Rosetta. It's driving me nuts.

[Steve Singh]

I don't have one. I think I might need one. But I don't want one. It's been bugging me for months. <BR>
OK. I record one channel at a time (always) with the following chain: Rode K2-Groove Tubes Vipre-1176LN-------(wait for it...) MBOX!!! <BR>
Everything sounds great but the idea that it could sound alot better with a stupid Rosetta is killing me. Is there a huge difference if I'm only recording one track at a time (word clock, jitter, whatever any of that means...) Obviously the converters are better but am I going to hear it? When I added the 1176 to my chain the difference was obvious. Is this $2000 ugly lavender box going to blow my mind? Is it? Is it? Can I at least paint it black?

[redrue]

Steve,

First I haven't HEARD the MBox BUT a few years back I was recording one
track at a time with my 001 when I bought the original rosetta... I couldn't
believe the difference! Worth every penny. I would bet the convertors in your
MBox are better than those in the 001 but I'll bet they can't touch the
Rosetta.

See if you can try one first... I think you'll be glad you did. If you can't
try one first buy one used. After the initial depreciation they hold their
value remarkably well.

good luck...

[RedWallStudio]

I don't know how much difference you will hear as far as using the Rosetta as a clock, but its A/D converters make a huge difference over the PT converters.

Don't forget that you will need to feed it with a mic pre though....

[espasonico]

For me it made a huge improvement. First I bought the pre and if I have to be honest could´nt notice a big diference. But when I bought the Rosetta 200 a month later, it became obious the difference.

As far as clock, in my enviroment I don´t notice a 1800€ improvement, in fact I don´t hear any difference in a blind test, but the converters are another story. I do mostly acoustic stuff and I would buy the Rosetta 200 ( or another similar good converter ) again if something happened to mine.

I have to say that I also bought the Central Station when I got the Apogee and I monitor thru Genelec 8040 in a semi-treated medium sized "Bed-room". I use a Millennia TD-1 and lately I bought a GR ME-1NV.

The thing is that once you start buying good stuff, you can´t stop and you need to spend a lot of cash to improve your recordings.

My next move is gonna be to improve the room and get rid of the PC noise because I think I got to a point when I´m happy with my recordings. I also have to say that it´s not a commercial studio, it´s just a place to record my own songs.

[Steve Singh]

thanks guys. It just kills me to spend that kind of money on converters. Rather spend it on a guitar or another mic or pre or whatever.
Steve

[Kestral]

Hey Steve,

It will most definitely make a difference! And to put my money where my mouth is, I just recently ordered an Apogee Rosetta 200. So my chain will be:

Neve 1073 -> Urei 1176 -> Rosetta 200 -> M-Audio/Pro Tools M-Powered box

By the way, I'm a fellow Torontonian. I've heard you perform, your singing is top notch thumbsup I still have a sticker of yours somewhere (picked it up at Capsule Music). It said something like, "I go to your stupid gigs so why don't you come to mine". Nice!

[Steve Singh]

That's funny! Who are you? The Capsule guys are friends. Ha-tooo funny!
Steve

[T9c]

You could also check out some Mytek Stereo 96 AD and DA for a little less than the Rosetta 200. I usually only track mono or stereo as well and the Mytek was a real improvement over the MOTU 828mk2 I used before. As others have posted, another mic pre will also work wonders.

Rick

[Steve Singh]

Thanks guys. Remember Rick, I do track through a Groove Tubes ViPre with variable impedance and rise time settings. I don't use the Mbox pres. I guess I would just love to spend that kind of cash on something else like another Mic for flavour or a Germanium or whatever.
Steve

[bgroup]

I have an original MBox and a Rosetta 200... Night and day, both for recording and for monitoring. Highly recommended. Hope this helps. Brent

[Steve Singh]

OK! FINE!! I'm buying one tomorrow (on credit of course). Jesus. No one is saying anything less than great about these boxes. Hey Brent-I live in Toronto aswell.
Steve

[Kestral]

Just got a call from Apogee today, my Rosetta 200 should be shipping tomorrow, yay! (Thanks Max, maybe you read my post last night? )

PS Steve: I sent you a private message. You can get it by click on the "User CP" button on the top of the page to your left and then click on "List Messages" on the side.

[max cooper]

Originally Posted by Steve Singh

Thanks guys. Remember Rick, I do track through a Groove Tubes ViPre with variable impedance and rise time settings. I don't use the Mbox pres. I guess I would just love to spend that kind of cash on something else like another Mic for flavour or a Germanium or whatever.
Steve

That's kinda like a '59 Les Paul through a Behringer V-Amp.

It would have been better to have spent less on the preamp and put some bucks into the converters.

