Sound Devices USB Pre2 vs. RME Babyface vs. Apogee Duet 2 vs. Motu Ultralite mk3

[Ronald van Rhijn]

Hi all,

In my search for a good quality usb audio interface I have narrowed it down to these four models:
Sound Devices USB Pre2, RME Babyface, Apogee Duet 2 and the Motu Ultralite mk3. First I was going for the RME Babyface which had excellent reviews cause of it's great sound quality. But as we all know the manufacturer's software isn't always that great and accessible.
The Sound Devices USB Pre2 does not come with any software and are important settings changeable within Pro Tools and dipswitches on the back of the unit. The used mic preamps are the same ones as found in their well known audio recorders.
Does anyone have any experiences with these brands / models?

Thanks,
Ronald

[Brian Casey]

Hi Ronald,

I own an RME fire face UFX, which uses the same software as the baby face,
and on windows though their total mix fx software isn't accessible, the
fireface settings programme used for setting sample rate, latency and other
functions is completely accessible. I'm not sure if this is the same on a
mac, but I could check it with Voice over for you, but it could be a week or
two before I get near a mac to do so.

The total mix software is included as an option for creating moniter mixes
and such, but you might never need or want to use it.

The RME drivers are great as are the preamps, I think the baby face has two
of the preamps that come with my fireface.

The only annoying thing I noticed when researching the baby face for a
friend is that a few inputs and outputs are only included as part of a break
out cable, but since the break out cable includes the second headphone
output this could actually be helpful depending on what your needs are.

I have no experience of the other interfaces you mentioned.however if I
remember correctly you are also a windows user, so perhaps the apogee isn't
the best choice as it is mac only?

If you can wait that long I'd be happy to check it out on the mac for you,
but I don't use a mac for audio work at the moment, so it would be a week or
two before I get a chance to test.

Brian.
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Ronald van Rhijn" <pa...@xs4all.nl>
Sent: Friday, April 13, 2012 3:25 PM
To: <ptac...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Sound Devices USB Pre2 vs. RME Babyface vs. Apogee Duet 2 vs. Motu
Ultralite mk3

[Ronald van Rhijn]

Hey Brian,
Cool you own a Fireface. The Babyface comes indeed with a break out cable for certain connections. Probably to keep the unit small, will get used to it hopefully. So the Total Mix software on pc is inaccessible. I read some settings like phantom power for mics have to be adjusted there. I tried the settings program on my Mac, but don't work when a RME interface isn't connected. If you would try it out for me I would be very grateful.
You are right I also run Windows with Sonar, but hardly use it anymore and will go for Pro Tools from now on.
The Apogee stuff is indeed mac only, will keep that in mind for sure.

Thanks,
Ronald

[The Oreo Monster]

Based on what you said and revies and etc i have read, I'd go for the sound devices and or apogee personal. The downside is the Apogee is mac only, but that may not matter. Everyone who has heard anything apogee says there is some magic mojo in there that just makes evertything that goes through it sound better, makes you wonder they are doing to those converters lol.
- T.O.M

[Nickus de Vos]

Hi I personally only have experience with the RME and not the others you've mentioned. I don't like the RME's pre amps they're certainly not the best in this range you are looking at and as said, the software isn't accessible. Don't get me wrong I think RME makes some of the best interfaces and pre amps but I don't like their lower end stuff. I can't tell you anything about the others but in sted I'm going to give you another one to look at. The Focusrite Safire 6 USB, it's really a great little interface with awesome sounding pre amps, it doesn't really have a software suite it only has drivers and the rest of the stuff like sample rate and bit depth you set in pro tools so there's no problems with inaccessible software. All the other settings, the gain, pad, phantom power etc is physical buttons and pods on the device. The safire 6 has the same pre amps as the rest of the safire range and I also own a 8 pre amp firewire safire pro 40 and it sounds just as good. I seriously recorded stuff before with my safire 6 with very experienced audio engineers not believing the awesome sound quality and thinking I recorded it with pre amps a lot more expensive. go to www.focusrite.com and go check it out you can't go wrong.

