[[email protected]]

Is there anything comparable to the Metric Halo Mobile I/O ULN2 for PC
users?

Which of the following interfaces would you choose for least colored
preamps, lowest residual noise, phantom power that works, decent
sounding A/D D/A, portability, and driver stability for WinXP:

SoundDevices USBPre
RME Fireface 400
TC Electronics Konnekt 24D
Presonus FireBox
Mackie Onyx 400F

Others?

bobs

Bob Smith
BS Studios
we organize chaos
http://www.bsstudios.com

[Mike Rivers]

On Sep 25, 1:56 am, wrote:

Is there anything comparable to the Metric Halo Mobile I/O ULN2 for PC
users?

Depends on what you like about the Metric Halo, but I suspect not. It
has a reputation for great preamps and great converters, but given
that it only works on a Mac I know it only by reputation.

Which of the following interfaces would you choose for least
colored
preamps, lowest residual noise, phantom power that works, decent
sounding A/D D/A, portability, and driver stability for WinXP:

Given the list of requirements, I'd suggest the Sound Devices or RME.
I don't hear much about the Sound Devices, and given its price and who
they sell to, that's probably a good thing. I'm always hearing about
RME being on top of fixing bugs and updating drivers. I guess that's a
good thing too, but I'd rather not have to keep up with the updates.

One thing that you'll need to contend with, being that you're a PC
user and will probably want to use this with a laptop, at least on
occasion, is that your laptop computer probably doesn't have a
"powered" Firewire connector, so you'll need to power a Firewire
interface externally. That's not a problem with USB.

[Eeyore]

Mike Rivers wrote:

On Sep 25, 1:56 am, wrote:

Is there anything comparable to the Metric Halo Mobile I/O ULN2 for PC
users?

Depends on what you like about the Metric Halo, but I suspect not. It
has a reputation for great preamps and great converters, but given
that it only works on a Mac I know it only by reputation.

Bizarre !

Why would any company want to restrict themselves to something that only works
on a Mac ?

Graham

[Arny Krueger]

"Eeyore" wrote in
message
Mike Rivers wrote:

On Sep 25, 1:56 am, wrote:

Is there anything comparable to the Metric Halo Mobile
I/O ULN2 for PC users?

Depends on what you like about the Metric Halo, but I
suspect not. It has a reputation for great preamps and
great converters, but given that it only works on a Mac
I know it only by reputation.

Bizarre !

Why would any company want to restrict themselves to
something that only works on a Mac ?

Religious fervor.

[andrejs eigus]

SoundDevices USBPre
RME Fireface 400
TC Electronics Konnekt 24D
Presonus FireBox
Mackie Onyx 400F

while the hardware unit itself seems to be made well and works well in
standalone mode (no computer connection necessary) along with its built in
effects and signal controls, i wish TC would do their homework better in the
software department. Konnekt series of audio interfaces contain numerous
bugs in their TC Near software drivers. i bought K24D on january 2, 2007
and i still can't use it properly with my laptop (Toshiba Satellite Pro
M30) - so it's sleeping here on a shelf. there are two huge forum threads
on harmony-central about the issues people are having with Konnekt
interfaces. so, beware..

Others?

followed my tragedy with Konnekt, i bought myself E-MU 1616m audio
interface, which is rather a CardBus/PCMCIA interface + a breakout box.
audio quality is very good (the A/D and D/A converters used are top class)
see http://tinyurl.com/lxchu for more information. see also RMAA tests done
by Alex Lukin at the WNAMM 2007:

http://audio.rightmark.org/test/EMU1616m.htm

works fine with my setup. there's a non-official E-MU site dedicated to
E-MU interfaces at www.productionforums.com

good luck,

-andrejs

[Mike Rivers]

On Sep 25, 8:49 am, Eeyore
wrote:

Why would any company want to restrict themselves to something that only works on a Mac ?

So that they don't have to deal with all the PC users with all the
hardware variations out there. I constantly harass them about making a
PC version of their really cool SpectraFoo program. For a while they
said that it was on the back burner, but now they won't even talk
about it.

What they make is good stuff though, if you can use it. They're a
pretty sharp outfit.

[[email protected]]

On Sep 25, 8:02 am, "Soundhaspriority" wrote:
"Mike Rivers" wrote in message

One thing that you'll need to contend with, being that you're a PC
user and will probably want to use this with a laptop, at least on
occasion, is that your laptop computer probably doesn't have a
"powered" Firewire connector, so you'll need to power a Firewire
interface externally. That's not a problem with USB.

Yes, this is true, and Bob will have to decide whether all-battery operation
is important enough to him to accept less audio quality than he can
otherwise get.


Thanks for the comments and suggestions from all. More comments or
discussion very much appreciated.

External power for the device is not a problem, as some of the
difficult environments involve special vehicles which have 12VDC and
sometimes 120VAC available. I have several portable 12V 12~20AH power
sources for times when it isn't. The application is more for acouistic
measurements than for recording as I use SD 7xx (which really rock,
IMNSHO) for remote recordings. There are times when I'm measuring
residual room noise that low noise mic pres are a necessity. Other
times I'm measuring high level noise and it's not as important.
Fiddling when taking measurements during transient events that are not
readily repeatable is not desireable.

