003 is out!!!!

[Sir.Audio]

Nope. It's been tried before.

The only answer is people stop buying.

Why wont people stop buying ?!?!?!


from me already Digi

[frank lyon]

I own an 002 console, and do not see a reason to upgrade.

[Sabian576]

003
Digidesign

[original]

The 003 line is very disappointing (and that's an understatement).

Digi needs to jump to the 004 fast !

[Benmrx]

My real confusion comes from the fact that I don't see why ANYONE would buy this, when the M-Powered line offers WAY more options. The marketing team at Digi seems like no one is talking to each other in regards to the M-Powered vs. LE range.

What is the real incentive to go with the 003 over the M-Audio PFLB or even the 1814 if you need a couple on-board preamps?

Both those units will end up being quite a bit cheaper even after you tack on the M-Powered software. Plus the obvious reason that with the PFLB you can use the converters of your choice for all 18 I/O.

Considering the 003 will be the most expensive way to get into the LE or M-Powered software, you'de think they would want to sell a few?

[brokemusician3]

Ultimately this is good for Protools users because it will help their competition gain market share, then and only then will you see digi compete. HD has a few years left period and digi knows it so they're just milking it as long as they can before they become a software only company.

[fivestarstudios]

another reason I'm glad I just got Logic Pro 7..............
Digi can eat me-

Good sounds, songs,creativity, and front end will always beat out $20k HD systems, anyday, anyhow-
Give me 16 bit and a good tune-

[theblotted]

exactly, throw the 003 out.

anybody waiting for 004?

[Bdiggy]

Originally Posted by theblotted

exactly, throw the 003 out.

anybody waiting for 004?

If it wasn't for knowing PT pretty well (no expert) and needing to
move projects around from time to time I would already
be on a new platform. Hell I started on DP. At this point
it's a crap shoot because if you invest in an HD system
and computers get faster and faster why would you move
up to HD?. I'd say most will move over, not up. And THAT
is something Digi obviously hasn't thought about enough.

It's my fear HD will go the way of the dodo in a few short years.
There's just too much competition offering way more for way less IMHO.

We'll see I guess .

Bdiggy

[xabiton]

Originally Posted by andrew269

pretty lame in my opinion... it's not an upgrade at all. doesn't come anywhere close to the features of the ff800, firestudio, saffire pro, etc. it's just a very basic evolution of the 002. looks like i'll be moving to a different daw when i outgrow my mbox.

im not a pro tools user but this was my thought exactly

[Bdiggy]

Pulled it.

[Windshore]

Originally Posted by DeeDrive

how is this surprising??? Was the 002 a huge upgrade from the 001?? Sound quality wise maybe, but not in features.

Digi wants to keep LE and HD users in 2 very distinct categories. If they had a 003 with 8 pres and 16 channels of lightpipe, they would lose HD customers because more people would buy the 003 rather than pay big $$ for HD.

Digi does what is good for themselves, not their customers, (just like most businesses). They are a leader in DAWs because of pro tools, and people will buy whatever they put out, because they want pro tools.

Excuse me, but HELLO, YES! the move from the 001 to the 002 was huge.... remember... the 001 was PCI!

I think you're right on base with the rest... Digi is desperate to protect their expensive HD systems.

[Sara_tonin]

I just recently bought an 002. I'm nervous that Digi is gonna do with the 002 what they did with the 001 where you can't upgrade the software.

I wish I wasn't so comfortable within PT
This is definetly making me re-think why I'm using it.

I'd write a letter but I think it's pointless.

[Makinithappen]

What a mess. Out of the dozens of professional audio guys I talk to locally and all the forums I frequent... absolutely NOBODY is even interested in this new box. Us audio guys are impressed with even the most miniscule upgrades but with this one you have a whole community of very loyal people extremely disappointed. I work on several HD systems every day but I certainly don't make enough money to get one at home. I would love to be able to bring projects back home (even though the girlfriend would hate it I'm sure) but there is no point if I'm not going to be able to open it because of track count or ADC or plug compatibility.

Being a hardcore HD guy, I understand that there has to be a significant difference in operation from the lower level products, so when people ask for a 003 with 32 i/o, ADC, 192 kHz, and all the post capabilities, it is ridiculous but this latest attempt by Digi is just pathetic.


