questions on firewire recording interfaces

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woody777

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I am in the process of building my recording rig. My first purchase will be a firewire interface. I've been searching the forums and reading reviews and now I'm suffering from information overload :)

My computer is a Dell Inspiron 1501 with AMD Turion 64 (dual core) 2.0 ghz processor, 2 GB ram (although it is slightly lower because it's shared with the video card) and 100 GB hard drive. And... I'm running Windows Vista. My laptop doesn't have a firewire port, but I plan to add on via the expresscard slot.

What interface would you guys recommend? My budget is $1000 for everything - interface, microphone, monitors, headphones and midi keyboard. I'm thinking to dedicate about $300 of that to the interface.

I really will only need to record one channel at a time, although I would like enough ins to later add a row of preamps to record drums if I want (I don't need all of the preamps right now in the unit). And I would like the option to add a really nice preamp if I ever get serious about this. I would like good enough preamps in the interface to get good, clear vocals and acoustic guitar. Electric guitar and bass will mostly be recorded direct, so I need direct inputs also. Drums will be loops and programmed. And I will use midi pretty extensively.

So, what are my options? Vista compatible... $300ish... firewire interface? And if it matters, I plan to use Reaper and as many free plugins as I can find :) Thanks!
 
I know how you feel about looking for interfaces. I've searched and read a lot of reviews, but I finally settled for one interface with great reviews. I went with the Presonus firepod, but it sells for about $400. The next best thing under that is the Firebox, which sells for $300. It has two or four inputs and it has its own preamps. And it is also portable. I hope that helps.
 
Check out some alternatives by M-Audio.
Or if you want to record one track at the time, there are some nice pre-amps that come with a built in USB converter, so you just plug it on your pc and record, like the Art Tube MP. I have the non-USB version and it works like a charm. It costs 100$, so maybe you can check out some higher end pres with usb. Try looking at musiciansfriend.
 
Thanks coolsoundman!

I actually owned a Firepod for a while. The features were great and it was simple to use. I just couldn't get a good electric guitar sound out of it to save my life! I switched over to tracking guitars with an mBox and was able to get a much better sound with everything else remaining the same.

I wonder if with all of the pres in the Firepod that some quality was sacrificed? I would rather have an interface with one really good pre than an interface with 8 okay pres. But, there is a very good chance it was just me because I do see that people here rave about the Firepod and its sound quality.
 
Vagodeoz said:
Check out some alternatives by M-Audio.
Or if you want to record one track at the time, there are some nice pre-amps that come with a built in USB converter, so you just plug it on your pc and record, like the Art Tube MP. I have the non-USB version and it works like a charm. It costs 100$, so maybe you can check out some higher end pres with usb. Try looking at musiciansfriend.
Click to expand...

Hmm... that's interesting. Is that something that I could later add to a Firewire interface? I think I would rather start with an interface and then expand from there. But it would be nice to get a higher quality pre to expand my interface if I get serious about recording.
 
If the preamp has USB interface, you don't need the Firewire interface anymore, you connect it directly through USB to your pc.
However if you still would like to connect it to your firewire interface by some weird reason, you could preamp your signal, then go out through the regular XLR output and go in on your firewire interface.
 
Edirol FA-101 or Focusrite Saffire? The Edirol has more inputs, but the Focusrite (maybe) has slightly better pres.

Other interfaces in my price range:

M-Audio FireWire 410
PreSonus FireBox
Alesis iO|14
TC Electronic Konnekt 8

Any opinions? It's got to have Vista drivers :)
 
Last edited:
woody777 said:
M-Audio FireWire 410
PreSonus FireBox
Alesis iO|14
TC Electronic Konnekt 8

Any opinions? It's got to have Vista drivers :)
Click to expand...

Then scratch the M-Audio, they don't do vista yet. The firebox does. Not sure about the other two
 
Bulls Hit said:
Then scratch the M-Audio, they don't do vista yet. The firebox does. Not sure about the other two
Click to expand...

M-Audio scratched. Alesis iO|14 scratched too. The TC Electronic doesn't seem very popular.

I scratched the Focusrite because I would like to be able to add a mixer and record at minimum 4 simultaneous channels.

So... that leaves just the following:

Presonus Firebox
Edirol FA-101

Does anybody have experience with both? There isn't a lot of information about the Edirol on the boards, but it seems like a great little unit.
 
I haven't used the Edirol, but I have used the FireBox and liked it.
 
i use the tascam fw-1804 on my gateway laptop running vista and there have been no problems yet.

edit: the pres are *ok*
 
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