Just get 'em then you can forget about 'em.

Then you can really *experience* those variable impedances and rise times.

[max cooper]

Originally Posted by Steve Singh

OK! FINE!! I'm buying one tomorrow (on credit of course). Jesus. No one is saying anything less than great about these boxes. Hey Brent-I live in Toronto aswell.
Steve

Good man.

So, what kind of monitors are you using? Monitor controller? Subwoofer? Room Treatment? Bass Traps? Shock mounts? Power conditioning? Lava lamps?

Aaaaahahahahahahaha! There's no escaping here!!!

[Steve Singh]

Ok. I bought one.
Steve

[bgroup]

Hey Steve,

Great purchase - you won't be sorry! Yeah, I noticed you live in Toronto - checked your site... I may have met you at some point, you look really familiar to me. Noticed Noah mastered your disc as well - Noah's a good friend of mine and masters everything I do... Anyway, I was going to offer for you to come by and check out the Rosetta vs. MBox, but I guess it's too late for that! But come by anyway and hang if you'd like! Enjoy the Rosetta! Brent

[Kestral]

Originally Posted by max cooper

That's kinda like a '59 Les Paul through a Behringer V-Amp.

It would have been better to have spent less on the preamp and put some bucks into the converters.

Just get 'em then you can forget about 'em.

Then you can really *experience* those variable impedances and rise times.

Hmm interesting. I've had both experiences:

1. Using great pre/comp with not as good converters
2. Using not as good pre/comp with great converters

And I think option 1 sounds better. imo pre/comp make far more difference than the converters. Of course, the goal is to have great pieces through the entire chain and not compromise on anything.

Steve is an amazing singer and writes some really nice tunes, so for someone like him imo he shouldn't be compromising at all cause he's seriously a pro musician that deserves to be recorded in the best way possible.

Steve, congrats on your Rosetta 200 (let me guess, Schlong & McQuades? ) Mine should be shipping today so I'll have it soon, yay! Next up, Roland XV-3080 (or 5080) and some expansion boards!

[bgroup]

This has become a funny Toronto/gear-that-I-have thread for me because Kestral I've got an XV3080 with a bunch of JV expansion cards in it! I'm thinking you, me and Steve should just get together and pool our gear 'cause we're all going to end up with the same stuff! Or at the very least, we could compare how the XV sounds through the Rosetta vs. MBox! LOL! As you were...

[Steve Singh]

Thanks for the nice words Kestral! Wait 'til you hear my new record (Ha!). Seriiously, thank you the compliments. <BR>
Question: So I hooked it up with spdif ins and outs and I'm able to hear my pre-rosetta tracks through the rosetta when I setup a master track in PTools and use it as a volume control. Does this sound right? Until I get a Central Station this workaround appears to be the only way to listen back through the rosetta.<BR>
It took me an hour to figure out why my stuff recorded at 44.1 sounded like the Chipmunks with the rosetta set at 48. Scared the shit out of me. <BR>
I'm going to start retracking everything tonight to hear this thing in REAL action.
Steve

[Needle201]

can we hope for some A/B stuff sound snippets here from you?




i am also interested in the rosetta...

[Kestral]

Hey Brent, which cards do you have for your 3080? I'm thinking Ultimate Keyboards and the Complete Orchestra board. Any other boards you recommend?

Hey Steve, do you still play live?

[ObnoxiousTyrant]

Don't bother buying the Rosetta unless you have another $1200 for the Big Ben. The clock in the box is sh*tty. You must externally clock it or you will be very disappointed.

[Kestral]

Originally Posted by ObnoxiousTyrant

Don't bother buying the Rosetta unless you have another $1200 for the Big Ben. The clock in the box is sh*tty. You must externally clock it or you will be very disappointed.

[dmb10]

Why doesn't someone here do a test between the rosetta, fireface, then both clocked to a big ben. Just run a full mix through it and upload those files along side the original - this is how I quickly test converters...NOT single tracks, they can be very misleading. By uploading the original and the converted signals we can see what the converters really do to the sound (ie:nothing at all, tighter lowend, etc.)

-Jeremy

[johnnyrock]

Originally Posted by Steve Singh

I don't have one. I think I might need one. But I don't want one. It's been bugging me for months. <BR>
OK. I record one channel at a time (always) with the following chain: Rode K2-Groove Tubes Vipre-1176LN-------(wait for it...) MBOX!!! <BR>
Everything sounds great but the idea that it could sound alot better with a stupid Rosetta is killing me. Is there a huge difference if I'm only recording one track at a time (word clock, jitter, whatever any of that means...) Obviously the converters are better but am I going to hear it? When I added the 1176 to my chain the difference was obvious. Is this $2000 ugly lavender box going to blow my mind? Is it? Is it? Can I at least paint it black?

