SLATE DIGITAL VRS-8
In 2017, Slate Digital are excited to announce the next step in their continuing crusade to bring professional audio tools to the masses: the Virtual Recording Studio, featuring the new Slate Digital VRS-8 audio interface.

The VRS-8 is NOT just another “me too” eight-channel recording interface - it’s a fantastic-sounding professional audio converter packed with tons of features:

• EIGHT Ultra Linear VMS-One mic preamps, enabling you to use our microphone and preamp emulations on every input and controlled directly from the front panel for easy control when tracking
• A LLN™ (Low Latency Native) custom hard-wired converter chipset, which reduces managed components in the audio path and allows an incredible .7 milliseconds of latency at 96K (with a 32 sample buffer) - allowing you to monitor through mic and preamp emulations while tracking
• Mastering-quality conversion technology incorporating the newest AKM converters, offering a whopping industry-best 124db of dynamic range on all inputs
• XTC satellite-grade clocking technology, utilizing four temperature-compensated crystal oscillators for ultra-stable audio performance
• Built-in monitor switching and headphone amplifiers
• Native MIDI IO, for accurate MIDI timing that doesn’t utilize the USB bus.

The VRS-8 comes with a free one-year subscription to the Everything Bundle, as well as the option to purchase a five-pack of ML-2 microphones at a substantial discount - so you’ll have everything you need to put together your own professional virtual recording studio.
(already being sold on sweetwater for 1.999$)
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/VRS8TB

Other toys;

MIMIC PRO
Slate and Pearl Drums have taken electronic drums out of the 80’s and into the future with the state-of-the-art Mimic Pro, a touchscreen drum module with 16 inputs and outputs, a 120GB Solid State Drive, Steven Slate Drums drum sample software (featuring SSD 5 sampled instruments), Burr Brown Converters, and much more! View it in person at the Pearl Booth at NAMM!



ML-2
Announcing the newest member of the VMS family, the ML-2 small-diaphragm modeling microphone. Featuring the same ultra-flat and linear response as its larger sibling the ML-1, the ML-2 allows you to recreate the sound of nearly twenty microphones, including both dynamic and condenser emulations. Check out the Keynote Video to learn more, and hear it in action.




RAVEN MTI CORE STATION

Announcing the RAVEN MTi CORE STATION, a sleek new production workstation featuring modern style and ergonomic workflow. Look out for pricing, MTi upgrade specials and shipping information on Slate MT very soon.

 

enough Slate for a whole Year

But kudos for the achievements

 

Fancy stuff from Mr. Slate and business partners! Besides from that he´s really not a born sprechstallmeister!!!!!

Also looks a little expensive too, and .... besides from the "hardware" what do we know about the soft?

Thank for the head up VS!

 

As usual with Slate, it's not cheap but that's not the main point since their products are usually game changer.

 

Lots of money indeed.

 

You'll probably have to pay a subscription for the workstation.

 

Yeah, don't personally subscribe to the whole Slate ethos but was interested when this came up as was looking at new interfaces and stuff.
Still think his plugins etc are pretty cool but I hate his whole marketing concept and whatever it is.
Looks great but whether it functional and practical I couldn't say. Time will tell.
Seems to have good connectivity as in Thunderblot, PCIe, line out etc etc .
See the whole Slate-VS88 in 6 month output with iLOK
Anything of past history is to go by then it will be overpriced and whilst looking amazing will probably not be that great in functionality

Out of interest anyone got thunderbolt installed and workin right on PC with expansion card etc if connection not there & motherboard capable?

Who knows, could be amazing?

 

The real question is, is he cloned?

 

@Kloud .. I too have been pondering adding on a thunderbolt port as some exciting things to me only go this way, such as the Clarett line from Focusrite as well as UA stuff which up until now has been a no go, as you would have needed to threaten the life of my child to make me use a Mac. For 80 Swiss Francs I could drop one in.