Given the number of issues I've heard about the Konnekt I'm leaning
away from that. The RME Fireface looks the closest to fitting my needs
with the least fiddle factor, though the SD USBPre is the smallest. 16
bit on playback isn't an issue for sound system sweeps. SD says that
they have redesigned their boards to remove most of the playback noise
though there are still a few issues at 1KHz + harmonics. I'm mostly
concerned about the lack of external power input on the SD USBPre and
the 500mA maximum bus power available on the USB spec limiting total
performance of the device.

bobs

Bob Smith
BS Studios
we organize chaos
http://www.bsstudios.com

[Mikey]

"andrejs eigus" wrote in message
...
SoundDevices USBPre
RME Fireface 400
TC Electronics Konnekt 24D
Presonus FireBox
Mackie Onyx 400F

while the hardware unit itself seems to be made well and works well in
standalone mode (no computer connection necessary) along with its built in
effects and signal controls, i wish TC would do their homework better in
the software department. Konnekt series of audio interfaces contain
numerous bugs in their TC Near software drivers. i bought K24D on january
2, 2007 and i still can't use it properly with my laptop (Toshiba
Satellite Pro M30) - so it's sleeping here on a shelf. there are two huge
forum threads on harmony-central about the issues people are having with
Konnekt interfaces. so, beware..

Others?

followed my tragedy with Konnekt, i bought myself E-MU 1616m audio
interface, which is rather a CardBus/PCMCIA interface + a breakout box.
audio quality is very good (the A/D and D/A converters used are top class)
see http://tinyurl.com/lxchu for more information. see also RMAA tests
done by Alex Lukin at the WNAMM 2007:

http://audio.rightmark.org/test/EMU1616m.htm

works fine with my setup. there's a non-official E-MU site dedicated to
E-MU interfaces at www.productionforums.com

good luck,

-andrejs

I have a Presonus Firepod that I use occasionally, but you may also want to
look into MOTU's Traveler, Ultralite, and 8-pre, etc.

Mikey Wozniak
Nova Music Productions
This sig is haiku

[Mike Rivers]

On Sep 25, 1:33 pm, wrote:

I'm mostly
concerned about the lack of external power input on the SD USBPre and
the 500mA maximum bus power available on the USB spec limiting total
performance of the device.

Not that it's what you want for your project, but Focusrite has
thought about that. The Saffire Pro 10 and 26 have a mysterious button
on the software console labeled H/ROOM. It drops the maximum output
level by 6 dB so that when powering the unit from the Firewire bus, it
doesn't have to work so hard at digital full scale. And +16 dBu out at
0 dBFS is still pretty hot.

In fact the individual analog output pairs also have a button that
drops their level by 10 dB to fix the "My sound card is too hot for my
monitors" problem.

[[email protected]]

On Sep 25, 8:49 am, Eeyore
wrote:
Mike Rivers wrote:

Depends on what you like about the Metric Halo, but I suspect not. It
has a reputation for great preamps and great converters, but given
that it only works on a Mac I know it only by reputation.

Bizarre !

Why would any company want to restrict themselves to something that only works
on a Mac ?

Graham




Because A) It's what they know and B) They're such a small
company that for the past decade their user base size suited them
pretty well as it is.

As an early adopter of both an I/O and a ULN-2 I can attest to them
both being as good as the reputation.

[Ty Ford]

On Tue, 25 Sep 2007 08:49:35 -0400, Eeyore wrote
(in article ):



Mike Rivers wrote:

On Sep 25, 1:56 am, wrote:

Is there anything comparable to the Metric Halo Mobile I/O ULN2 for PC
users?

Depends on what you like about the Metric Halo, but I suspect not. It
has a reputation for great preamps and great converters, but given
that it only works on a Mac I know it only by reputation.

Bizarre !

Why would any company want to restrict themselves to something that only
works
on a Mac ?

Graham


If you only have Macs, you haven't realized the pleasure of windows.

Ty (mac user) Ford

--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
Acting and Voiceover Demos http://www.tyford.com
Guitar player?:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RZJ9MptZmU

[[email protected]]

On Sep 26, 5:57 am, Ty Ford wrote:
On Tue, 25 Sep 2007 08:49:35 -0400, Eeyore wrote
(in article ):









Mike Rivers wrote:

On Sep 25, 1:56 am, wrote:

Is there anything comparable to the Metric Halo Mobile I/O ULN2 for PC
users?

Depends on what you like about the Metric Halo, but I suspect not. It
has a reputation for great preamps and great converters, but given
that it only works on a Mac I know it only by reputation.

Bizarre !

Why would any company want to restrict themselves to something that only
works
on a Mac ?

Graham

If you only have Macs, you haven't realized the pleasure of windows.

Ty (mac user) Ford

--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
Acting and Voiceover Demoshttp://www.tyford.com
Guitar player?:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RZJ9MptZmU- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

If I had the time, I might be inclined to buy a Metric Halo, reverse
engineer the com and write a WinXP driver myself, but I'm being kept
so busy being a user and getting paid for it, rather than a SW writer
that I don't think I could justify the time. As Mike Rivers can tell
you, I already have a backlog of unfinished projects, one of them
several years old.

Thanks everyone for the suggestions. It appears that the RME Fireface
400 has the best compromise of size, features, etc for my needs.
Several in particular beyond audio performance include individual
phantom selection for the mic pres and flexible routing of individual
inputs and outputs which is handy switching between various
measurement systems.

bobs

Bob Smith
BS Studios
we organize chaos
http://www.bsstudios.com

[Ty Ford]

On Wed, 26 Sep 2007 12:28:57 -0400, Soundhaspriority wrote
(in article ) :

If you only have Macs, you haven't realized the pleasure of windows.

Ty (mac user) Ford

It is certainly true that at one time, for A/V work, the Mac was
overwhelmingly superior to Windows, because the homogenous hardware platform
produced a more consistent user experience. This advantage has shriveled, but

those companies who have not accumulated Windows programming expertise may be

reluctant to make the switch. Even companies, particularly small ones, have a

"comfort zone".

Very gently put.

Regards,

Ty Ford



--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
Acting and Voiceover Demos http://www.tyford.com
Guitar player?:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RZJ9MptZmU