M-Audio solo vs. MOTU 828 mkI

[brandon.w]

well I have a tricked out mac mini and now it's time to decide what firewire device to buy. I have a budget of around $300 bucks for my firewire solution and I've been pondering two things, the M-Audio Solo and the MOTU 828 mkI (used). The MOTU has 8channels in, midi, 2 preamps/XLR inputs...but the M-Audio solo is bus powered, and coupled with a midisport Uno (about $240 all together), I could get by...but I've heard some bad things about the solo and I've only had possitive experiances with my friend's MOTU. Has anyone had any experiance with the Solo?

 

[cawhite12]

If bus-powered isn't that important to you, then I think it's a no-brainer: go with the MOTU. The way I see it, if you're recording for any length of time at all, you're going to have to plug the laptop in anyways, so getting something that's bus-powered would really only be saving you one cable. The Motu 828 has a lot more features than the Solo does, and you will get along with it for a while.