Is the M-Audio Fast Track Ultra 8r the best bang for the buck USB Interface?

[FreD_BeaR]

First time poster, I really need some incite.

I've read countless threads, sites and reviews. But I really would like some additional help making a decision. Im looking to buy the best USB interface under $500. I plan to buy PT10 after purchase FYI.

My Macbook does not have firewire, so I need a USB interface. I had a Tascam US-122MKII and it drove me nuts. I just got rid of it and need something a few tiers up.

I want something with 4-8 XLR inputs and preferably a midi input.

I basically narrowed it down to the:

-M-Audio Fast Track Ultra 8R $370

- Tascam US-2000 $311

-Tascam US-1800 $299


It's such a bummer I can't use firewire, as those seem to be the best units.

I've read comparison upon comparison, but have yet to get a clear cut answer.

Is the Fast track Ultra 8r better than the Tascams?

After my last experience with Tascam, I vowed never to buy another product under the name Tascam. Mostly due to drivers. But it seems the 1800 and 2000 are not too shabby. I just don't understand why the 2000 does not have a midi port, if it did I don't think I would have hesitated.

Or is there another one that is better? I look at pre sonus, which seemed alright. Most others with compariable features are out of my price range.

I have done my research, I just need the last push. Thanks!

[rony feliz]

hows it going fred... im on the same page as you, i actually posted up a thread on this.. im lucky to have firewire in my setup so im really leaning toward the profire 2424 but the 8r is an option for me as well since i can pick it up for about 200 used.

i dont know much about the tascams, as i was looking into purchasing protools mp9 instead of 10 so you have alot more freedom as to interface of choice. im only limited to maudios line..

the fast track 8r seems to be promising. out of all of them i would choose that one.

have you looked into presonus or focusrite? they have some really good interfaces also

goodluck!

[gravyface]

Originally Posted by FreD_BeaR

First time poster, I really need some incite.

I've read countless threads, sites and reviews. But I really would like some additional help making a decision. Im looking to buy the best USB interface under $500. I plan to buy PT10 after purchase FYI.

My Macbook does not have firewire, so I need a USB interface. I had a Tascam US-122MKII and it drove me nuts. I just got rid of it and need something a few tiers up.

I want something with 4-8 XLR inputs and preferably a midi input.

I basically narrowed it down to the:

-M-Audio Fast Track Ultra 8R $370

- Tascam US-2000 $311

-Tascam US-1800 $299


It's such a bummer I can't use firewire, as those seem to be the best units.

I've read comparison upon comparison, but have yet to get a clear cut answer.

Is the Fast track Ultra 8r better than the Tascams?

After my last experience with Tascam, I vowed never to buy another product under the name Tascam. Mostly due to drivers. But it seems the 1800 and 2000 are not too shabby. I just don't understand why the 2000 does not have a midi port, if it did I don't think I would have hesitated.

Or is there another one that is better? I look at pre sonus, which seemed alright. Most others with compariable features are out of my price range.

I have done my research, I just need the last push. Thanks!

USB seems to be the odd man out; there's just so many more firewire options out there, likely because Firewire 800 is twice as fast as USB 2.0.

No comment on the Fast Track Ultra, but I don't think M-Audio gets much love from the GS folks, save for the classics like the Delta 1010, 2496, etc.

[timx1386]

I am yet another person stuck with USB and was looking to increase my inputs. I just placed an order for a Focusrite 18i6.. I'm pretty excited. I know it only has 2 XLRs (so it might not be the best choice for you) but it IS a non-hub powered unit AND it is ADAT expandable (so you can add 8 XLR/line inputs if you want in the future) ..pretty handy

I'm going to be mostly using external preamps anyway (so I didn't really need an interface with a ton of built in xlr pre's) and I don't use midi so that wasn't a problem for me either..

Theres alot to consider.. I'd suggest you spend alot of time reading/thinking about what you want in an interface. You don't want to end up spending the cash and then a month later saying "I wish it did THIS" or "I wish it had another ___ input" ...and then regretting it.


I'm pretty excited. For the first time in a few years I've decided to take a chance with a DAW other than PT and now I'm swapping out my interface! (good bye mbox2, goodbye PT) Its exciting and a little scary but yeah: I just suggest you ask alot of questions and really make sure you know what you want before you invest!

[recordinghopkins]

ultra 8r is ok as long as you never need to expand. No WC or optical connections. you can use spdif in as 7-8 for clocking, but you'll lose two analog inputs. The built in comfort verb is nice for hp mixes though. also, the trs inputs dont bypass the internal preamp stage.

