Fireface UFX.



http://www.rme-audio.de/en_products_fireface_ufx.php

Seems like an interesting in-between mobile solution.

• Operates as Firewire OR USB2.0.
• Has 12 analog inputs, four of which are XLR pres with phantom power. (Supports up to 30 inputs via various other connection types.)
• Possibly most interesting, IMO, has a nifty-as-all-fuck ability to plug a USB external HDD(or thumbdrive, obviously) directly in, to record a backup directly(and independently of the data being sent to/from the computer), OR to alternately allow the use of the interface as a standalone hard disc recorder, with NO computer.

Like most of the RME stuff it is pricey-ish, at $2100 or so, but gee-wowzers, it has a certain slickness to its feature set.

I would love to see the USB HDD backup feature start popping up on more interfaces, for sure. Handy, and totally independent of the state of sync of a recording computer? Very handy sort of jib-jab to have in the sort of mobilestudio thing that a lot of us do.

I was aware of its existence but not all of what it did. RME seems the obvious choice for reasonably priced-ISH lotsa i/o high-end stuff. And to be honest, with what I've used, through the monitors I'm not hearing a difference in D/A. I'm hearing a difference in the headphone amps. (Which suck. The Saffire's headphone amp is especially bad. It is much better routed to an external amp. A boring old Presonus HP4 is actually quite good. My old Yamaha is nice, if noisy.)

The backup drive bit is supercool. That is actually a brilliant idea.

Re: pres, I'm not horribly concerned, though having something for utility purposes is cool. I like the idea of the Echo Audiofire 12 that has no pres, just lines. Going with the interface pres, I prefer the Saffire's particular flavor of clean.

Yarr, i would dig on something with just 16 line-ins straight up. But then i would need a whole pile more dollars to put towards preamps.

My current hardware demands are more simple though, and i pretty much just prefer one jobber with as many XLR inputs as possible.

Actually, even if i had $2000ish, i would probably, at this moment in time, be compelled to direct it towards something all-in-one-y like the Presonus 16.4.2 mixer, which actually looks to be a very nice sort of collection of items in a remarkably non-ridiculous(so little menu scrolling! an actual fader per channel!) format, and a pleasingly compact size.

Either that or cheap it out with daisy chained firepods/saffires/whatevers. Even though i am becoming oh so tired of firewirehardware-based wrenches-in-the-works during recordings.

I am really hoping that USB2.0 will bring a brighter future for interface/computer relations. I badly desire one of those ghettocheap Tascams to run Science experiments on. I would love to be able to break up with firewire for good.

Echo Audiofire 12 is just line channels and apparently well-thought of, but it's Firewire and Chris and Firewire aren't the closest of friends I take it.

My occasional doomy collaborator uses the Presonuses in his live sound gig and has lots of praise for the things. (24 channel, too!) There isn't a big learning curve coming from an analog desk; it's easier from what I've observed to navigate than our (Garda's) Yamaha 01v, which still sorta confuses me. Put motorized faders on that thing- IMO its one downside for a digital desk- and you have a total champion.

Well, -ish. The one thing I'd really love to see on a digital board would be EQ settings without having to pre-select a channel. Or onscreen in a DAW for that matter. And not on a graph. If you use the stock EQ in Logic it'll display a miniaturized EQ graph on the channel. (I do use the stock EQ for what you'd use a non-modeling digital EQ for sometimes, surgery at the end.) Looking at the tiny graph tells me less- where's my center point?, how wide's my Q?, etc. And maybe I'm just getting old now, but an immediate visual assessment of what is doing what where across the board- quite literally across the board- helps things get done in short order. To me, a "real" board is a very intuitive, purpose-designed tool and I am somewhat surprised the visual aspect hasn't been better incorporated into digital devices.

I've never had an issue with Firewire on actual Macs. It's dead stable there, plug-and-play, Bam! Spice Weasel! Done. From my old G3 on. On other hardware it goes from slightly wonky to quite wonky, and I suppose why it never quite caught on in the same way as it did with Macs. Fucking Apple, how does it work? Having run multiple interfaces on two different Hackintoshes, even those treat them differently re: what you need to do for the system to see them- and they have the same motherboard!

hrm.. that's interesting. i was thinking it has 12 concurrent PRES-- now THAT would be exciting. that thing seems like a cool box with a lotta capacities-- but the saffire 26 does a lotta that biz and has the 8 analog xlrs. i've heard great things about the RME sounding fantastic.. but i think their user is either somebody with hella outboard, or guys running some nice stereo pairs. those things would be bomber for live classical recording.. like 4 omnis in a hall or something. i really dig the usb/firewire option, and the backup.. holy moses. i'd love to play with one.. but shazam.. $2100! my mics would probably evaporate once connected to such a device..

For sure, it is in the top end pricely for these sorts of interface jobbers. Mainly what interests me about it, is that they are approaching the one biggest issue that i do have with mobile interface formats, their (in)stability and most-certainly-not-failsafe-ness.

I have recorded hundreds of things now, and i have done like five or six bandrecordings in their spaces. Out of all of that i have run into one major technical disaster with the firewire connection that mattered, several major issues that didn't(recording myself for instance), but also multiple minor ones. The one major one was just totally shitty and unacceptable, and it was lucky that i wasn't really getting paid for it. When you have to go into spaces that you aren't familiar with, specifically electrical outlets that you don't know how they are run, what else they are attached to, etc., the quirky demons of firewire become much more likely to appear.

I really enjoy doing mobile recording like this, but there has to be a more stable system in place. The ideal solution would be a desktop build in a rackserver box with a couple 1U 8x preamps and a couple PCIe cards and a power conditioner. But that is talking more $$ even than this RME.

What i would most prefer, is that other manufacturers adopt the USB-drive redundant recording option that this thing has, and also the USB/Firewire option would be nice to see more commonly(though i think that what is more likely to happen on that one is that more interfaces are going to just be based in USB2 or 3 and firewire will recede).

I.e. so that if(when) there are going to be problems, they will have simple solutions, built in. Basically it is fantastic to have the interface independent enough from the laptop, that even if the laptop crashes in the middle of recording, the recording still continues without error. The interface is basically a 12 input standalone hard disc recorder(but with the very clever flexibility of allowing the user to provide the hard disc via the USB output on the front). That is fucking brilliant.

All i need now, is for tascam/presonus/focusrite to add it to one of their $300-500 range interfaces, and i will have something to save my pennies for.

What Chris said, pretty much. The backup- or rather the fact the thing is essentially a hard disk recorder on its own, is stupid-brilliant-innovative-useful.

Both our Hackintoshes are equipped with USB 3, which is raging fast like you wouldn't believe. I use it for all my data transfers.

Mobile recording now is slightly less obnoxious than ten years ago.