I wonder if the people at digi read these forums. Nuendo is looking better and better nowadays (not that i'll switch anytime soon)

[fromthesunset@y]

yeah. This unit pretty much looks like a suckgrade .... not an upgrade. I was hoping for the best, too. I really was. Seriously, about an hour and a half ago I was kinda pumped, cause I thought there might be a new tool available for us folks who don't wanna drop five figures on HD. At least a tool that was a little better than the 002. This looks gay (not that there is anything wrong with that), but I'm sorry.


It does look gay. Or retarded. Or idiotic. Just whatever is least offensive to you, cause I didn't mean any offense.

[Makinithappen]

Originally Posted by fromthesunset@y

It does look gay. Or retarded. Or idiotic. Just whatever is least offensive to you, cause I didn't mean any offense.

Gaytardiodic. ?

I wonder if thats less or more offensive.

[djbrough]

From the description, it sounds like a direct reaction to the BLA modded 002.

[fromthesunset@y]

Originally Posted by Makinithappen

Gaytardiodic. ?

I wonder if thats less or more offensive.

I could get on board with that I suppose...

[n8tron]

digidesign releases a product that has a bunch of new features...word clock, 2 headphone outs(great for small home studios...or where the 002/003s are mostly used) and a/b monitor outs... not to mention, according to sweetwater better pres and a/d ... and no arguments about this until someone actually gets their hands on one... also better design on the board unit all for the same price... and everyone just complains?

when has motu, apogee, rme, presonus etc etc. made that much of an upgrade... or an upgrade at all to their similar products?

that being said, if digi makes the 002 incompatible with the next software update I will be pissed. but as far as I know the main reason why the 001 was made incompatible is because it was pci which at the time the new macs did not use, and they were coding above 6.4 for the new macs... hence the problem. (still they should keep the support, but at least they have a reason).

[xabiton]

^something tells me these pres arent going to be any better than the ones found on the mbox 2

[peeder]

Apparently, the sonics are considerably better...pity about the rest.

002:

THD+N (line input):
Inputs 1-4: 0.004% @ -3 dBFS input level (minimum gain)
Inputs 5-6: 0.002% @ -1 dBFS input level
Inputs 7-8: 0.003% @ -1 dBFS input level

Main Outputs: <0.0016% (-95 dB)
Monitor Outputs: <0.0016% (-95 dB)
Outputs 3-8: <0.0023% (-93 dB)
Alt. -10 dBV Outputs: <0.0023% (-93 dB)


003:

Mic Inputs
THD + N: 0.0007% (-103 dB)
Line Inputs
THD + N: 0.0007% (-103 dB)

Line Outputs (1-8)
THD + N: 0.0007% (-103 dB)
Monitor Outputs (Main & Alt)
THD + N: 0.0008% (-102 dB)

These are ~10db improvements (quite significant in my book!)...I imagine the clock and power harness have been fixed too.

Anyone know if this will external synch to 96k? (Why have word clock in if no?)

[jdjustice]

i am going to buy one.

i have an Mbox2 and this exchange offer is too good to resist:
http://www.digidesign.com/index.cfm?...2&itemid=24722

i can trade in my Mbox2 and get the 003R WITH the Music Production Toolkit for retail $1,145 USD which i imagine from a dealer will only be about $1,050 USD.

to me that is a good deal.
i am not expecting it to be a unit with great preamps (i have outboard for that).

so shoot me.
i'll let you guys know how much it sucks when i get it in a few weeks.


cheers.
~j.d.

[DISCERN]

Surely the biggest upgrade LE users are chasing is an increase in sound quality? We are making music after all. LE users aren't silly enough to actually expect digidesign to roll over and hand them the key features that makes people choose HD in the first place are they?

You know what Cubase SE/SL users or Logic Express users do when they need features that aren't offered in the software that they use? They upgrade... Cubase Sx or Logic Pro. Why is it that Protools LE users get upset and stamp their feet and throw a tantrum? Digidesign already sell and market what most of you guys want. Its called Protools HD. The fact that you don't want to fork out for it is a completely different issue. This is nothing more than a case of LE users wanting everything for next to nothing... and its plain gobsmacking and very niave.

[Club Soda]

Here's what Digidesign has to say about it at the DUC.

" Hi All,

Sorry for this relatively slow response post to what is clearly a headline issue for many DUC citizens – the thread arrived ahead of the actual launch, and I didn’t want to post until after we’d got the official news up on our own website, and given it time to propagate around the world a little.