[Ronald van Rhijn]

Hi T.O.M,
Thanks for your input. The preamps of the Sound Devices are perhaps the best, but how the converters are I don't know. The Sound Devices is a bit more expensive than the rest, I think around 700 euro and is very hard to find over here in the Netherlands. Apogee and RME is widely available though. I would like to have as much as physical controls on the unit itself as possible, it's not important it's small.
Well, I'll have to feel the models to get a good idea I guess.
Thanks again.
Ronald

[Ronald van Rhijn]

Hi Nickus,

Thanks for your feedback as well. Funny to see how different people have different opinions… That's always great, but makes things even more complicated… LOL

About the Babyfaces preamps: I read somewhere the preamps are exactly the same as the high-end stuff and many folks are blown away by the quality. But you are not so impressed you say?

Ahum another option to consider.. the Safire 6 is pretty cheap, about 200 bucks and still has excellent quality? I would rather go for a Safire 24 or 40 instead for the extra connections i think. 

Don't know if ever need more, but the Safire 6 only goes up to 48khz samplerate and even the Safire 40 only to 96khz.

While all the other before mentioned models can go up to 192khz. The Safire 6 is usb 1.1, if that's any concern of course.  Perhaps Firewire is something to take under consideration

Do you think it is doable to listen to them and make a disicion on that at a store?

Well, thanks again.

Ronald

[Nickus de Vos]

Hi the only way to really listen would be to take it home where you know the sound of your room and monitors and to actually record something with it and then to compare, if the store will allow you to do this it would be awesome to first compare. The USB 1 on the safire 6 is no problem because you can anyway only record 2 tracks at a time and it's more than fine for the 2 tracks. If you're looking at something bigger go for the safire pro 40 with the 8 pre amps, you have to configure more with its software though and I'm not sure if it's accessible on the mac, I only used mine on pc before. On the issue of it only going up to 96 KHz, well with this class of pre amp you'll anyway hear no difference whether recording at 96 k or higher, in fact I doubt if you'll even hear a difference above 48 k, the main thing here is recording 24 bit for higher dynamic range but as I say over 96 you won't hear a difference. Where above 96 k comes in to play is where you start going up to interfaces or mixers where you pay $500 or more per pre amp worked out as price divided by number of pre amps. I will always highly recommend any of the focusrite interfaces, from the cheepest $200 to the most expensive, they're really awesome sounding.

On Friday, April 13, 2012 4:25:08 PM UTC+2, RvR wrote:

[Polaris-17]

Hi, this is my first post, nice joining here.
Unfortunately Nickus de Vos, you aren't right in this topic.
First of all, we should talk about driver types, USB protocols and drivers.

RME has class A A/D and D/A converters. Focusrite, for example, has good preamps and converters, but their drivers are bad, unstable, and USB also sucks.

Talking about frequency, we talking about sound quality. If we are mixing or recording something at 96 kHz, the result will be better than at 48 kHz. Why - we won't enter into deep details... Someone could explain it more properly than me ;)

[Brian Casey]

Hi there,

 

Yes, I'd like to back up what's been said here about the RME versus the Focusrite...those RME pre-amps in the baby face are very high quality, and would almost definitely be a class above the stock ones in the lower end focusrite interface. That said, Focusrite do some very good more high end pre-amps.

 

The RME USB Drivers I've used were very stable indeed and could handle quite low latency opporation with a 26 in and 26 out interface, however USB isn't as consistant as firewire, as some older laptops I've had experience random CPU spikes with various USB audio interfaces, when firewire interfaces are more stable.

 

An important issue here for Ronald though is the fact that some of the RME functions won't be accessible. Even on PC, though the settings for buffer sizes sample rate etc are accesssible, the controls for phantom power, setting the input to high impedence opporation etc aren't accessible through RME's software. However, there may be work arounds, but in my situation, this doesn't worry me, as I have plenty other pre-amps to choose from that have physically switchable phantom power.

 

I've thought about that issue a bit Ronald and think that not being able to switch the phantom power could be the deal breaker for you, however great the RME interface is. I can talk you through some possible work arounds though after I get a chance to try the RME software on my brothers mac, hopefully this weekend.

 

Brian.