? I was thinking of buying the Firebox, but this is about half the price, so I may look at this.
 
lasagne said:
Glen - would you think that unit was better than the Firebox ? I was thinking of buying the Firebox, but this is about half the price, so I may look at this.
Click to expand...
I've not tried the Firebox specifically, but I have used a Firepod. But the distance in time and circumstances between the two uses is so large that I'd have a hard time making a fair comparison. I can tell you that at the time when I used each one, I was more impressed with the sound of the Tascam than I was with the Firepod (which I was rather non-plussed with); but that could have been as much an expectataions game as anything else. It's hard to compare apples and oranges from a distance.

Feature-wise, the Firebox has a kind of cool feature in that the headphone mix can be treated seperately from the main mix. Cool if you need to set up a cue mix, which you really can't do with the Tascam alone.

OTOH, the Tascam has much higher MIDI capacity (16ch vs 2 ch). Both come bundled with CubaseLE, but the Tascam also comes with Gigastudio software. Combine that with the wide MIDI pipes, and the Tascam is particularly nice for composing purposes.

Based on what I have experienced, I can't imagine why the Presonus should cost twice as much other than the fact that the Presonus is using a FW interface, which is a bit more expendive to implement and is easy to charge more for. When dealing with only two channels of audio, whether one uses FW or USB is really quite irrelevant from the perspactive of bandwidth and buss performance; there is far more than enough either way for two channels of audio, even with things like protocol overhead considered.

So the fact that one is FW and the other is USB makes no difference to me; as long as I have a free port on the PC, I'm good to go either way.And if I am short a port one way or the other, it's a LOT cheaper to get a USB hub or Adaptec expansion card than it is to pay an extra $150 to get a box with FW instead.

So unless the Presonus sounds a whole lot better than the Tascam - which I cannot verify one way or the other, but I'd highly doubt it was THAT much better, if at all - or unless that headphone mix feature is a huge dealmaker for you, I'd stick with the Tascam and get the extra MIDI capability and composer software for half the price. And you're still sacrificing in sound, IMHO; the Tascam sound still beats anything else at it's price range, IMHO (YMMV).

G.
 
Thanks very much for your detailed reply. I'm on a budget so saving £100 is worthwhile. One last question - I've just ordered an AT3035 from e-bay, and I'm also considering an sm7. Do you know if the Tascam would provide enough gain for the sm7 ?
 
lasagne said:
Thanks very much for your detailed reply. I'm on a budget so saving £100 is worthwhile. One last question - I've just ordered an AT3035 from e-bay, and I'm also considering an sm7. Do you know if the Tascam would provide enough gain for the sm7 ?
Click to expand...
It should. I've used it with a pair of SDCs, a couple of LDCs and a standard dynamic, and did not have the slightest gain issue with any of them.

G.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top