Firestudio vs Saffire Pro, about to go crazy trying to decide!

[Hardtailed]

A bit of history: I've been using a Delta44 for like 6 years or so (ever since they came out). Now we are recording a full album and I need something better and of course with more inputs. I don't have any good preamps right now (just a Behringer board... ) so of course the new interface must include multiple "better than ok" preamps (it is our intention to rent a really nice pre/mic combo for vocal tracks).

With that in mind, I went and got a Mackie 400F last week. Was instantly seduced by the sound I got, until I started using more than one input at a time with the phantom power supply on. This very weak high-pitched noise became apparent with the gain turned up and of course piled up as you added tracks. Didn't want to mess with such bs so I returned it, hoping it was a defect, but every unit in store had the problem... So instead a placed an order on the Focusrite Saffire Pro 26.

Now I'm reading about the new Presonus Firestudio which has similar features but use supposedly better converters and mostly the Dice II chips with ultra-low jitter clock.

Fair enough, but the Dice II chip is also in those cheesy Alesis firewire mixers... of course it's the analog circuitry around the chip that count. But still...

Anyway, so what I need is at the very minimum 4 preamps, ideally 8. ADAT i/o is a big plus cause it'd be nice to track the whole band at once for scratch tracks. Of course I want great A/D conversion and a steady clock, but the preamps are more important to me (although I realize, no firewire interface is gonna replace stand alone preamps). I don't expect to get something that sounds like an album recorded with a 100 000$ budget, but I want the best I can get in this price range.

I know about the FF800, but I'm not too excited about those preamps and it has a few tricks which are useless to me. Anyway, the Firestudio is pretty much the most money I can put on that part of the project. Room and monitoring is already taken care of, the rest of budget will be microphones. I don't care about getting a slightly better sound out of the RME if I'm stuck using a SM57 on everything.

ANyway, Focusrite... Presonus... arghhhh

[Reggie Love]

I seem to remember twin headphone sockets, 2 ADAT optical channels and Green design mike pres on the Saffire Pro, if that's any help.

Or you could up your budget and join the very long queue for an Apogee Ensemble.

[Hardtailed]

Originally Posted by Reggie Love

I seem to remember twin headphone sockets, 2 ADAT optical channels and Green design mike pres on the Saffire Pro, if that's any help.

Or you could up your budget and join the very long queue for an Apogee Ensemble.

But I'm on a PC...

[respirator]

The new TC unit could be interesting. They can be chained, so you could start out with one and add more as the need arises + you got some DSP-powered fx that I'll bet my socs on are better than the Focusrite ones.

[Hardtailed]

Originally Posted by respirator

The new TC unit could be interesting. They can be chained, so you could start out with one and add more as the need arises + you got some DSP-powered fx that I'll bet my socs on are better than the Focusrite ones.

You're referring to the Dice II chip?

So far they haven't mentionned any DSP effects for the Firestudio, but I guess since they are using this chip, it can be added by software update later on... It would be nice to give the singer some reverb without patching an FX processor. That was the main selling point of the original Saffire, but the Saffire Pro doesn't have this feature.

Still, the fact that this "incredible" chip is also used in Alesis' firewire mixer makes it less exciting to me

[respirator]

Originally Posted by Hardtailed

You're referring to the Dice II chip?

This one: http://www.tcelectronic.com/Default.asp?Id=7618

[Hardtailed]

Originally Posted by respirator

This one: http://www.tcelectronic.com/Default.asp?Id=7618

Sorry, I thought you were referring the Dice II chip in the Firestudio, since it was developped by TC...
And as I see, this Konnekt 24D does use the Dice II chip... (make sense)

As it stands, it's not enough i/o for me, but I guess two of them chained together might be interesting. I don't have the highest confidence in TC's a/d conversion though, I remember not buying a G-Force for my guitar amp because even in bypass mode it totally screwed up my guitar tone. When you consider that my PodXT Live has absolutely no audible effect when in bypass running through my FX loop, that says a lot.

[Hardtailed]

Well that sank fast...

I'll throw some questions some of you might be able to answer: anybody knows what ADC chips will be used in the Firestudio?

Anybody can't comment on Presonus (Firepod/Digimax) pres vs Focusrite (Octopre) pres vs Mackie (Onyx) pres?

The only ones I've heard are the Onyx. I've read some "scary" comments about the Firepod's pre on HC, seems they don't do very well with low-frequencies. If they are all the same, I'll just go back to the Mackie since it's the cheapest and has very nice ADC and used the money I saved for the "API fund"

[r0ck1r0ck2]

surely (sp?) someone has gotten a Konnekt 24D as a Demo or Beta or something...
oh how i am hot for this box...
this box gets me hot in the pantalones..(spanish?)