faderport vs alphatrack?

[Alex Aliferis]

I've had an AlphaTrack for a few years now, and for the money have found it to be a great purchase. While volume automation is nice, my main use for it has been using the fader to control filter cutoff, formant shifting, etc.

I have some minor complaints (not a huge fan of how automation modes are switched from the unit but perhaps I can set the assignable buttons to do that...) but overall it was money very well spent.

[Wiz_Oz]

I used to own a Alphatrack, and now I own a Fader port.

Both have their pro's and cons.

For my purposes, I am enjoying the Fader port.

The alpha track was completely bus powered, and I had a 5m extension cable (USB) which allowed me to take it with me when tracking vocals. The Fader port needs a power supply for the fader to work.

I actually prefer the fader port.

cheers

Wiz

[sparqee]

Yeah, I wish that there was an easier way to assign the fader to various plugin parameters but once you get used to the:
Plugin button > F2, F2, F2 > Flip > Touch encoder routine it goes pretty fast.

[dave gross]

Originally Posted by sparqee

In Cubase 5 under both XP & Win 7 the tracking/accuracy of the fader is excellent. If I recall correctly there is a fader calibration function accessible from the AlphaTrack buttons. Did you run that?

Thanks for the heads up, but it was actually with the FaderPort, not the AlphaTrack.

[TS-12]

I'm deciding between Alphatrack and Faderport.
Everyone says the faderport's fader is better, but watch this video how much faster alphatrack's fader responds:


Faderport vs Alphatrack Speed Test - YouTube

[ericzang]

I have an alphatrack.

I'm not sure why fader response time would be a significant factor. Actually I don't like the fader moving around much automatically when I'm mixing, kind of annoying sound. I can easily flip to a mode so this doesn't happen.

I'm generally satisfied with the alpha (never tried the faderport though), but what I don't like most about it is that the buttons click very loud (I bought mine around 2006, maybe its different now?). Also, the whole thing is quite light and plasticy, and I'd like it to feel more substantial, but I've never had any problems with the build quality.

Alphatrack has a footswitch input that can be mapped to various things, very convenient sometimes. Don't know if faderport has this (I don't know anything about faderport).

As for remote control needs (in response to the old replies earlier in the thread), a great option is to use a cheap netbook with vnc style remote software, and/or an ipad/iphone with remote control app such as ac-7.

[traumerei1838]

Originally Posted by TS-12

I'm deciding between Alphatrack and Faderport.
Everyone says the faderport's fader is better, but watch this video how much faster alphatrack's fader responds:

Faderport may have a crappy motor for playback of automation, but it's repsonse to your touch is spot on. I never once looked at the fader and thought "man, that is slow". It gets the job done perfectly and they are < $80 used. Thumbs up.

[BassDuck]

I love my faderport, my goal is to use my mouse and keyboard as little as possible and it allows me to do everything I need, fader is great quality, I had a few issues installing it the first time but once you update the firmware seems to be fine.

[shponglefan]

Have an Alphatrack, it's quite awesome. It has a LCD which the faderport doesn't have, plus three rotary knobs compared to one on the faderport.

Buuuuuuuut... it's also discontinued (as of 2-3 years ago). If you're super lucky you might find one still for sale new. I managed to find an online store that still had four of them. Otherwise you have to shop used.