Save another $100 and get a used profire 2626 and a FW 800 expresscard. Your hard disk will thank you too.

[FreD_BeaR]

Originally Posted by recordinghopkins

ultra 8r is ok as long as you never need to expand. No WC or optical connections. you can use spdif in as 7-8 for clocking, but you'll lose two analog inputs. The built in comfort verb is nice for hp mixes though. also, the trs inputs dont bypass the internal preamp stage.

Save another $100 and get a used profire 2626 and a FW 800 expresscard. Your hard disk will thank you too.

Unfortunately my macbook does not have an expresscard slot. Otherwise I agree, that would be my best bet.

For midi I think I will just buy the maudio midi> usb adapter, and worry about what really matters.

So it seems USB really is my only option. Does anyone know the quality of the preamps and converters between the US-2000 and the Fast Track Ultra 8r?


@Rony PT10 allows any third party interface from my knowledge, so it shouldnt matter the brand. If I had firewire I would either go with the maudio 2626 or the Focusrite Saffire Pro 40.

But Without spending a bunch more money theres not much in this price range with 8 xlr inputs. Presonous has one with 4 inputs for 299, then focusrite has the 18i6 for 299 with 2 inputs.

Having ADAT would be great, but Im thinkin by the time I want to/ am ready to add another, I will be ready to upgrade my computer with firewire. Thus, get a better interface all together.

Which again kind of narrows it down to the Tascam US-2000 vs the Fast Track Ultra 8r.

I Like the fact the US-2000 looks sleek, has LED meters, a bunch of inputs. but am worried about it's build quality, driver compatability with lion and sound quality.

The M-audio to me just holds more via the brand alone, which may be a farse. (not a fan of tascam) But on top of that, It just seems sturdier, not sure why. It's not as flashy as the tascam, but looks and aesthetics are not what's important ultimately.
the Ultra 8r has DSP and more outputs. It also has Midi.


Can someone please help me with this decision? They practically offer the same thing in a different box. What I can't seem to find out is what the difference is on the inside. Thanks!!!

[FreD_BeaR]

After looking into it further, Im afraid of the Tascam drivers. When I updated to lion my Us-122mkII stopped working properly. ( constant screaching, unless restastarting the computer each time you unplug the interface) I just found that the 1800 has the same issue. Tascam really does not care about it's customers. No driver support is a deal breaker.

Tascam US-1800 / OSX Lion Problems - YouTube

So my next question...

My original choice was the Fast Track Ultra 8r, then I was looking at other brands. Now after doing research, it seems for $370 the FTUltra8r is likely my best bet.

I have never used one however, and would like to know if it is indeed worth the money? I like to do an immense amount of research before sinking into a purchase like such. I'm sure ill be happy with it, but is this the best money can buy for the price?

[Bill@WelcomeHome]

"Bang for the Buck".... does that mean the cheapest interface you can buy, or one that actually performs as it should, invisibly, working for you from now until you decide to replace it? One that the company supports, one that has no driver problems, one that has a responsive tech team fixing issues quickly as they pop up? One that fills your needs and more for the foreseeable future? That is what "Bang for the Buck" means. There is no "Bang" otherwise, there is just 'Buck', which used to be yours and now is theirs, while you piss and moan about the product that you bought that seemed like such a good deal when the bottom line was the only consideration. Nobody WANTS to spend a lot of money on gear, particularly on something with as little sex appeal as an interface.

[FreD_BeaR]

Originally Posted by Bill@WelcomeHome

"Bang for the Buck".... does that mean the cheapest interface you can buy, or one that actually performs as it should, invisibly, working for you from now until you decide to replace it? One that the company supports, one that has no driver problems, one that has a responsive tech team fixing issues quickly as they pop up? One that fills your needs and more for the foreseeable future? That is what "Bang for the Buck" means. There is no "Bang" otherwise, there is just 'Buck', which used to be yours and now is theirs, while you piss and moan about the product that you bought that seemed like such a good deal when the bottom line was the only consideration. Nobody WANTS to spend a lot of money on gear, particularly on something with as little sex appeal as an interface.

Hey Bill. thanks a lot for your help. I read that over a few times, and although it didn't really answer my questions directly, it made me really think about what I want and put things into perspective. Because I really don't want to end up regretting a this purchase/ decision like Timx said above.

