advice on audio interface (rme babyface)

[ochaim]

My echo miamidi is finally failing on me.

I recently got a benchmark dac1 so I'm looking for a comparable ac converter. Unfortunately the lavry's are a bit out of my price range. The rme babyface is more my speed at the moment. The asio drivers and latency are supposed to be pretty good, as well as the ad coversion.

Anything else I should consider in this pric range?

Or maybe I should just wait a bit and save up for a lavry?

Thanks
Owen.

[Len911]

I hear ya about the Lavry's being out of your range at the moment, I have an rme adi2 for a few years now and don't have any complaints at all, it would be difficult imo opinion to beat the rme at that price point. I can't speak for the preamps, I don't have any in my rme, I just use the a/d, d/a and as a digital router, the headphone out isn't much different than my octamix, but of course the d/a conversion has already been performed in the rme, though it is passing through the analog octasonic and octamix before the octamix headphone out, fwiw.

Hmmm, I think if I was you and already had the preamps I wanted to use, I'd go with the rme, but if I was relying on the preamps, I don't know, I might wait and spend twice the money for the Lavry black MP-10, because I might have to spend a lot more if I wasn't happy with the preamps and had to buy a preamp or two.

[ochaim]

Thanks for the insight, Len.

I wouldn't be using the babyface for the preamps. Got a 6176 last year for that. Now I just need an ad converter to pull the most out that, within budget of course.

Now that I think of it, it might work out better if I went for the lavry you suggested. It'll minimize how much tax I'll have to pay on my PRO royalties /sync fee (yah, my first big one) I've received this year.

I think I saw an AD10 and another, might have been the MP you mentioned, ranged between 1400 and 1700 on a couple canadian retailer sites. Any experience with that one?

[Len911]

oops, I think the mp10 is just preamps. the ad10 is a/d, and ad11 is a/d plus preamps. I've never used the Lavry's, that would have been what I would have bought though at the time had I not had to buy everything all at once and settled instead for the rme.

The ad11 with the preamps retails for $200 more or $200 for two preamps included. Then there is currently a demo deal for the Ad11 @ Vintage King for $1450, or about the same price as an AD10. I don't have a problem buying a demo from vintage king, as that is how I bought a telefunken mic, and it was just like new in the original packaging, couldn't tell the difference.
http://vintageking.com/lavry-black-ad-11-demo-deal

[mojobone]

Have a look at Burl Audio; it gives you an excellent pristine clean, along with some saturation options like those you'd find in the best vintage analog gear. O'course you're looking at circa $2500 for each side of your I/O and that's for two channels. Also, have a gander at the Lynx HiLo and bang per buck champ Cranesong HEDD 192

Any of the above should outperform Apogee and RME; anything better is mastering grade and at least double the price per channel.

[ochaim]

Whoa there, Mojo!

Did you see my budget?!?

Was discussing this with my bro-in-law last night and he realized he has his old echo layla kickin around. Upgraded his computer so he doesn't have pci anymore.

Luckily I have a pci/pcie mobo so I'm providing it a new home and its working out lovely!

Thanks for the input guys. I'm probably gonna get an adequate sound from this for a while so I can hold off on the lavry for now.

[Len911]

Great!! Except now that you realize you need a tax deduction, what might you be buying,lol??

[Dwayne Russell]

My echo miamidi is finally failing on me.

I recently got a benchmark dac1 so I'm looking for a comparable ac converter. Unfortunately the lavry's are a bit out of my price range. The rme babyface is more my speed at the moment. The asio drivers and latency are supposed to be pretty good, as well as the ad coversion.

Anything else I should consider in this pric range?

Or maybe I should just wait a bit and save up for a lavry?

Thanks
Owen.

How many channels do you need and what are you doing with it?

[Dwayne Russell]

Whoa there, Mojo!

Did you see my budget?!?

Was discussing this with my bro-in-law last night and he realized he has his old echo layla kickin around. Upgraded his computer so he doesn't have pci anymore.

Luckily I have a pci/pcie mobo so I'm providing it a new home and its working out lovely!

Thanks for the input guys. I'm probably gonna get an adequate sound from this for a while so I can hold off on the lavry for now.

Oh..never mind.

[mojobone]

Whoa there, Mojo!

Did you see my budget?!?

Was discussing this with my bro-in-law last night and he realized he has his old echo layla kickin around. Upgraded his computer so he doesn't have pci anymore.

Luckily I have a pci/pcie mobo so I'm providing it a new home and its working out lovely!

Thanks for the input guys. I'm probably gonna get an adequate sound from this for a while so I can hold off on the lavry for now.

Well, you did say "comparable to the Benchmark", heh