8 channel interface for live recording - your advice please?

[Teeej]

Looking for advice on upgrading to better interface.

Goal:
The goal is to be able to provide decent quality live recordings for bands & solo acts using a laptop (Win XP 32). Also, to use the interface to record demo quality in the studio (Win 7 64 desktop). Both designed to help in band/musician promotion (both audio & videos).

Criteria/preferences in interface:
 8+ preamps, expandable to 16 later would be a big plus
 Firewire 1st or USB 2nd – not PCI
 Must have MIDI, stable, decent support
 Good dynamic range 105 db+; 24 bit, 96KHz sample; Low jitter
 Desired options: ADAT, S/PDIF,
 Price in $400 - $800 range
 Likely will use Reaper for DAW

Units I’ve considered:
 Presonus Firestudio – good headroom, firewire, more likely the 2626 or Tube models – gotten good reviews, expandable, some issues with Mac’s
 Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 or (a stretch on budget) the FR Liquid 56 – impressive Liquid pre’s, 192K option on 56, more affordable and good pre’s on 40, but worse jitter
 Steinberg MR816X – big reviews here, no MIDI?
 M-Audio 2626 – good reviews, product issues in earlier in 2010?, expandable, 92K option

Questions: (yes, I’ve spent hours reading the forums!)
 Which would you recommend, and why?
 Any other serious contenders to look at?
 Any other suggestions on how to do FOH and studio work with an affordable
 interface/gear?

In several threads, very knowledgeable people pointed out its more about what you want to accomplish than a comparison of specs & absolutes. Any advice would be much appreciated! :D

[studer58]

Originally Posted by Teeej

Looking for advice on upgrading to better interface.

Goal:
The goal is to be able to provide decent quality live recordings for bands & solo acts using a laptop (Win XP 32). :D

I use the R16 version of this very successfully and reliably, so take a look at: Samson - Zoom - R24

I seriously query the need to use 96k sampling...have you compared with 44.1 or 88.2 ? If so, what differences have you noticed ? What's your final delivery medium for the recorded product: SACD ? If so you need 96k...maybe ? The R16 and R24 do 24 bit...now that's a spec I regard as more significant. Do lots of reading about Firewire dropouts during concert recording to PC laptops, which almost universally use the weedy little 4 pin FW connector. How good is a concert recording to your client if you have to shut it down and reboot 2 or 3 times during the gig, losing valuable minutes of concert material each time ? I'm not necessarily advocating USB over FW...just cautioning you to do lots of research over this glaring vulnerability of the PC laptop/FW scenario. For what it's worth I'm now using a Macbook Pro (few years old) and Audiofire interface with no reliability issues at all. Or you could use the PC laptop against all best advice and use the R16 or 24 as a backup/insurance device when the FW dropouts occur !!

[studer58]

You may want to shoot for the top shelf gear, at least as a benchmark for what the less costly gear might aspire too, if it had the R + D behind it that this unit does: Orpheus Recording Interface Home Page

[Teeej]

Thanks for the input... definitely high end, and more low end. I've used a Zoom for hand held recording before. Surprizingly better sound than you'd expect for the price and size. Bookmarked the R16 to look at further.

Was curious how much time you were able record with the 32 gig card. It's like a super portable version of a 2488, but the 40/80 gig drive is flash memory.

[philper]

If that's really your price range then look at MOTU, maybe used. If you have a bit more, then RME (also maybe used). A good deal more than that, Metric Halo and Prism. After that, separate preamps and interfaces.

Philip Perkins

[Murton]

M-audio profire 2626 or Metric halo. Depends how much you want to shell out. Apogee ensemble maybe, but would need pres.

[studer58]

Originally Posted by Teeej

Thanks for the input... definitely high end, and more low end. I've used a Zoom for hand held recording before. Surprizingly better sound than you'd expect for the price and size. Bookmarked the R16 to look at further.

Was curious how much time you were able record with the 32 gig card. It's like a super portable version of a 2488, but the 40/80 gig drive is flash memory.

