Help deciding on Audio Interface

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DiVendetta

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Hello people, this is my first post. I am getting gear up to start my home recording studio in a spare bedroom. I do not have a band.. its just me recording each track at a time

Well, right now I am just using my computer's soundcard (Creative Soundblaster Live! Platinum) line input to hook up my old Tascam 4-track tape recorder. I am getting a condenser microphone (MXL 990) and if the sound was not good, I suspect that with the new mic its going to stink.

Is anything wrong with just using my soundcard for my "solo" recordings or should I get a dedicated PCI or Firewire audio interface?
I've been looking in the low budget ones and I found mixed reviews about the Firebox. A guy at GuitarCenter told me i should get the Mackie Onyx. I definitely would need the phantom power for my mic.

Any recommendations? I want a nice clean sound buut I don't need many tracks. 2 to 4 is more than enough for me I guess.

I appreciate your help. Thanks
 
Get yourself a decent Firewire interface with a good firewire card(incase if you don't have one) and a condenser mic. You could get the Firebox with a Studio projects B1 or C1. You should be able to get pretty good audio outta it.
 
Hey,

I don't know about their smaller units, but I have a Presonus Firepod, and it's the best investment of all my gear, in my opinion. Following the logic that less components means less to go wrong, I would surmise that the Firebox (pods little brother from what I can tell) would be a great option for you. If you can get the features, ease of use, and customer service of a Firepod in a smaller unit, I would go with that. Firepod changed my life!

Disclaimer:
I do not now, or have I ever worked for Presonus and unless something was really as great as I say, I would never give an endorsement when not being paid for it....

There. That's my $0.02.
TUV
 
Pretty much 100% of the reviews I read about the firepod are good. I'd say about 10% of the firebox owners were not happy with it. Maybe I should modify my budget to get the firepod.. maybe I'd use the extra inputs someday.

I just read anothe recent post about how a soundcard sucks... so looks like I am getting an interface. I'll make a few recordings on the soundcard to compare the difference myself just for learning experience.

Anybody owns a the Mackie Onyx Satellite though? It looks cool but... how good is it?
 
I'd look into Echo Audio products - highly underrated IMO. First truly good quality audio I experienced was with the Echo MIA PCI. Then I moved up to an Echo Gina24 PCI. Then I went to another manufacturer's Firewire interface. Then I came back to Echo again :cool:

Now I'm using an Echo Layla 3G (PCI) and absolutely love it. Great converters, and I feel two decent pre-amps for the money the Layla's are going for - quiet and pretty neutral. You'd get the same quality with the AudioFire interfaces (which are Firewire as opposed to the Layla 3G's PCI) and now Echo has an interface called the AudioFire 4 - which I would take over a Firebox any day. You can depend on solid drivers as well.

I don't work for Echo, but keep coming back to their products for quality.

P.S. The other interface I had briefly was a Firepod - nothing bad to say about it at all. Tracked one demo project with it using all eight inputs at a time, and had great results. Decided I didn't need the all the built-in pre's, and opted for a cheaper interface with some $$$ left over to invest in higher-end pre's. I haven't performed any "lab" tests, but to my ears the Layla 3G sounds better than the Firepod I had. More detailed highs, and accurate low-end. Guess it comes down to "do you really need 8 built-in pre's"?
 
Let me tell you about a secret I discovered a while ago. It's Creamware. They make excellent but expensive soundcards with built in DSP meaning you can use the built in DSP processors (there's 3, 6 or 15 of them depending on the card type) to run excellent effects and softsynths plugins built especially for those Creamware card without taxin the CPU of your computer.

Now here comes the real secret. Because there's no more PCI slots in new Macs the pros who used to use these Creamware cards are getting rid of them as they upgrade their computers and now you can pick up these second hand pro cards fairly cheaply. If you're really lucky like I was you may even get a bunch of extra plugins worth of hundreds of dollars with the card.

www.creamware.com
 
irishfolker said:
I have a Firepod as well and love it.
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Wow just browsing the thread and checked out the Presonus Firpod. Looks absolutely amazing! The diagrams on the site are pretty useful too, but have you tracked a full band with it? Can it be done? Almost seems to good to be true :)

Also, this is a retarded qustion but what are the outputs on the back of the interface for?
 
TelePaul said:
The diagrams on the site are pretty useful too, but have you tracked a full band with it? Can it be done? Almost seems to good to be true :)
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"Tracked one demo project with it using all eight inputs at a time, and had great results."
 
TelePaul said:
Also, this is a retarded qustion but what are the outputs on the back of the interface for?
Click to expand...

Outboard equipment, multiple monitoring setup, surround sound etc...
 
studiomaster said:
Outboard equipment, multiple monitoring setup, surround sound etc...
Click to expand...

It will be mine...damn it studiomaster I want your DAW. If only had about 2 grand on me. Think I need to see the bank manager.
 
TelePaul said:
whoops missed that thanks warble
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That's cool. I was really impressed with quality - and the fact that I was able to track eight inputs at one time flawlessly (mind you I've tweaked my Windows XP system for audio use). Now that I'm venturing into high end pre's, I'm happy with my decision of the Echo Layla purchase and getting better quality with better pre's.
 
TelePaul said:
It will be mine...damn it studiomaster I want your DAW. If only had about 2 grand on me. Think I need to see the bank manager.
Click to expand...

My DAW...well..i love chinese stores...everything is dead cheap there. :)
 
Firebox is great. I love mine. Very stable and audio quality is pretty good for home recordings
 
As a start you have enough. You'll wnt to upgrade sooner or later though.
I used my Mt100 4 track ito a soundblaster for a while. The preamps on it were fine for the task with a mic. though you'll need a pre to power the mic with phantom power. I did a lot of stuff that way until I had the experience, need & money to upgrade. When I could I bought a better soundcard. Now I often rcord to tape & then upload all 4 taped tracks to comp through the card (Inca 8 I/O). I do this as I like the tape sound. Then again I often go straight in through the soundcard box. The phantom power isn't 48 in it though so I still need a pre for the condensor.
Hey, IF you have the money go for it OR go with what you have until you're comfy.
The card is useable but will need an upgrade for A/D/A conversions etc.
the 4 track can be your mixer easily enough.
A pre & Mic mean you're almost set.
All you really need is a good recording prog.
 
rayc said:
As a start you have enough.
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this is very true and easy to forget because its so fun to research and get new gear. you can certainly do some recording with what you already have. that said; i have a mackie onyx 1620 with the firewire option. i like it, but for me the 'mixer' portion is kind of overkill, meaning an onyx 800 might make more sense. I think the onyx series come with a copy of traktion - mackie's daw which is pretty powerful and intuitive. - good luck
 
Do Firewire interfaces generally cut down on latency? Zero latency is sweet.
 
I ownded a mackie onyx satellite, and it was great, until I switched on the phantom power- very noticeable hum, even/odd harmonics of 6 KHZ. So I sent it back.... Still not sure what to replace it with (I want to run off of my Dell Latitude D610 laptop)- maybe the MOTU Ultralite?
 
I second MOTU ultralite. it's an awesome interface. and I don't think I'm being biased here since I use and love MOTU interfaces.
 
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