Echo Mona's Preamps

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mkatz9267

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Question to those who have the Echo Mona or have at least heard it in action: How would you rate the preamp quality? For example, would they be better than or equal to the XDR one's on the Mackie's or DMP3. How might they even compare to the Presonus MP20 or the Aphex 207? Here's the thing, I'm trying to decide whether to buy the Layla + preamp now or the Mona and wait and save for the MP20, 207, RNMP or Grace101. I want something clean, quiet with lots of gain for vocals, piano, and guitar. Tube coloration isn't so important to me. Any help would be really,well, helpful. Thanks.
 
I don't see how you could buy the Layla now with a preamp, but have to wait to buy the Mona with a preamp. The Mona and the Layla are the same price.
 
clarification

Actually, I mean buy the Layla and some preamp now or buy the Mona now and save some cash to buy a nicer preamp a little later if I want one or two channels of higher quality preamps.
 
I have the Mona card and like it very much. I can't give you any real qualified advice cause it was the first sound card I ever bought and I pretty much chose it over the layla just because I could plug my mic right into it.

Now since then, I have purchased a separate preamp cause I needed to compress the vocal chain before it hit the computer so take that into consideration I guess. When I went straight into the mona it sounded just fine to me but I also never heard anything else so no real comparison to make.

If I had to do it again, I probably would buy the Layla just because it has more inputs and I wound up buying a separate pre anyways.
 
Have you looked at the Aardvark Q10. All the reviews I have read said that it has very nice preamps. It also has 4 inserts for compression, if you have to do it before it hits the computer. You might check it out. I was looking at MOTU 896, and Q10 and eventually decided that the Q10 was the way to go. Unfortunately, the place I bought from were in Washington State, and I am in Georgia. So the thing was damaged from its long journey. I should get a new one anyday now from Aardvark.

Beezoboy
 
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