I didn't see much mention of this firewire interface on this board, so I thought I would post my impressions after having one a few months.
I bought the Firefly 302 because it is currently the cheapest 2 channel firewire interface that has spdif i/o. Its small, and can be powered off a computer (if you have the larger 6 pin firewire port available, which isn't stated in the brochure).
Overall, it works, but I'm not happy with it and I would not suggest buying it. It 'sounds' fine, like most of the other mass market converters out there today, and probably won't be the limiting factor in your recording chain.
There are a number of things I'm unhappy with about it:
Unlike the brochure said when I bought it, it does not have hardware direct monitoring. The routing options are poor to non-existant (there is no hardware/software mixer). Similarly, the brochure states there is gain on the line level inputs (which would be unusual), but there isn't. There are trim pots (decreasing the available level), which is handy, but there is no amplification available. I tried to talk to their technical support about this, but just got typical run-around answers, and they clearly didn't know the difference between gain and attenuation. That was annoying.
There is a large amount of capacitance that discharges sometimes, from somewhere to the chassis. To me this says 'poor design'. I wonder if UL would approve. I can't remember if it was around the power socket, or the firewire socket, but either way, it didn't make me happy. I haven't figured out exactly when/why it happens.
The thing that is MOST annoying about this unit is that, when in use recording, if I bump either end of the firewire cable (either plug), my application freezes and I have to manually reboot my PC laptop (I havn't checked to see if it happens on my desktop). This is extremely annoying. I bought this unit to do mobile recording, and this pretty much nixes that. I can't move it a centimeter without losing everything.
Another issue, which probably isn't actually important, is that the RMAA distortion measurements are unusually high. I was getting THD% of .4 and IMD% of .8, while typical values for typical gear is about .007%. A difference of a factor of 100! I think this level of distortion is still low enough to not be audible (argue all you want, it 'sounds' fine to me). I posted these results on the RMAA forum, and someone else had gotten the exact same results, but I can't find the thread now.
Anyway, take it or leave it, but I wouldn't suggest buying a Firefly 302. In fact, if your looking for 2 channel external converters, I would would look at USB based units (I did the firewire route because of the higher bandwidth, only to realize now 2 channels probably don't need it). USB is probably cheaper too.
Cheers
I bought the Firefly 302 because it is currently the cheapest 2 channel firewire interface that has spdif i/o. Its small, and can be powered off a computer (if you have the larger 6 pin firewire port available, which isn't stated in the brochure).
Overall, it works, but I'm not happy with it and I would not suggest buying it. It 'sounds' fine, like most of the other mass market converters out there today, and probably won't be the limiting factor in your recording chain.
There are a number of things I'm unhappy with about it:
Unlike the brochure said when I bought it, it does not have hardware direct monitoring. The routing options are poor to non-existant (there is no hardware/software mixer). Similarly, the brochure states there is gain on the line level inputs (which would be unusual), but there isn't. There are trim pots (decreasing the available level), which is handy, but there is no amplification available. I tried to talk to their technical support about this, but just got typical run-around answers, and they clearly didn't know the difference between gain and attenuation. That was annoying.
There is a large amount of capacitance that discharges sometimes, from somewhere to the chassis. To me this says 'poor design'. I wonder if UL would approve. I can't remember if it was around the power socket, or the firewire socket, but either way, it didn't make me happy. I haven't figured out exactly when/why it happens.
The thing that is MOST annoying about this unit is that, when in use recording, if I bump either end of the firewire cable (either plug), my application freezes and I have to manually reboot my PC laptop (I havn't checked to see if it happens on my desktop). This is extremely annoying. I bought this unit to do mobile recording, and this pretty much nixes that. I can't move it a centimeter without losing everything.
Another issue, which probably isn't actually important, is that the RMAA distortion measurements are unusually high. I was getting THD% of .4 and IMD% of .8, while typical values for typical gear is about .007%. A difference of a factor of 100! I think this level of distortion is still low enough to not be audible (argue all you want, it 'sounds' fine to me). I posted these results on the RMAA forum, and someone else had gotten the exact same results, but I can't find the thread now.
Anyway, take it or leave it, but I wouldn't suggest buying a Firefly 302. In fact, if your looking for 2 channel external converters, I would would look at USB based units (I did the firewire route because of the higher bandwidth, only to realize now 2 channels probably don't need it). USB is probably cheaper too.
Cheers