This looks like a ultra cheap solution for 12 in/out balanced interface.

How are the converters? how are the drivers for Nuendo in XP?

Hi - we're waiting for the first (UK) shipment to arrive - they left on Friday, so we should be able to check them out by the end of the week with any luck.

We'll post back when we've tried (and we'll use with Nuendo)

Cheers

Steve

So whats the word on the ECHO Audiofire?

There was a review in this months sound on sound. To summarise, the reviewer thought:

Audio quality was excellent (better / more precise than EMUs m-series AKM based interfaces).
Digital mixing / monitoring features are useful and well executed.
Build quality is high.
ASIO drivers are good.

The lack of digital inputs or outputs is a bit of a pain.

That was about it.

I'm seriously thinking of getting on over a Fireface because I don't need pres and digital inputs / outputs. I also like the fact that it can do > 96 khz.

ableit after MUCH thought. He eventually decided on the ECHO because the stereo image was a little more focused.

And its worth noting the the AudioFire 12 is the same technolofy as Audiofire 8 which is the same as Layla3G.

This is the first head to head of Layla and the 1820M I have come across. If the Echo is a little better - i'm thinking of finally ditching the EMU

echo interfaces are -very- underrated, imo. extremely good bang-for-the-buck and better than most of the other manufacturers...

btw, if you need digital i/o (and a good pair of pres), the yamaha i88x is terrific. they used to go for $899 but the price was recently cut to $399. i just picked one up and i'm really digging it...

good luck

.... and I forgot that I was due to post back...

I didn't get to try myself, but my tech support guys tell me that the interface is solid on XP with Nuendo & SX - both 3.0x and 3.1.

And in terms of the SoS review, I think I'm right in saying that Martin Walker bought the unit.

Cheers

Steve

Alright, you can't complain about them being too new to have seen one anymore.

So now that they've had their debut and have had ample time to settle into whichever niche they reside in ... gosh, screw the metaphors. What do you think?

(P.S. I'm thinking maybe of using the Echo Audiofire12 behind an A&H GL2400, but I'll settle for advice specific only to the Audiofire12.)

+1

Has anybody daisychained two Audiofire 12s together? If so, how have they handled?

I tried for a long time to chain my AF12 with an AF8. I even had an Echo tech working with me over email. I finally gave up on the Echo driver and started using ASIO4ALL. That worked but was a bit clunky when I wanted to change buffer size. This was all under XP 32bit running Cubase 5.

I'm using 2 AudioFire 12's daisy chained on Win 7 working solidly.

Good to know. I plan to upgrade to Win7 early next year.

This interface sounds great, and the meters are very handy. I loved how low that latency was in OSX compared to the Saffire I had previously.

Lack of a headphone out may be a pain for some people so keep that in mind.

I recently upgraded to a Zed R16 so the Audiofire will be on its way out soon.

love my af12

latest firmware on osx 7.2 is flawless

pair it with a nice small format rack mixer like a soundcraft gb2r or a&H mixwiz and you've got a great recording/otb mixing setup

lots of people complain it doesnt have preamps/headphone outs/digital i/o but thats its point! 12/12 i/o of 24/192k great audio!

I am a little confused, considering it doesn't have preamps, digital i/o and a headphone out... isn't this more like a pure digital/analog analog/digital converter than an audio interface?

Thanks guys this is great info! I use Mackie analog desk and have no need for digital I/o or headphone sockets. Good news bout the low latency on the mac. I'm running 10.7.2 with logic 9, ProTools 9 and Cubase Le5 so it looks like you've all helped me decide to invest in a pair of Audiofire 12s

I used one AF12 and one AF8 together for more than 3 years, never had a problem and they sound GREAT!
I prefer them to an ADI8-DS from RME, and I had the RME for years, so I knew how it sounded like when I switched to the AF12 on the same room, same monitors, etc...
GREAT interfaces! I highly recommend them!

I've been looking for an affordable way to add some decent extra i/o's. Would this work OK in tandem with a Fireface UC?

If it's MacOs, you can create an aggregate device with both but I would say it will not be a calm road...

Thanks for the quick reply. I'm using a PC anyways, so maybe I will sell the UC and just get two of these...

You can use ASIO4All. This would allow you to use two different interfaces in tandem. I used ASIO4All with my AF12 for a while and it worked great. The only down side was that when I wanted to change buffer size I had to change it both in the ASIO4All control panel and again in the AF12 control panel.

amazing! ill give that a shot. thanks!

how do you clock them ? I had few problems recently with connecting two together, it worked for 20 minutes then one of them would just desynchronize.

I was running an AF12 alongside an AF8 using the AF12 as word clock master. No problems.

Same thing... Had the same setup for 3+ years, worked perfectly and I know it still do...

so it`s computer firewire -> AF12 -> AF8, with AF12 word clock OUT -> AF8 word clock IN ?

exactly. Computer FW - AF12 - FW OUT - AF8, then Wordclock out from AF12 into 8...
The only time I had issues... was when somehow... the wordclock cable got "unlocked" and started not working intermittently... stayed like this for a few weeks until I got tired and went looking for the problem

Yeah... that`s what I thought, I think it`s the cable, need to buy new and check it for sure. Thanks !

i have to disagree with the mostly favorable opinions on echo audiofire that i read here. i've had bad experiences. i owned an echo af2 and had a lot of problems with the device. the drivers were buggy, i.e. audio drop-outs, random samplerate changes, etc. (no problems at all with my rme fireface on the same computer). but the worst thing: when i tried to update the driver to 5.7, the firmware got corrupted (the driver update automatically updates the firmware, too) and the device stopped working alltogether. the customer support said there is no way of resetting the firmware, it's simply broken. how poorly designed must a hardware be to get damaged beyond repair by as simple a thing as a driver update... definitely no more echo products for me.

edit: i have not used the af12, maybe it has a fundamentally different design than the af12 (though i doubt it). just wanted to share my experiences with this series in general.