Im thinking of getting the PreSonus AudioBox 1818VSL now. From everything I've read it's way better than both m-audio Tascam, and just about anything in this price range that is USB. I'm all about spending more now to be happy later, second guessing a big pruchase like this is the last thing I want to do.

[Bill@WelcomeHome]

Originally Posted by FreD_BeaR

Hey Bill. thanks a lot for your help. I read that over a few times, and although it didn't really answer my questions directly, it made me really think about what I want and put things into perspective.

It took me a really stupidly long time to figure this out for myself. Happy to share.

[Guyotron]

Originally Posted by recordinghopkins

ultra 8r is ok as long as you never need to expand. No WC or optical connections. you can use spdif in as 7-8 for clocking, but you'll lose two analog inputs. The built in comfort verb is nice for hp mixes though. also, the trs inputs dont bypass the internal preamp stage.

Save another $100 and get a used profire 2626 and a FW 800 expresscard. Your hard disk will thank you too.

According to the manual (http://www.m-audio.com/images/global...0UG%20(EN).pdf) on page 5, it states that line level (which is +4dBu, btw) bypasses the preamps.

[yosefTux]

FreD:
If you can stretch the budget up to the MOTU 828mk3 (~ $650) I think you'd be pretty happy, it would last long enough to let you get some use out of the ADAT i/o, and is rock solid on Mac. Skip the $300-400 range if you can, and go for a real step up. Wish I could take my own advice here, but I have to buy mics at the same time. This would be the only interface I could justify paying >$400 for on my budget.

[recordinghopkins]

Originally Posted by Guyotron

According to the manual (http://www.m-audio.com/images/global...0UG%20(EN).pdf) on page 5, it states that line level (which is +4dBu, btw) bypasses the preamps.

Then maybe I owned an early revision that did not include that feature. I know for sure that when I sent it 1.228v line level on TRS the gain knobs still worked. I remember being able to clip the input by cranking the gain knob, so I self calibrated them by measurement and marking on it with a dremel tool where unity really was.

Of course, you can always use the unbalanced insert returns on channels 1 and 2 and go straight to the A/D.

[FreD_BeaR]

Originally Posted by yosefTux

FreD:
If you can stretch the budget up to the MOTU 828mk3 (~ $650) I think you'd be pretty happy, it would last long enough to let you get some use out of the ADAT i/o, and is rock solid on Mac. Skip the $300-400 range if you can, and go for a real step up. Wish I could take my own advice here, but I have to buy mics at the same time. This would be the only interface I could justify paying >$400 for on my budget.

I cant find it anywhere cheaper than $750. It looks unreal, I am pretty disappointed it has only 2 XLR inputs though. The amount of 1/4 inputs is intense, why not more XLR?

Primarily I will be using it to edit audio for video. But will also be doing quite a bit of recording, drums being my instrument of choice.. So I'm not sure... This is such a hard choice.

[yosefTux]

Originally Posted by FreD_BeaR

I cant find it anywhere cheaper than $750. It looks unreal, I am pretty disappointed it has only 2 XLR inputs though. The amount of 1/4 inputs is intense, why not more XLR?

Primarily I will be using it to edit audio for video. But will also be doing quite a bit of recording, drums being my instrument of choice.. So I'm not sure... This is such a hard choice.

Talking used on eBay, but I've looked at so damn many interfaces I may have mis-remembered. Forgot about the 2 mic inputs, that's for sure.

I guess I was thinking I would populate a few of those line inputs with outboard preamps, and add an 8pre through ADAT. Hmmm, where did I miss winning the lottery? And why wasn't I getting a full blown ADK 8 core desktop, metric halo and some Cranesongs while I was at it?

But I feel ya FreD. Best advice I can give is still to focus on stability. Maybe the right interface is down the road a few years, and you just need Ms right now.

[Toogy]

I have an Ultra 8R, and have had absolutely no problems with it! I had a Tascam US-800 before and had nothing BUT problems with it! YMMV of course.

The only reason I'm personally wanting to replace it is because of the lack of additional inputs. If you don't think you'll need more than 8 inputs anytime soon, I say go for it!

[gravyface]

3 month owner/user of the Tascam US-2000. Windows 7 64-bit, Reaper; absolutely no problems and have tracked live rehearsals with 13 concurrent inputs for 2+ hour sessions without a hiccup. Cannot speak for Lion myself, but on my aging Snow Leopard Macbook (again with Reaper), again, no issues at all.

