I have one and it works fine for my purposes but I'm pissed that they force you to install Ilok to use their asio driver. I don't want to use their "free plugins" that you can install with it so why should I need Ilok? If I had known in advance it would have been a deal breaker for me... At least I was able to delete Ilok after I blocked their software from going online.

 

for the price of about 200,00 euro Audient iD14 MKII is a hot recommendation.
Thanks for your opinion.

Lack of MIDI can be a NO-GO for some people.

Audient ID14 MK2

 

I wonder how much it differs compared to its rebranded refresh "Neumann MT 48" ?
https://www.thomann.de/de/neumann_mt_48.htm

 

woow, thats interesting
thanks a lot for your opinion

Merging Anubis

 

oooh , I didn't know about Ilok problem before, very good that you mention it.
thank you very much for your experience report.

by the way, which model exactly do you have?

 

As you say, we've all been ripped off. I now use my Mackie 1640I FW as a headphone monitor. HAHAHA!
2000 euros for that!
That said, it still works on Win7.

 

Volt 1 because I usually don't record anything I just use it for my monitors at home and to hook it up to the mixer when I'm playing livesets.

You can use the interface without their asio driver though but it has lower latency of course.

 

UAD Volt 1

 

Antelope Orion Synergy Core
Almost 4 years in use
Pro user

Incredible performance (SQ) and a real swiss knife on the connection department.

In the beginning the software had some maturity problems, this is past tense. The drivers are stable. Allthough the GUI is practical and nice-looking, the lots of possibilities/connections takes some concentration.

The effects are top notch on the level of UAD, some better, some worse. Just as UAd, Antelope has now native effects with subcriptrion.
I think all the pro audio/software firms struggle with their business model: to expensive subscriptions, ridiculous discounts etc. Also Antelope and UAD.
The effects on the Antelope hardware works the best for me. The Afx-Daw software (for using effects as a plugin in a DAW) is adding to much latency for my taste. Presumable better are the native effects but I didn’t checked that yet.

 

@nor17, many thanks for your experience report, very helpful
Antelope Orion Synergy Core

 

A video of 3 Focusrite interfaces tests (also the new 4th gen).

The Scarlett 4i4 4th gen comes out as the best for the price.

 

usb. but it's a nice cable. . joking. that is as reported by Logic 10.4, High Sierra mac pro 5.1, late 2010. 2 x Intel Xeon 2.4 ghz.
I don't remember the actual difference when I had it as Thunderbolt, but it was negligible. When I play and record anything, it's just synths anyway; so I am recording midi data into Logic, then replaying that midi to the external synth and capturing the audio input. For my purposes it could be probably like 10ms and it wouldn't really matter all that much. The amount of i/o connectivity was the same as the Focusrite it was replacing. I really don't have a single bad thing to say about it. It's never been used with a pc so I have no idea what that would be like.

 

Thanks for the info. When I was looking for my new Audio Inter phase MOTU said there USB and Thunderbolt are very close. It might have to do with it being Thunderbolt 2 not 3. I ran test with a guy on here and the MOTU had a little better IHD than the 2626. They are very close.
In quality.

 

I think you see the biggest jump in throughput at thunderbolt 3, compared to other usb vs thunderbolt type comparisons. I'm not sure how much data we have to put over the wire where throughput is even a pure reflection of speed, if there is no bottleneck. In my situation/use case Logic's external hardware latency compensation makes it of low importance (none). Realtime playback and recording is where latency can really mess up someone's timing. Anyway, when running via Thunderbolt from my laptop; it's almost no difference. The macbook pro is Thunderbolt 3, but to get to Thunderbolt 2 Motu, I have to use this Apple TB adapter. They are like a dongle, they fail, they cost almost $40, the cable is a thick thunderbolt2 cable into the Motu. I have no way to test it, but it stands to reason that adapter is doing nothing to improve latency at all. For $40, maybe it should. If my Mac was fast enough and could playback well at 32 samples, it drops to 2.3 ms roundtrip.

 

Last edited: Dec 12, 2023

This line is also on my list to demo as it has some very good independent user reviews saying its SQ is up there with high end interfaces of today. Yes, it would be great to get some user feedback here too.

I also think it would be better if people listed speakers brand/model and the room these interfaces are being used in (eg. small treated, semi-treated, not treated at all) to give a better perspective of where and how people are using them. For instance, I could have a $5000 interface running through $50 pc desktop mini speakers and earbuds that came with my shitty phone or something or on the flipside $10k 3-way speakers + sub fed by a $100 interface. If you have a nice room with great speakers, then I think doing shootouts will render more accurate results and opinions on this stuff. Or not.

 

It makes no difference whatsoever. If you have one person test different audio interfaces, everything else connected to the interface, and the listening environment; is a constant. The only variable is the interface.

 

Entirely flawed logic. Completely defeats the purpose of this thread and any other form of testing, feedback and fact and opinion based reporting. Everything is the same. But you do you lol...

 

Last edited by a moderator: Dec 13, 2023

Add me to the RME crowd - been using them since early 2000s. First the Fireface 800, then the first UFX (which is still running strong after swapping some capacitors in the power supply), and a Fireface UFX+ (which replaced the UFX before I learned how to replace those capacitors!). RME has no disadvantages except cost.

 

It's not flawed at all, if I'm testing 3 interfaces, my room or whatever are constant, interfaces change... maybe you are missing the point of this thread, we are just posting what we use and our experience with given piece of gear... it's just that, personal opinion, nobody sits there accumulating interfaces and pretending he's Julian Krause or our opinion should be taken as an fact or anything, so we need to determine in which conditions test's are done and etc.

 

The purpose of the thread is for people to answer the 4 simple questions asked by the Original Poster.

Maybe that is too difficult for you. If I swap out my interface with whatever interface you are using, the only difference is the interface. Should I check my Tuesday interface against my Wednesday interface? Will the interface driving my Genelecs work with the Adams? Such a confusing topic.

You have no clue what you are talking about. (and are now ignored.)

 

Last edited: Dec 13, 2023