See http://www.gearslutz.com/board/low-e...-opinions.html for general chat about recording length times for this device. A great handy calculator is here: Audio Record Time Calculator | Professional, Portable Audio Products Just punch in your expected recording duration, bit rate, file type and card size and it'll tell you what to expect. There's also a thread at the Zoom Owners forum: Zoom Gear & Home Recording Forum • View forum - Zoom HD8cd, Zoom HD16cd & Zoom R16 regarding recording times with various card capacities, plus great general users advice and critiques.

To answer your question, you'd never fill a 32Gb card with 8 tracks going for a full gig, even if you record the rehearsal also !! I'd recommend going with a few 8's or a couple of 16's...less temptation to let it fill over several gigs and perhaps risk the lot if it accidentally corrupted (which is a rare event these days, as the cards are much more reliable)

[AngusF]

Originally Posted by studer58

I use the R16 version of this very successfully and reliably, so take a look at: Samson - Zoom - R24

Though it doesn't meet your criteria of MIDI, I'm very fond of my R16. You can get around 4 hours of 8 tracks at 24/44.1 on a 16gb SD card.

I recently recorded two concerts by the same group with the R16. I used two Rode NT3s as room mics in XY at the front of the stage, along with six channels from direct outs on the FOH board.

I was quite impressed with the quality of the recording. I ran everything nominally at -24db, as it was a jazz group with considerable dynamics. Peaks got as high as about -5 db.

I'm not a big fan of the metering on the R16, but it works.

[cyjanopan]

echo audiofire pre8

[Teeej]

Thank you for the info & recommendations! Definitely getting some additional ideas to check out. Some are just naming gear, could you please add why you recommend it? There are always trade outs.

The R16/24 does look pretty interesting. The MIDI I/O is something truly needed though. Will look at it more anyway. Spoke with a friend into recording today for an hour, he was pretty impressed with the Liquid 56 also.

[ysmgj]

this is relevant to my interests

i'm looking at upgrading from a motu ultralite to 8 channels so i've been looking at the Steinberg mr816x too, some great reviews but not much in this particular forum,...

would love to hear from anyone recording classical stuff with the mr816.

[pkautzsch]

Originally Posted by ysmgj

this is relevant to my interests

i'm looking at upgrading from a motu ultralite to 8 channels so i've been looking at the Steinberg mr816x too, some great reviews but not much in this particular forum,...

would love to hear from anyone recording classical stuff with the mr816.

Why not the Motu 8pre, then? You could even daisychain both for more channels.

What put many devices off my list when I was establishing my system was the location of the inputs. I don't want any inputs at the front side, as the multicore comes in at the rack's back. Front inputs are good for project studios when you want to quickly connect stuff in the control room.

[ysmgj]

i did look into that as well, but the pres and the converters in the mr816 seem to be better than some motu stuff, i forget which model but it was a model a bit more than my lil ultralite.

hmmm, perhaps i should search for classical and motu and then use that as a cross reference for guessing about the mr816. its pretty cheap right now though so i probably wont think about it too much

i barely classify as project studio so yeah front inputs dont really bother me much.

[Teeej]

Been reading more on the Liquid Saffire 56, reviews there were requests posted here looking for sound samples of the various pre emulations.

First the review they came from:
Focusrite Liquid Saffire 56 review | EM Author Brian Smithers Reviews Focusrite Liquid Saffire 56 Audio Interface

Then the A/B comparisons with multiple mics, sources (sax & voice), and settings - about half way down the page:
Electronic Music September 2009 Web Clips, Audio Clips | Audio Examples, PDFs, Downloads From Electronic Musician

Maybe you can hear much of a difference, but with studio headphones on its difficult to hear any. Very impressed.

[pkautzsch]

Originally Posted by Teeej

Been reading more on the Liquid Saffire 56, reviews there were requests posted here looking for sound samples of the various pre emulations.

First the review they came from:
Focusrite Liquid Saffire 56 review | EM Author Brian Smithers Reviews Focusrite Liquid Saffire 56 Audio Interface

Then the A/B comparisons with multiple mics, sources (sax & voice), and settings - about half way down the page:
Electronic Music September 2009 Web Clips, Audio Clips | Audio Examples, PDFs, Downloads From Electronic Musician

Maybe you can hear much of a difference, but with studio headphones on its difficult to hear any. Very impressed.

