I came to some serious money some time ago and desided to buy me a new sound card!

I bought the Focurite 18i8 gen2 that had good reviews. Today I simply gave up fighting with this unit, I found my nearly 10 years old sound card (Lexicon I-ONIX U82s) connected it and installed the old driver and do you know what?: It works perfect (good I didn´t sell it ;-)

No more pops and artifacts whatever, the cpu doesn´t have to work as hard any more ..... it works and sounds perfect.

My advise: Keep from buying any Focusrite sound card ..... IT SUCKS BIG TIME!

Cheers

 

I could have tell you before.
I don't know what people like on Focusrite. It falsifies the sound so bad!
They used to make a good stuff back then, tho.

 

Yeah, got burned with them once with Saffire 6, lousy drivers and USB 1.1 issue with Intel i series processors, never again Focusrite.

 

Sorry to hear that, mate. I have Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 2nd gen for my "on the move" work with laptop and had no issues so far (except HP output could be a little louder).
Just of curiosity... what is your OS? Do you use Focusrite USB ASIO driver? What is your USB chipset?

 

I've never liked Focusrite.Here in France focusrite doesn't have good press.
Personnally I prefer spending some more Euros and buy RME when I want a good interface.
As all what I read here and there on the web,Focusrite has some problems with their drivers.You are not alone!
Good luck for the future!

 

Guess Steinberg is the way to go for small pockets that wants good driver support and solid interfaces for the buck (or Focusrite Saffire firewire range), heard some good stuff about Behringer U-Phoria UMC line, but it might be just the same case as Focusrite, which I got based on word of mouth too.

 

The Behringer UMC interfaces are much beter than the Steinberg UR interfaces. Cleaner preamps with more gain, better latency, cheaper. I had a Steinberg UR22mkII and when compared to a Behringer UMC204HD it's nowhere near as good. The only thing better about the Steinberg is the DI input which sounds a bit muddy on the Behringer, but I just use a DI box with it to solve this one issue.

 

I have the Focusrite Clarett 8PreX and it works without problems. Im on Windows 10 fully updated if that helps.

 

I have an 8Pre, but on a MBP, how did you connect it? USB version?

 

I too am currently stuck with an 18i20. Their drivers are THE worst. Focusrite are still making beta drivers for their 1st gen product line - and still it's just not right. I have managed to rid the clicks and pops, but i deal with frequent crashes, or the driver not initializing upon reboot. It's actually quite the headache. If I get out of sleep mode, occasionally a focusrite driver causes a blue screen "collecting data" blah blah...

Focusrite, why can't you make proper functioning drivers for at least the majority of your customers - especially since you've had all the time in the world to try. It's quite a shame, because your hardware is actually pretty nice. Your driver-makers are gonna tear down your company.

I'm saving up for a Slate VRS8. My wife is gonna kill me.

 

Win7, I used the Focusrite usb asio driver..... usb chipset?...... Intel i7 here!

 

UMCs work. That's the best term I could use. Rather high noise floor and higher latency, but works. It's even class compliant, so you don't need drivers under linux.
Eventually I ended up with good ol' EMU0404, which for the most part, works fine.
Once in an eternity there's a blue screen of death due to its Win7 beta drivers, but other than that it's solid, quiet and has a headphone amp.

 

Interesting, thanks for the info, seems you and @Daned have little different experience concerning noise floor and latencies, does UMC have dedicated drivers?

Yeah, that EMU one is pure gem.

 

Damn man, the 2nd generation have problem with driver, i have a scarlett 18i20 1st gen, i never had a problem with this soundcard, i use it to play it live, in free party, in the dust, humidity, for three years now, she is still well working, i'm using it, on my homestudio pc, and my live laptop, with win7 pro x64 and the softwae i mostly use for production and live is reason 10 now

 

Thanks for the warning phloopy! I'm looking at getting a new computer and sound card by the end of the year and was seriously considering a Focusrite until you made me think again.

 

I only use it to play live but my first gen scarley 6i6 has always treated me well

 

You can check some of the latency figures here, I think the Behringer ones are from an old driver, they recently released an updated driver that improved latency a little bit more. http://kailuamusicschool.com/tech/round-trip-latency-roundup/

I have tested both interfaces with an SM7B and I noticed that the Behringer had more gain than the Steinberg. I managed to gain match the Behringer and Steinberg by doing a reamping test, I turned down the gain knob a bit on the Behringer so that it captures the same level of signal as the Steinberg when it is giving its max possible gain.

I noticed that the preamp noise/hiss was 3-4db higher on the Steinberg than on the Behringer. It is clearly noticeable when listening to the gain matched recordings that the Behringer is cleaner and has a better signal to noise ratio. I did the same test with my other low sensitivity dynamic mics like the EV635A and had the same results.

That's why I sold the UR22mkII, it just had more noisy preamps than the Behringer and less stable drivers with worse latency.

 

I'm sorry you had tough luck with your Focusrite audio interface, but in my experience they all work nicely and I recommend them when the budget is tight. I wonder why your experience have been so bad? Especially having a PC with Intel chipset and using W7. It should work normally.

Anyway, I've also heard good stories about Steinberg and Behringer budget interfaces, so you might give it a shot.

But if one wants a really great audio interface that works without any problems with any configuration, there's always RME and Lynx, of course.

 

I wonder if all of you having problems with USB audio interfaces have turned off Windows power management on USB hubs in Device Manager? It's also good for DPC latency. Also, you should use maximum performance power profile and turn off everything you can in it.

This tweaking guide at Focusrite is good, but not complete: https://support.focusrite.com/hc/en-gb/articles/207359245-Optimising-your-PC-for-audio-on-Windows-7

This is a bit better. Add these tweaks to Focusrite ones: https://audiostrom.com/?epkb_post_type_1=tweaking-windows-for-audio

Presonus Windows tweaking guide is the best IMO: https://support.presonus.com/hc/en-...ur-Computer-for-Audio-Windows-Vista-Windows-7

Combine all these tweaks and see what happens.

 

Last edited: Sep 30, 2018

Good ol' EMU - same here - pci version has really low latency but only people who ACTUALLY play care for that - never had bsod on win7 but I get problems with sound if I keep comp on stand by - so I have learned to shut it off completely over night now and no problems what so ever! I have to ask you - do you think usb interface could have any acceptable low latency like under 10ms roundtrip? because I am planning to buy Behringer U-PHORIA UMC22.