Anyone using an Echo AudioFire Pre8?

[Jeff White]

Anyone using an Echo AudioFire Pre8? I'm curious about how happy you are with it's sound quality, functionality, mic preamps, etc. If you have any of the other Echo FW units I'd also like to hear about sound quality and functionality under Mac OSX.

I am currently using a Black Lion modified MOTU 828mk2 and a 1st generation Apogee Duet. I am looking to go 16 tracks i/o at 48kHz and have another additional 8 mic preamps / line inputs. Having another 8-channel interface is key right now since my MOTU is almost 9 years old.

Just curious as to what is out there for under $1000 that rules for the money. Seems like the next tier of interfaces is around $2K. I just can't justify that right now.

Jeff
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[jhharvest]

It's not the response you want to hear but is there something wrong with the MOTU (apart from it being old)? Why not just expand your MOTU with 8 channels of ADAT preamps?

[Bro Shark]

I have an Audiofire 8 and Motu 8 pre. I have no real opinion of either except that they generally do what they're supposed to. I wouldn't say either sounds particularly good or bad. Neither has anything remotely resembling sonic magic or fun, they just kind of do a job.

Ha ha, what a depressing post. 3 cheers for prosumer digital gear.

[Int'l Feel]

I went from 1st gen Duet to an Audiofire 8 back to the Duet. As a disclaimer, my main reason for going back to the Duet was because I downsized from 8 channels to just two because I only need two tracks now, BUT here are my observations.

IMO, I like the pres/converters on the Duet much better and the drivers/software are integrated seamlessly with Mac OSX. With the Audiofire, you have to use their "digital console" to make sure everything is routed properly, which is fine, but not nearly as intuitive as the Duet (then again, you're dealing with 2 IN/OUT versus potentially 16 IN/OUT). I use a SM7 on vocals and found the Audiofire couldn't boost it enough. The Duet could. I don't remember the actual dB difference, but I do recall that it was significant.

This is also coming from a guy who works on music in his apartment and only records vocals, guitar, and rhodes.

[Jeff White]

[blungo2]

I didn't care for the pres, the headphone amp or really any of the analog section. The conversion seemed fine.

I actually liked the digital console or whatever it was called, but i like the rme version much better.