My personal experience with Saffire interfaces unfortunately isn't too impressive. In a test run, communication loss between computer and interface occured a few times, even during recording. In addition, it would take up to 6 reboots until computer finds interface and interface will actually react to its control software. A colleague of mine has had the same issues. If it's not reliable, the greatest of all sounds is worthless. Maybe they've solved the issues in the Liquid version.
That said, I've found the occasional drop-out in data stream from my MOTU firewire hardware, too. With lots of system tweaking (including downgrading PC firewire drivers to SP1) it's now rather smooth. I guess the only hardware that's really reliable is made by RME.

[rumleymusic]

I went from a Motu 828mk3 to Steinberg MR816 for location work and now wish I hadn't. The sound quality is a little better, but the stability it terrible and driver support is the worst. (Read the steinberg forums to see how many people gave up and sold theirs) Most people believe the units will be discontinued very soon. I would stick with MOTU or RME as the most reliable brands. MOTU is known for packing a lot of I/O and functionality into their products, but the preamps are poor. RME has the best stability in the biz, though the price point is slightly higher.

I would look at the MOTU Ultralite which has USB and Firewire, and get some better external preamps.

[ysmgj]

damn, cheers for that info rumley.

to be honest pkautzsch's avatar has got me lusting after a nagra

been obsessively reading up on them over the past 24 hours.

[rumleymusic]

to be honest pkautzsch's avatar has got me lusting after a nagra

Aren't we all.

[pkautzsch]

Originally Posted by rumleymusic

Aren't we all.

I'm not

[TonyF]

No-one has mentioned the PreSonus 2626 interface, nor the Tascam 680 battery portable. Both worth looking at. The PreSonus has ADAT input on it which would interface with the new digital snake multicores.

[rumleymusic]

No-one has mentioned the PreSonus 2626 interface, nor the Tascam 680 battery portable.

I have little knowledge of presonus hardware, but I have heard mixed reviews, especially about connection problems when using certain software. I guess that wouldn't be an issue if using ADAT though.

That was another problem I had with the MR816, the ADAT output can only handle 44.1 or 48k. No SMUX for 96k. So even though they probably have the best preams outside of a metric halo/orpheus unit, your standalone capabilities are limited.

I am very interested in the Tascam though, I really like my DR100. My only question would be whether the sound quality is good sounding and the preamps quiet.

[Plush]

You've listed your wants and requirements but you have not assigned a budget to satisfy them. I think that $400-$800 is way too low for getting the things you have specified.

YOu may indeed find something that does most of what you want but it might be not very good.

[Don S]

A used Fireface800. 16 ADAT I/O, 2 SPIDF, 10 Analog. I really like matrix. You can mix any I to any O. The AtoD stage would be a notch above the other units you have listed except for MH. Rock solid drivers.

[ysmgj]

one last hijack of the thread,...

the nagra stuff i've been reading got me thinking,...and i've decided that i dont actually need 8 channels.

so i think i'll go for 2 channels of something really nice rather than 8 of something not that bad,.... i think that would make the biggest difference at the moment.

so cheers to everyone in this thread otherwise i would have picked up an mr816 instead of first lusting after a nagra, and then second, coming to my senses about what i really need and what would give me the biggest improvement which would be 2 channels of something really great.

and for about the same money too.

so DAV BG1 it is.

[skygod]

Originally Posted by Teeej

Looking for advice on upgrading to better interface.

Goal:
The goal is to be able to provide decent quality live recordings for bands & solo acts using a laptop (Win XP 32). Also, to use the interface to record demo quality in the studio (Win 7 64 desktop). Both designed to help in band/musician promotion (both audio & videos).

Criteria/preferences in interface:
 8+ preamps, expandable to 16 later would be a big plus
 Firewire 1st or USB 2nd – not PCI
 Must have MIDI, stable, decent support
 Good dynamic range 105 db+; 24 bit, 96KHz sample; Low jitter
 Desired options: ADAT, S/PDIF,
 Price in $400 - $800 range
 Likely will use Reaper for DAW

Units I’ve considered:
 Presonus Firestudio – good headroom, firewire, more likely the 2626 or Tube models – gotten good reviews, expandable, some issues with Mac’s
 Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 or (a stretch on budget) the FR Liquid 56 – impressive Liquid pre’s, 192K option on 56, more affordable and good pre’s on 40, but worse jitter
 Steinberg MR816X – big reviews here, no MIDI?
 M-Audio 2626 – good reviews, product issues in earlier in 2010?, expandable, 92K option

Questions: (yes, I’ve spent hours reading the forums!)
 Which would you recommend, and why?
 Any other serious contenders to look at?
 Any other suggestions on how to do FOH and studio work with an affordable
 interface/gear?