I realise this is the high end but I doubt you need to buy a Rosseta in order to hear a huge improvement in conversion over an Mbox. Probably a Lynx 22, or an RME HDPS9632 would do it, two channels of ADA for about 650.00.

[bgroup]

Hey Kestral,

In my XV-3080 I only have the old "SR-JV80" cards - there's only one slot for the newer "SRX" cards, but I haven't checked any of those out yet. In any case, the cards that I do have (after auditioning basically all of them!)

SR-JV80-04 Vintage Synthesizer - this one's AMAZING, I use it the most
SR-JV80-11 Techno - some good analog tones plus a bunch of stuff I never use!
SR-JV80-12 Hip Hop - for e.pianos and drum samples to prog loops
SR-JV80-15 Special EFX - trippy textures for layering

I also recently managed to track down SR-JV80-08 60s & 70s Keyboards which I'm going to pop into my JV-880 for some extra pianos/clavs/organs...

FWIW, I'm doing guitar based music - rock & pop a la Switchfoot, Foo Fighters, U2 maybe even venturing into Radiohead-land ocassionally!! I'm not doing much in the way of "keyboard" music which would probably require a different set of cards!!

I've been interested in the SRX Orchestral card as well, so let me know how you like it!!

Not to feed the trolls or anything, but FWIW, the clock in the Rosetta is just fine IMO... I've used it with it's internal clock and compared it clocked to my Mytek 8x96 and the difference is negligible. For the most part these days, I just use it with it's internal clock with great results. YMMV. Hope this helps. Brent

[Steve Singh]

There is NO WAY I am forking out more cash for a Big Ben. The Rosetta will be just fine!<BR>
How the hell do I monitor out of the rosetta with the Mbox while I'm tracking? I don't think it's possible and I'm content to just monitor with the mbox and use the rosetta for a/d only but is there a way? A mixer? Central Station? I would rather not buy anything too expensive. Any creative ideas out there? <BR>Also, the levels of my tracking appear to be: I'm having to crank my pre or my compressor output more.
Thanks, Steve

[Kestral]

Hi bgroup, I just did a quick Google and the XV-3080 can hold 2 of those SRX expansion boards. Hmmm, for some reason I thought it could hold 4. But it holds the 4 JV expansion boards and 2 of the SRX. I'm still waiting to find out if a 5080 is available, if so I'll pay the extra to go 5080 and not have to worry about which cards to get (I'm sure I'll fill it all up). But as far as the boards go, I'm pounding the table on the Keyboards 60/70's board! That and the Vintage Synths imo are the two BEST cards. The kind of music I do is like U2/Depeche Mode/New Order/Joy Division/Doors/Cure/Coldplay/Radiohead/Green Day style so my synth sounds would reflect those influences. Definitely get the 60/70's card! The L&M on Bloor has a whole bucket full of these boards, I think they're selling them for about 50 bucks each so check that out.

Steve - I just got my Rosetta 200 today! When I get home from work I'll hook it up and I'll see if I can answer your question. But from what I understand you should be able to monitor off your Rosetta 200 if you have the SPDIF out on your MBox outputting to the Rosetta 200 (which is where you want it anyway). If you hit a major snag send me a private message and I'll give you my number and we can figure it out. btw, you don't need a Big Ben with the Rosetta 200. The clock on the Rosetta 200 is great, you'd only need a Big Ben if you were trying to syncrhonize a whole bunch of digital gear together.

[bgroup]

Kestral,

How long ago did you see the bucket of JV cards at L&M Bloor? I called them a week ago and they said they didn't have ANY! Let me know. Thanks, Brent

[Kestral]

Hi Brent, it was a few months ago. I do know that L&M in Scarborough has about 2-3 JV boards, I was just there this weekend, and they were about 50 bucks.

Steve - I just installed my Rosetta 200 into my setup. I used the SPDIF in and out into my M-Audio Audiophile Firewire and I'm monitoring straight from the Rosetta 200 with no problems. The analog output is really damn hot though, at unity it's clipping my Mackie 1202vlz so I've got the fader knob on that channel well below unity.

But holy f--- does this thing sound beautiful! Everything just sounds so upfront and present, exactly the classic Apogee sound I'm looking for but it's way wider in terms of stereo width than the old PSX-100 and AD-8000's.

Really looking forward to doing some tracking with it this weekend, need to borrow an SM58 from a friend and I'm need a cable to hook my 1073 to my 1176 (damn Mogami cable died on me so time to see if that lifetime warranty really does work).

For now, even listening to iTunes coming out of the Apogee is sweeeeeet