Why A High End Interface?

[BigEZ]

My wife has finally approved me moving my studio out of my little 8x8 cubby in the basement to the larger family room down there so I think that will help quite a bit with acoustics. I have a whole bunch of home made absorbers...I will post a thread shortly with a sketch of the room and dimensions to get help in the best spots to put the panels.

I really love the C414 on my vocals and my Taylor. Of course, I've only really compared it to an MXL4000 and a Rode NT1A.

 

[Ethan Winer]

Loudspeakers are pretty much the highest source of distortion in the audio chain, so I reckon that this is where money should be spent for real audible improvements.

Indeed, by a factor of at least ten to one if not 100 to one. And don't forget the importance of room acoustics. In this case not distortion, but the frequency response in a room is also at least ten times worse than any loudspeaker.

You might find Ethan Winer's Audio Myths workshop interesting. Audio Myths Workshop - YouTube

You beat me to it.

--Ethan

 

[BigEZ]

Very informative video. Thank you.

 

[Chili]

I'm always late to these kinds of threads....

I have converters of the two extremes. The best of the best and the worst of the worst: Lavry and Phonic. Okay, well, maybe the phonic isn't the worst of the worst, but it is down around Behringer level. And I can't hear any significant difference between the Lavry and the Phonic. I know I'm supposed to but......

I'm sure with a 100-track project, noise, jitter and sample error will show the differences between the two, but with my simple 5 track songs, I notice no difference in converters. Plus, there are so many other variables that affect quality before the converters come into play.

I do, however, hear a major difference when using a better grade mic pre. The mic pres in the phonic suck, peroid. I have a focusrite platinum mic pre and it sounds so much better. (Hoping to get a True P-Solo soon!!! That'll really be sweet)

Don't sweat the converters. Look at improving the mics, mic pres, room and plugs-ins (UAD!!! )

 

[Ethan Winer]

I'm sure with a 100-track project, noise, jitter and sample error will show the differences between the two

Probably not. The notion that "stacking" and "summing" multiple tracks will reveal flaws in audio gear is another myth.

--Ethan

 

[BigEZ]

Hi Ethan,

Just out of curiosity, do you feel that converters are a waste of time even in the highest end pro studios?

 

[Ethan Winer]

do you feel that converters are a waste of time even in the highest end pro studios?

Well, converters are never a "waste of time" because you won't get very far recording without them.

As I explain in my upcoming book, there are valid reasons not to buy the cheapest gear even if it sounds just as good as more expensive gear. Reliability from using high quality parts and assembly is important, and better gear often has more features, or better drivers, etc. And cheap converters are mostly 2-channel only, where pro studios need 16 or more inputs. But for the most part, I think spending a lot of money on converters - or preamps or anything else - is not necessary.

--Ethan

 

[Bobbsy]

Yeah, that's what I was trying to say earlier as well. At the professional end of the market, the reliability of the hardware (and the software drivers) is probably a much bigger consideration when choosing gear like interfaces than any perceived difference in audio quality.

There is some argument that using a more accurate clock source can have a subtle effect on the recorded sound--but, very often this isn't the converters themselves other than them simply having the ability to accept an external reference. Certainly external wordclock is very common in professional applications--but that's as much to do with the need to synchronise multiple digital devices than any thought of improving sound quality.

Finally, as studios get bigger, it's quite common to not use the sort of stand alone interface that's common in project studios. Even my modest set up doesn't have a conventional interface. Instead, I have a digital mixer (which handles the AD and DA conversion needs) and feed that to my computer via plug in ADAT expansion cards and a Profire Lightbridge adaptor. A future iteration will likely drop the firewire and use something like an Audinate "Dante" card which, in effect, allows me to feed the audio data in and out of the computer via standard network protocols. You'll find the idea of feeding audio via some form of Cat5 interface and doing conversions in a mixer (Yamaha, Digidesign, DiGiCo, Soundcraft, Studer, etc. etc. all have those sorts of solutions) is all the rage now.

 

[cusebassman]

Not sure if anyone else mentioned this, but before dealing with upgrades to most of the recording signal chain, look at your instrumentation. This seems obvious, but most beginners (including myself years ago) don't seem to understand that most cheap guitars are going to sound cheap regardless of the quality of the recording equipment.

Not necessarily advice for OP - he/she may or not be a beginner, and may be playing some really quality instruments.

As for quality of interfaces, I assume the more expensive you get, the better the converters are (on top of the addition of more and advanced features). Once I started recording through something better than the line-input on my Powerbook G4, I stopped noticing a difference in converter quality. Of course, I've never used something on the high-end in terms of converters either (Apogee et al)....

 

[BigEZ]

I think I'll stick with my Focusrite PRO24DSP FireWire interface and spend my cash on the LA-610 Signature Edition instead.