In several threads, very knowledgeable people pointed out its more about what you want to accomplish than a comparison of specs & absolutes. Any advice would be much appreciated! :D

TEEEJ-
I do a tremendous amount of live recording straight off the mixer feeds. Here's a word to the wise. Use an external MDM and stay away from computer recording live. Your choices up until recent have been the HD24XR. Great unit. Been using it for years but has limitations. I'll make a better recommendation at the end.

Small scale: Stuff like the Boss BR800 that will hit the streets this month as well as the upgraded Zoom R16 to the new R24 coming out the same time as the Boss, is a great MDM for studio guitar or synth composers who want a stable MDM w/o a moving hard drive, and be able to record 4-8 channels cheaply at 24 Bit quality to 2, 4. 8, 16, or 32 Class 6 to Class 10 SDHC Cards. Basic Investment $449-$499 + cost of the SDHC $74.00 - $300.00 USD. This will give you 4 or 8 live inputs at 24 Bit/44.1 resolution. Not the greatest noise floor, but ok for capturing live small events with 4-8 live mics, church events, club gigs, jazz gigs , and studio composition, looping etc. Not great for outdoor events, but gets the job done for 4-8 indoor controlled live tracks in real time at 24 BIT/44.1 Max resolution.

Any rack unit, whether USB or FW going to a laptop is, for lack of a better term: STUPID. Everybody does it, but that doesn't make it rational. Its plain STUPID. Mix on the computer ITB if you must, but record away from it. It is EVIL LOL. The stuff you listed above is all laptop inteface kitchenware regardless of MFG. Its all crap. I know, the folks who bought it will curse me. Well fukkem. I bought them all too and ot rid of all of it. They're all crappola.

Save your money and buy the best of the best and have 24 channels of live data at 24/96 for $2.75K. Hello? Record to standalone USB Glyph 2.0 drive and you're in hog heaven. Open ended architecture. Won't become obsolete like the rest of the crap grabage kitchenware in this industry for the past 10 years.
I know, each of the above listed companies has a purebreed pedigree as long my dick, but theyre all dvvchebags at the end of the day. They were all off the mark at the starter gate, and now coming to the finish line, guess what? They're all still off the mark but have no clue. Shhhhh, let's all be real quiet now lest they find out and get their heads out of their arses and come up for air ......

JOECO got it right with the Box. Its happening, its real and its freaking so simple its utterly amazing. Disconnect the glyph after the recording, connect it to your WIN7 OS Mainframe with 12GB of RAM or better and you're in hog heaven son. The OS will recognize it as a drive, move you files over into your fav software program and you're off and running. Or do as I do and do it OTB with a touch of ITB VST on very rare occasion for a spicy piece of this or that that I lack in hardware which is not much. Its a wonderful thing.

Well that's my 22 cents. Best money you will ever spend and never have to respend again.

Remember the old C programming screen shot : Hello World?
Well now its Wake up World ... Wakathefvvkkup LOL!

Cheers-

~skygod~

[tribeofenki]

Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 is expandable, too. IMHO is a good choice - better check drivers page on the official site. Less cheapy options: TC Electronic, RME, Metric Halo...

[philper]

Originally Posted by skygod

TEEEJ-
I do a tremendous amount of live recording straight off the mixer feeds. Here's a word to the wise. Use an external MDM and stay away from computer recording live. Your choices up until recent have been the HD24XR. Great unit. Been using it for years but has limitations. I'll make a better recommendation at the end.