Me thinks Tascam has sorted out their driver issues.

Build quality is very good, very solid unit; whisper quiet, cool.

My needs were as many gozintas as possible (I regularly record live off the floor with 3-5 musicians).

Biggest downfall is that the zero latency monitoring is kind of limited because there's really no headphone cue mixing capabilities in the control panel, so if you wanted to setup different mixes per musician for overdubs, you'd have to get creative with the DAW's routing (and potentially suffer latency) or use a headphone amp fed by the 2-4 TRS outputs and hope that the amp has the ability to give you the mix you need.

I haven't crossed that bridge myself (and I may just use my 8 channel mixer for that as it's doing nothing now).

Because of this limitation, I really wouldn't build a proper studio around this interface, but for 300 bucks, it does everything I need now.

[Bondo21]

From what I have seen the M-Audio Ultra 8R is one of the better USB interfaces in that $500 or less range. On a PC at least, their drivers are every bit as good and in many cases better than the firewire drivers of similarly priced interfaces.

I am thinking the Presonus 1818VSL will also perform in a similar manner. I have seen great results with the smaller versions of that, the 22VSL and the 44VSL, but haven't had the time to play with the bigger unit.

[yosefTux]

M-Audio FTU 8R looks good, so do Presonus 1818VSL and Phonic Firefly 808U. I would hazard a guess that Phonic does the actual manufacturing on all 3. Possibly even some of the design work. The Tascam 1641/1800 and 2000 have fallen off my radar in the last month as I've rethought a few things along the same lines Bill was saying.

New AI and gear for me need to wait a few more months - gotta concentrate on a CCNA cert for work.

[mattjew24]

Ive owned a Firepod which is the same idea...8 pres interface. I also own a Fast Track pro. I would rate the preamps in the fast track pro slightly better than the Firepod. So get the fast track 8 and be happy

[mattjew24]

Also consider a Profire 2626. Its my current big project interface and I paired it with two Behringers for 26 ins. It has super nice converters and good Octane preamps. Plus two headphone outs, with DSP mixer for zero latency monitor mixes in stereo.

[Tungsten Carbide]

+1 on the Roland Octa-Capture (despite the price - I started out in the $300 budget range and was beaten into reasonableness by purchasing and returning other products)
I just went through this, bear in mind I'm a windows 7 x64 user. I was/am a happy owner of fastrack pro which I still use on my lappy but wanted more I/O. I did a lot of research and scoured user forums for complaints.
One thing I kept seeing come up as something people were universally happy with, but which was over my budget, was the relatively new Roland Quad-Capture and Octa-Capture.
Because of budget constraints and the fact that I use Studio One V2, I decided to to the FW route and try the FireStudio Project - big mistake. With all the correct drivers and a factory-recommended FW card I could not get it to communicate without jitter and dropouts. Plus, the config app / mixer / integration isn't really all that great. Noticed a lot of similar experiences on Presonus forums, as well as on focustrite forums for similar products.

In the end, I paid about double (~$700) of my original ~$400 budget for an Octa-Capture and boy was I amazed - it turned out to be totally worth it. This thing worked perfectly out of the box, the driver / mixer software is awesome, it has a lot of nice features which I thought I didn't need such as a good interface on the front panel, quick and handy load/save of mixer pre-sets, and even some decent preamps and compressors. Also great software metering which is something I didn't realize I was missing on my old FastTrack. I bought this thing very reluctantly because it was "the only game in town" that had more or less universally good reviews. Now I am totally glad I did, and I do not hesitate to recommend that you do the same.

[MattW94]

I'm having trouble routing my Ultra 8r into Pro Tools 10 for windows. Its detecting a new Asio Driver but the Ultra 8r is visible, but not in yellow and its not picking up anything through a microphone or DI. Any ideas what i can do?

[D-Fyant]

I own a fast track ultra 8r and have been using it for the past 2 years without any problems whatsoever....well at least not driver wise (user error on my part as far as understanding the routing).

Before the fast track, I owned a tascam fw 1082 and had so many problems relating to drivers that I sold it the first chance I could. Before that, I had a tascam us 428 and us 224 (I was a big tascam fan up until my run in with the 1082.)

I absolutely love the thing. I have some inputs plugged up with ts cables and some with xlr and they're all very quiet. When I used to use the preamps for my primary vocals (I have outboard pres now), they were very good as long as I didn't have to crank any of them past 80%.

I paid $500 for mine and don't regret it at all.