For discussion about setting up your studio and advice on the gear and equipment within it.

Presonus Digimax D8 vs Focusrite OctoPre MkII

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User avatar
By al-Zarqawi Sun Mar 21, 2010 3:53 pm
I would go with the Focusrite if I had to choose between the two. If the A/D converters are anywhere near as good as the optional A/D card in the Platinum range, it ought to sound stellar. Are you aware of the new Octorpre MkII Dynamic?

http://www.focusrite.com/us/products/mic_pres/octopre_mkii_dynamic

It's got VCA compression for every channel which might be useful. They're just now starting to ship them in the US. I was holding out for one but decided on the Behringer ADA8000 and a JoeMeek MC2 instead. Check this thread:

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/gear-shoot-outs-sound-file-comparisons-audio-tests/335267-lynx-aurora-16-vs-behringer-ada8000.html

I'm really happy with the ADA8000 so far. It sounds great, works as advertised and stays out of the way. If you want to hear it in action here's a little something I recorded a few weeks ago when I was testing it:

Spectral Audio Neptune 2 - 24 bit @ 44.1k - 12.6 MB .WAV file
http://audio-kinetic.iswiz.com/plaid_emu/ADA8000-neptune2.wav

Access Virus TI - 24 bit @ 44.1k - 12.6 MB .WAV file
http://audio-kinetic.iswiz.com/plaid_emu/ADA8000-virusTI.wav

I'm using the RME's wordclock output to sync the ADA8000 with an Apogee Wyde Eye BNC cable.
User avatar
By al-Zarqawi Wed Mar 24, 2010 12:31 pm
Where's the OP? I guess "Behringer" wasn't the answer he was looking for! :lol:
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By al-Zarqawi Sun Apr 25, 2010 12:59 pm
Infamous wrote:Not tryin to steal the topic, but what about the Focusrite Saffire Pro 40, any thoughts ?


Nah, you're not stealing the topic. The OP abandoned this thread like a premature crack baby in a dumpster. Quite rude in my opinion since we took the time to actually reply. Maybe he just forgot about it?

Anyways if I were in the market for a new interface, I'd be taking a hard look at the Focusrite stuff. It's pretty damn clean sounding and the build quality is above average for the price point.

I would also be checking out the new RME Babyface which should be coming out soon. Since it has ADAT I/O you could hook up a Behringer ADA8000 and get an extra eight channels of I/O for peanuts. That would be a killer combo for under $1,000.
User avatar
By DJ Hellfire Sun Apr 25, 2010 3:26 pm
al-Zarqawi wrote:
Infamous wrote:Not tryin to steal the topic, but what about the Focusrite Saffire Pro 40, any thoughts ?


Quite rude in my opinion since we took the time to actually reply. Maybe he just forgot about it?




Yeah, being that the first replay was made THREE DAYS AFTER I made the thread, I forgot about it. Now I see this thread went over a month without a new post as one point. Found my answer elsewhere!
By ntalec Sun Apr 25, 2010 3:40 pm
DJ Hellfire wrote: Found my answer elsewhere!

Which was?

I found this thread funny since people tried to make the 2 units you asked about come off like highend.
The best thing about adding either of them to your 003 is you don't have to worry about them being better than your stock 003.


The popularity of the units came from way back when the DIGI001 was around and there were very few ADAT I/O units around for reasonable prices except the Alesis units.
When the Digimax and OctoPre dropped their price and performance made them a perfect fit.
They have modified them over the years and the 002 then later 003 users continued to use them.
BUT, they don't sound better than the ADA8000. :lol:
They do however offer some very distinct feature sets that could possibly make them useful for certain users who are looking to do more than add the additional 8 channels.

A good upgrade is to get the ADA8000 use that until your money is right then do the BLA mod to the 003 and add a Rosetta 800.
User avatar
By al-Zarqawi Sun Apr 25, 2010 3:44 pm
DJ Hellfire wrote:Yeah, being that the first replay was made THREE DAYS AFTER I made the thread, I forgot about it. Now I see this thread went over a month without a new post as one point. Found my answer elsewhere!


:lol:

Just an opportunity for me to make a sick analogy in poor taste. Too bad humor doesn't always translate. Especially when it's not really funny.

Anyways.... what did you decide and how's it working out?
User avatar
By al-Zarqawi Sun Apr 25, 2010 4:05 pm
ntalec wrote:
DJ Hellfire wrote: Found my answer elsewhere!

Which was?