As several posters have concluded, our intention with the 003 family was to provide a refresh of an already successful product. This is a smaller scale effort than some of the projects we do at Digidesign, and the decision to approach it this way limited our freedom to innovate with features, or change the price.

Why would Digidesign choose to just do a refresh? It’s certainly not our first preference: we’ve come into our current position in the creative world of audio on a foundation of innovation. We’re wired that way still. Even a relatively large company like Digi still has to make tough trade-offs over what to spend time on however, and since the 002’s continue to fit the bill for many users, we decided to go with a refresh. This left us free to pursue some other projects we’d long wanted to do, like the Mbox2 Pro, Mbox Mini, the Profile live console, a lot of Pro Tools feature development, and a bunch of other things I can’t talk about yet.

Despite the constraints of doing a “refresh only” project, we still worked at making improvements to every aspect of the design that we could.

The I/O complement had to remain the same, so the differences in that area are relatively few. The biggest change is in audio quality. The mic pres were completely re-designed, and we upgraded their dynamic range by almost 6dB, and their distortion performance by almost an order of magnitude from 0.004% to 0.0007% (note the three zero’s after the period.)

We found several ways to enhance the 002 control surface as we re-worked it for 003: it now includes dedicated automation controls, and you can use the meters to provide an auto mode status display. The 2-line display provides much better visual feedback for all functions, allowing you to see 6-character channel names at the same time as parameter value readouts. With a jog/shuttle wheel and an external clock input, the product is more at home than before in post production environments. And the updated MIDI mapping mode will make controlling other MIDI apps and devices much more fluid for music producers.

Despite these changes, I can see how this intro is disappointing to existing 002 owners who were looking to upgrade to a product that would take them to the next level. We don’t mean to limit anyone’s options, and clearly the 003 family is not intended to serve that “step-up” purpose – it’s for new users. We understand the desire, though: we are hard at work on products which will allow people to move beyond today’s LE family (whaaaat! like I said, I can’t talk about that stuff!)

I hope this post helps with understanding our moves (I know it won’t help much with the disappointment) and that we are thinking along the same lines as many of you. Despite some of the harsher comments, I’m glad we have such a passionate and engaged customer base – it makes the communication open and easy.

One last note: some of the posters on this thread were concerned that 002 support will be going away with Vista. As we state elsewhere on our website, we’re beavering away at Vista support right now, and I’m glad to confirm that 002 will be fully supported in the forthcoming Vista-compatible release of Pro Tools.

- David

Senior Director, Product Marketing
Digidesign"

[moonpi]

Originally Posted by DISCERN

Surely the biggest upgrade LE users are chasing is an increase in sound quality? We are making music after all. LE users aren't silly enough to actually expect digidesign to roll over and hand them the key features that makes people choose HD in the first place are they?

You know what Cubase SE/SL users or Logic Express users do when they need features that aren't offered in the software that they use? They upgrade... Cubase Sx or Logic Pro. Why is it that Protools LE users get upset and stamp their feet and throw a tantrum? Digidesign already sell and market what most of you guys want. Its called Protools HD. The fact that you don't want to fork out for it is a completely different issue. This is nothing more than a case of LE users wanting everything for next to nothing... and its plain gobsmacking and very niave.

I'm going to second this opinion.

As far as PTHD goes, technically it is not even directly comparable with Nuendo, Cubase 4, Sequoia, Samplitude, Logic Pro, etc... Due to their proprietary processing design, they are able to create a system that at least ACTS like a multitrack-tape-machine when you go to punch-in or overdub, no matter how many plugins you have running. That's ultimately why people use it, aside from the compatibility benefits from pro studio to pro studio. Ultimately, you have to add a lot of high end gear to the other systems (awesome converters, clocking, external proprietary processing boxes or cards like WAVES APA44, Muze Receptor, UA's UAD-1, etc.) to begin to approach near-non-existent latency.

Now, I am a deeply conflicted individual because, while I admire Digidesign for what they provide in their high end hardware (meaning, a system that "acts" like a tape machine (but is most certainly not a Studer A800 mkIII), I really am not a fan of the way ProTools SOUNDS. A lot of my engineer friends and I discuss this and we have come up with this... "ProTools sounds big, but that big sound does not translate to clarity and depth."

That last statement is going to be rather controversial and will probably earn me some hate mail. But this is the opinion of several who have used PTHD, PTLE, Nuendo, Sonar, etc.. I've heard and read all of their sound engine hype and I ultimately feel that the proof is in the pudding. It's quite an amazing difference to be heard when you export your sessions from ProTools to Nuendo.