Small scale: Stuff like the Boss BR800 that will hit the streets this month as well as the upgraded Zoom R16 to the new R24 coming out the same time as the Boss, is a great MDM for studio guitar or synth composers who want a stable MDM w/o a moving hard drive, and be able to record 4-8 channels cheaply at 24 Bit quality to 2, 4. 8, 16, or 32 Class 6 to Class 10 SDHC Cards. Basic Investment $449-$499 + cost of the SDHC $74.00 - $300.00 USD. This will give you 4 or 8 live inputs at 24 Bit/44.1 resolution. Not the greatest noise floor, but ok for capturing live small events with 4-8 live mics, church events, club gigs, jazz gigs , and studio composition, looping etc. Not great for outdoor events, but gets the job done for 4-8 indoor controlled live tracks in real time at 24 BIT/44.1 Max resolution.

Any rack unit, whether USB or FW going to a laptop is, for lack of a better term: STUPID. Everybody does it, but that doesn't make it rational. Its plain STUPID. Mix on the computer ITB if you must, but record away from it. It is EVIL LOL. The stuff you listed above is all laptop inteface kitchenware regardless of MFG. Its all crap. I know, the folks who bought it will curse me. Well fukkem. I bought them all too and ot rid of all of it. They're all crappola.

Save your money and buy the best of the best and have 24 channels of live data at 24/96 for $2.75K. Hello? Record to standalone USB Glyph 2.0 drive and you're in hog heaven. Open ended architecture. Won't become obsolete like the rest of the crap grabage kitchenware in this industry for the past 10 years.
I know, each of the above listed companies has a purebreed pedigree as long my dick, but theyre all dvvchebags at the end of the day. They were all off the mark at the starter gate, and now coming to the finish line, guess what? They're all still off the mark but have no clue. Shhhhh, let's all be real quiet now lest they find out and get their heads out of their arses and come up for air ......

JOECO got it right with the Box. Its happening, its real and its freaking so simple its utterly amazing. Disconnect the glyph after the recording, connect it to your WIN7 OS Mainframe with 12GB of RAM or better and you're in hog heaven son. The OS will recognize it as a drive, move you files over into your fav software program and you're off and running. Or do as I do and do it OTB with a touch of ITB VST on very rare occasion for a spicy piece of this or that that I lack in hardware which is not much. Its a wonderful thing.

Well that's my 22 cents. Best money you will ever spend and never have to respend again.

Remember the old C programming screen shot : Hello World?
Well now its Wake up World ... Wakathefvvkkup LOL!

Cheers-

~skygod~

Do you really need 12 GB of memory to work w/ the JoeCo box? I like the computer based stuff pretty well, but I also like how SMALL the Joe Co box is, and since I'm a Sadie user I'm a FAN of Joe. I wish he'd give us a video out (like the old Akai recorders) AND the ability to hit 2 disks at once, but otherwise it's very cool. Did they get 23.98 TC working? That's a dealbreaker for me since I work on a lot of HD video jobs.

Philip Perkins

[mixedupsteve]

Originally Posted by TonyF

No-one has mentioned the PreSonus 2626 interface, nor the Tascam 680 battery portable. Both worth looking at. The PreSonus has ADAT input on it which would interface with the new digital snake multicores.

I have Firestudio 2626 with a D8 feeding the ADAT input for a total or 16 chan. I've never had a problem recording to a Macbook and I think it sounds just fine. I have a Lunchbox with Great River, API, and a couple other pres to feed it with if I need to.

[Teeej]

Thanks for all the updates and comments. A couple more:
- The JoeCo does look cool, if I only had $2.7K for the interface. But, not a real option at this point.
- The issue I saw with the Saffire Firewire gear on the various forums is needing TI chips in the Firewire interface.
- After reading a number of reviews, found a demo unit of Liquid Saffire 56 and when I checked they were out of the demo and shipping new in its place. Was a no brainer after the reviews to try it. Recorded a little yesterday, more to work through, of course. Recorded vocal and guitar on a direct XLR and HiZ insert, the sound I got was clean.
- Sky & others - lots of info which I'll be checking into more
Look forward to learning more from the people on GS'z!
Teeej

[RickB]

+1 for the Zoom R16.

I've had one for several months now and lice record every gig my band does.

Once setup it's very fire and forget, low power, and records plenty of time on an 8GB or 16GB SD card.

I just pull the tracks onto CuBase, and mix down there.

It also doubles as a very nice practice/spare live mixing desk!