I found this thread funny since people tried to make the 2 units you asked about come off like highend.
The best thing about adding either of them to your 003 is you don't have to worry about them being better than your stock 003.


What are you talking about? Nobody alluded that anything mentioned was high-end. These are all basically mid - low tier converters. Does that mean they sound like garbage? Definitely not. Good technology is becoming cheap. The difference between "prosumer" and pro is narrowing every year.

I'm using my ADA8000 with an RME Fireface and comparatively they're much closer sound-wise than most people would care to admit. Sure the RME sounds a little better but not by leagues. My decision to purchase an RME Fireface was only partially based on the excellent sound quality. It mostly had to do with driver stability, build quality, format, and features.

Conversion is only one part of the process. Mixing and processing skills are much more important than just conversion. Especially if you have some quality outboard.
By ntalec Sun Apr 25, 2010 6:50 pm
Of course you did.

al-Zarqawi wrote:I would go with the Focusrite if I had to choose between the two. If the A/D converters are anywhere near as good as the optional A/D card in the Platinum range, it ought to sound stellar. Are you aware of the new Octorpre MkII Dynamic?


The Platinum range stuff sounds like low rent stuff for sure.
I'm glad you see the value in the ADA8000 and realize how far up you have to go to sound better.



al-Zarqawi wrote:
ntalec wrote:
DJ Hellfire wrote: Found my answer elsewhere!

Which was?

I found this thread funny since people tried to make the 2 units you asked about come off like highend.
The best thing about adding either of them to your 003 is you don't have to worry about them being better than your stock 003.


What are you talking about? Nobody alluded that anything mentioned was high-end. These are all basically mid - low tier converters. Does that mean they sound like garbage? Definitely not. Good technology is becoming cheap. The difference between "prosumer" and pro is narrowing every year.

I'm using my ADA8000 with an RME Fireface and comparatively they're much closer sound-wise than most people would care to admit. Sure the RME sounds a little better but not by leagues. My decision to purchase an RME Fireface was only partially based on the excellent sound quality. It mostly had to do with driver stability, build quality, format, and features.

Conversion is only one part of the process. Mixing and processing skills are much more important than just conversion. Especially if you have some quality outboard.
User avatar
By al-Zarqawi Sun Apr 25, 2010 8:40 pm
ntalec wrote:The Platinum range stuff sounds like low rent stuff for sure.
I'm glad you see the value in the ADA8000 and realize how far up you have to go to sound better.


I was specifically speaking of the A/D conversion card for the Platinum series. Have you ever heard it? It's not Mytek but it's far from "low rent". Considering the price point for the application, it's more than adequate for getting a great sound.

It's no wonder that so many people give up on home recording and dump their whole setup on Cragslist. Yes, we all know that if you can't afford to spend $50,000 on a home studio there's no point in even trying to record music. :roll:
By ntalec Mon Apr 26, 2010 1:15 am
al-Zarqawi wrote:
ntalec wrote:The Platinum range stuff sounds like low rent stuff for sure.
I'm glad you see the value in the ADA8000 and realize how far up you have to go to sound better.


I was specifically speaking of the A/D conversion card for the Platinum series. Have you ever heard it? It's not Mytek but it's far from "low rent". Considering the price point for the application, it's more than adequate for getting a great sound.

It's no wonder that so many people give up on home recording and dump their whole setup on Cragslist. Yes, we all know that if you can't afford to spend $50,000 on a home studio there's no point in even trying to record music. :roll:

Yes I had a TwinTrak with the card.
Definitely something to avoid, especially now that there are mors available options.
I got the TwinTrak cheap and added the card, would have been really bad if I paid full price.
At the time I was using a RosettaAD for the front and the Lucid for the back.
The TwinTrak is designed with some routing tricks that allows it to make extreme use of the digital I/O and basically the more you used it the more realized about how the Platinum stuff sounds.
Now you figure the TwinTrak is $699 then ad the price of the digital card and the price point is lost.

Cost should never be an excuse for the quality of your gear, just spend the $$$ more wisely.
The problem is people want a full setup not a quality setup.
People would rather track 8 or 16 low quality channels at one time then to do 2 quality channels in multiple passes.
They would rather have a cheap mic and a Reflexion than to get a better mic.
Doesn't matter if you have a million $$$ budget or a $1000 budget, just make wise choices to get the best quality for your $$$.

It's a lot cheaper to start with some quality and then make gradual improvements than it is to start out with a full setup with no real point of quality.

The reason CL is full of people selling their stuff is because the economy is making the music hobby costly for many.