Frankly, I grew up with ProTools and I love the routing and all of the available plugins. I like the way it works. But I wish that they could just make it sound better. I know! People are going to hate me!

But the reason why I went on this rant is because, if Digidesign is going to release a new product, then they ought to make sure that LE can at least create a "bounce to disk" AIFF that sounds exactly like what you were monitoring to begin with. Otherwise, what's the 'effing point?

While we like to rant about the hardware because we are all STUCK with it in Digi-land, I really wish that more of us would demand some changes to the way the audio itself is handled once it's inside. With all the available gear we can use to bypass the Chinese-Garbage that ultimately is the LE line, we can certainly make some great sounding tracks. I just wish that I could have my cake and eat it too... in the same hardware/software system. To me there is no excuse for making substandard audio-engine when there are plenty of other reasons to upgrade to HD. Hell HD's audio engine is still questionable (big, but not deep), but at least you can punch in and out like you should without having to play around to get it to sit right.

[littledoodler]

really what a bunch of whiners here. That price on the upgrade path is pretty darn good!

[uncle duncan]

Originally Posted by n8tron

when has motu, apogee, rme, presonus etc etc. made that much of an upgrade... or an upgrade at all to their similar products?

That's funny, considering the above mentioned gear runs circles around the 002 or 003. Maybe that's why all these non-digi alternatives haven't made much of an upgrade - because it's not needed. Of course, you gotta qualify that statement by saying the Black Lion mod fills out the package on the motu gear, but as far as features go, native daws and their hardware kill PTLE. It's a mystery to me why anyone would get into LE land, outside of the so-called compatibility issue. But even that is bull, considering if you're sending a project out for overdubs, it's more effecient to just send a stereo mix or stem mixes in generic wav or aiff format, so that nobody messes up your project file. And many big name mix engineers prefer to receive an outside project with no automation, plugins, or virtual instruments, which makes PT compatibility a moot point.
This thread made my day - PT bashing. And it isn't even closed yet.

[DISCERN]

Originally Posted by uncle duncan

That's funny, considering the above mentioned gear runs circles around the 002 or 003. Maybe that's why all these non-digi alternatives haven't made much of an upgrade - because it's not needed. Of course, you gotta qualify that statement by saying the Black Lion mod fills out the package on the motu gear, but as far as features go, native daws and their hardware kill PTLE. It's a mystery to me why anyone would get into LE land, outside of the so-called compatibility issue. But even that is bull, considering if you're sending a project out for overdubs, it's more effecient to just send a stereo mix or stem mixes in generic wav or aiff format, so that nobody messes up your project file. And many big name mix engineers prefer to receive an outside project with no automation, plugins, or virtual instruments, which makes PT compatibility a moot point.
This thread made my day - PT bashing. And it isn't even closed yet.

Runs circles around the 002 and 003? I'm usually not one for semantics, but the difference between the 002R and similarly priced alternatives certianly doesn't qualify as "running circles around". Motu gear has a lot of I/O possibilities, but they been available since Mk1 products. Some models are now at mk3 yet still sound like arse. Presonus' alternative includes 4 extra preamps at the exclusion of ADAT connectivity entirely. RME's equivilant is several hundred dollars more and includes no software at all... and Apogee's equivilant is verging on twice the price.

You won't catch me buying a digidesign product ever, but the 002 and persumably the 003 fit very comfortable in both performance and features considering its price range (it surprises me that you have already formed an opinion on the way the 003 series sounds. I assume you have actually heard it?).

[GOD]

Originally Posted by BenJah

wow.. I mean WOW!!! They wated this long and all they added was wordclock....

What an utter let down. If only they spent a little less on that crappy digizine mag and a little more on say, another adat connector..

The mind really does boggle.

Nice one digi.

A home run for sure.

TRUE!
But you get to put in the ALL new flight case supplied


A weelee bin!

[Jamoson]

You know, I was thinking, I wonder if this has something to do with DIGI and Focusrite parting ways and DIGI not having Pre-amps or not being able to use them. So they go with a different pre and call it new. Any thoughts or confirmation on that? I love my 002R and will not upgrade and I love Protools but as far as I'm concerned MBox2, MBox Pro, and 003 have all been jokes. I can't believe nobody in a meeting said " I think they are all going to laugh at us"