OT: My kingdom for a 4x2 firewire audio card!

BrianStanding wrote on 11/8/2004, 7:55 AM
I'm looking for an external audio box for my newly ordered Sony VAIO GRT-250 laptop. I can't find anything that meets my needs! It seems all these units are designed for surround-sound studio use, where you need multiple outputs and are going to be recording individual stereo tracks two at a time. I would gladly give up some of those analog outputs (what do you do with 10 analog outs, anyway?) for more analog inputs.

I'm looking for something better suited to live field recording. Here's what I'm after:

- 4 mic-level analog inputs (preferably XLR) to record 4 tracks at once.

- 2 line level analog outputs (plus a headphone output would be nice but not essential)

- SPDIF output to connect either to my desktop Echo Mia or to my minidisk recorder, or both (preferably both optical AND coax, but I'll take anything)

The closest I've found is the PreSonus Firepod, but an 8x8 seems overkill for my use, and it's a bit out of my price range.

Why hasn't anyone come up with a basic 4x2 box?

Comments

Nat wrote on 11/8/2004, 9:39 PM
The new RME Fireface has 4 mic inputs but it's pretty expensive...
The Firebox by presonus looks nice, buy 2 and you have 4 mic inputs.
ibliss wrote on 11/9/2004, 12:21 AM
There's also the Edirol UA-1000, which has 4xmic pres on the front. It's USB2, and needs mains power (as far as I can work out from pictures). Also possibly outside of your price range, about the same money as the Firepod I think?
BrianStanding wrote on 11/9/2004, 11:20 AM
Thanks for the tips. I hadn't seen the firebox before. Looking at the specs, the nice thing about this unit is that you can use the XLR mike level and 1/4" line/instrument level inputs simultaneously.

Dumb question: what's the differenece between "mike level" and "instrument level," aside from the fact that one's typically on XLR and the other's on 1/4"? I know my old electric guitar amp is perfectly happy taking a dynamic microphone.

Do you think it would be possible to use XLR to 1/4" cables to hook up mikes (maybe dynamic?) to the instrument/line inputs? I Or would I have to worry about over- or under-modulation?
Nat wrote on 11/9/2004, 7:55 PM
Usually intrument inputs have a higher inpedence. You can you adapter to adapt the impedance of what you plug into the soundcard. The other difference is that the MIC input is balanced and the instrument input is usually unbalanced.
farss wrote on 11/10/2004, 4:45 AM
I THINK you could daisy chain two Firewire 410s to get what you want, you'd need to check with M-Audio to see if they've got daisy chaining to work or not, they were promising it when the thing first came out.
You could run these off an external battery, they only need 12V.
BrianStanding wrote on 11/10/2004, 7:17 AM
Daisychaining, huh? That's an interesting idea. Of course, once I've paid for two 410s, I might as well get a Firepod.

Thanks for all the info.
mhbstevens wrote on 11/10/2004, 8:20 AM
It's reported in a thread below that RME has driver incompatabilities with Vegas. I'm waiting on the Echo Firewire version of the Gina3G and Layla3G soon to be released.

Mike S
BrianStanding wrote on 11/10/2004, 11:47 AM
"I'm waiting on the Echo Firewire version of the Gina3G and Layla3G soon to be released."

I was hoping for a Firewire Mona. Why did Echo discontinue the Mona, anyway?
ibliss wrote on 11/10/2004, 8:05 PM
Here's another option: tascam FW1804 Audio Interface, 4 mic inputs (and more....)