 

Well that not bad 80 Swiss Francs seems cool

Clarett range like u said was one of those things that got me thinking. Looks great. I don't know enough about the technical side but like you mentioned the inclusion of that sort of thing would be great?
Is basically for a different setup as in want a desktop solution rather than rack based at home, no portability etc.
Basically i've been struggling with a couple of options as in connectivity etc like u mention.
UA apollo Twin USB to me is a clear winner. Costs a little more than wanted but I reckon it's a great option
However other options have been Audient ID22, SPL Crimson or different connections at different prices lol.
Really like the sound of the crimson and the fact you can use it without having to turn your PC etc on but also like the Audient etc.
Honestly don't know what to do lol. Don't like the look of the SPL Creon etc (Know that's stupid) lol but also thinking about other things like connections etc and lol
Basically, don't need USB3 -> don't need all those ins and outs and USB3 not the best protocol even though the bandwidth great.
RME looks great and great drivers but maybe not quite enough for what I need and always good to have a couple extra.
Crimson -> Looks also cool, sounds great but costs like 200 euro more in this country.
Scarlett 18i20 -> cool but don't need no rack for this setup
Audient -> seems a solid option outside thunderbolt and other connectivity issues.
Focusrite do some fabulous stuff and will mostly go for that.
Claret range looks immense.
I hate decisions like this lol but 80 swiss francs for a connection to solve that on a couple of PC's sounds cool

 

When I checked it out http://www.steg-electronics.ch/de/article/THUNDERBOLTEX-3-CARD-20002528.aspx I was pleasantly surprised by the price. As I am quite simple when it comes to these kinds of things, so is this really all that I would need to enable me to use a Focusrite Clarett? The Clarett ticks off all my boxes. The Slate Virtual Recording Studio, not so much.

 

Awesome!

A Slate thread.. without Slate in it!

 

??? The title...

Slate introduces new toys (VR-8 ,8 channel audio interface)

 

I have used some of his products, and some are ok. A lot of them are complete bullshit, laden with the overhyped crap of a frat boy who spends more time trimming his beard line then actually getting shit accurate. Raven touch screen control? Joke. Couldn't use it, No one could unless they spent days trying to... He's a joke, and pulls it off.... He's trying, and he has a schpiel, and again, some of his products are just fine, but his whole rhetoric is a put off... whatever.. i'm going off... I just don't like him and can easily live without his products.

 

He is a fine salesman of wares that I won't buy as I am put off by the spiel as well as the wishful future of a virtual reality, a place where ones imagination replaces actuality. I certainly use software instruments and enjoy them to pieces and do not wish to be a killjoy to people looking to use all these simulations as tools in the hopes of bettering their sound quality (or what they believe is a greater quality). It is just that, as a person who grew up prior to the binary system as almost another gene sequence in our cummulative DNA, it seems odd as well as scary that approximations are considered as good as the originals and that it is normal to live within that world view. I wager that if you put up a U47 that Sinatra recorded "I Did It My Way" next to Slate version of the same microphone, a singer would inevitably rise to the occasion to meet head-on with the history and crank out an amazing take compared to singing into the simulated version. I don't think it matters if a person would never have the actual opportunity to do so because an idea cannot replace reality, it is as simple as that. A virtual microphone has no soul, never has and never will. True, there still is a need for hardware, a microphone and a preamp, the cable, etc, but it is a mind fuck and detrimental to mental as well as spiritual health to buy into the idea that this is as good as the real thing. Copies of hardware such as a BAE Neve clone are real (if we can agree that we live within reality, at least the part that says I think, therefore ....), even the greatest simulations are not. It is akin to me as buying into "alternate facts" that are a matter of opinion. The young current generation as well as soon generations to follow, will need to decide if they wish to salvage how we hold reality or to supplant it with a convenient alternative for the sake of ease and what seems to be a cozy blindness to things which are perhaps difficult to deal with, much like now as well as historically, but the technology didn't yet exist to create such change at such a rapid pace. I shudder.

 

...anyway, whoever gets the lowest latency, he gets the girl

To bad, Slate products are too expensive...
but the good thing is that others will be forced to follow, so cheers to a future with better interfaces