Baseman, I'm using a Taylor GS7 to an AKG C414 XLII. And a stellar voice most men would die for and women fawn over

 

[Bobbsy]

The only thing more impressive than you voice is you extreme modesty!

 

[Ethan Winer]

the reliability of the hardware (and the software drivers) is probably a much bigger consideration when choosing gear like interfaces than any perceived difference in audio quality.

Exactly, as I explained in my upcoming book:

Further, paying more for real value is justified. Features, reliability, build quality, good components, convenience and usability, and even appearance all demand a price. If I’m an engineer at Universal Studios recording major film scores, which can cost hundreds of dollars per minute just for the orchestra musicians, I will not buy the cheapest brand that could break down at the worst time, no matter how clean it sounds.

...

There is some argument that using a more accurate clock source can have a subtle effect on the recorded sound--but, very often this isn't the converters themselves other than them simply having the ability to accept an external reference.

Actually, that myth was debunked soundly in a recent article from Sound on Sound magazine:

Does Your Studio Need A Digital Master Clock?

As you'll read there, using an external clock can only make jitter worse. More to the point, jitter is never audible. It's a non-problem made up by companies that sell expensive gear to scare people into buying their stuff.

--Ethan

 

[mshilarious]

Actually Ethan I slightly undebunked that a week ago or so in a thread here after a dude passed on a comment by a digital design EE. I measured a decrease in jitter in a PCI card's onboard converter when clocked to an external source.

So it turns out that external clocking *can* reduce jitter, but maybe only if your converter is extremely crappy in the first place!

No comment on audibility, I don't do listening tests. The measured jitter was -130dBFS though.

 

[Elton123]

I agree. Source, room, mic and pre are all more important than converters. Some argue converters are more important, and while I understand, the meager places I work in suggest different. I have an M-audio native rig, and an HD 192io rig. I swear I hear some difference, but probably just placebo.

 

[thebigcheese]

Just to add my two cents, I've gone through my fair share of mid-level gear and I do hear differences just with playback of tracks I have already recorded, which I attribute mainly to the converters. Coming from a Presonus Firestudio to a Mackie Blackbird, I noticed that the audio seemed less muffled and panning was a lot more apparent. Again, this is on material I had already recorded and was only playing back. I dunno if the Firestudio just wasn't working right or what, but I am now suspicious of their converters. The Mackie also uses the same chips as the more expensive brands, so I think there is definitely a point of diminishing returns. And frankly, it's a project studio, so I really don't care.

 

[cusebassman]

I think I'll stick with my Focusrite PRO24DSP FireWire interface and spend my cash on the LA-610 Signature Edition instead.

Baseman, I'm using a Taylor GS7 to an AKG C414 XLII. And a stellar voice most men would die for and women fawn over

All that modesty aside, I assumed you were working with some decent stuff - figured I'd leave that note for our newb friends here on the forum

 

[Bobbsy]

Actually, that myth was debunked soundly in a recent article from Sound on Sound magazine:

Does Your Studio Need A Digital Master Clock?

As you'll read there, using an external clock can only make jitter worse. More to the point, jitter is never audible. It's a non-problem made up by companies that sell expensive gear to scare people into buying their stuff.

--Ethan

You can count me on the sceptic side of this debate as well. However, I fear it's not as debunked as you think--there are still an awful lot of usually-competent engineers out there saying that the use of a highly stable master clock makes a difference to their results. As I say, I'm a sceptic but there are people very well known in the industry who insist it makes a measurable and audible difference.

By the way, my studio DOES need a master clock because I'm using 6+ digital devices that need to run on the same wordclock. However, I've not bothered with a separate external clock--I just nominate one device to be the master an distribute from there. However, if things get any more complex, I likely will purchase an external master if only to stop having to repatch wordclock every time I take a device out of the loop (something that happens often because of the mix of live and studio work I do).

 

[Elton123]

Just to add my two cents, I've gone through my fair share of mid-level gear and I do hear differences just with playback of tracks I have already recorded, which I attribute mainly to the converters. Coming from a Presonus Firestudio to a Mackie Blackbird, I noticed that the audio seemed less muffled and panning was a lot more apparent. Again, this is on material I had already recorded and was only playing back. I dunno if the Firestudio just wasn't working right or what, but I am now suspicious of their converters. The Mackie also uses the same chips as the more expensive brands, so I think there is definitely a point of diminishing returns. And frankly, it's a project studio, so I really don't care.

+1on that.

 

[Ethan Winer]

there are still an awful lot of usually-competent engineers out there saying that the use of a highly stable master clock makes a difference to their results.

Absolutely - even professional recording engineers are subject to placebo effect and expectation bias. This is the subject of my End Rant op-ed in the current issue of Tape Op Magazine. You can always tell which converter sounds better when you know the prices and can read the labels.

--Ethan

 

[mshilarious]

Or they may have legitimately preferred a technically inferior solution. That would hardly be a novel result.