Audio interface for Mac?

[CmdrLaForge]

Hello,

Who can recommend a good audio interface for Macintosh computers? I am looking for an Audio interface for my iBook G3 900MHz. It should run under Jaguar. I need two Mic inputs with phantom power and USB connectivity. Low latency is also a must. I will use Garageband.

I read some comments here on the forum and the more I read the more I freak out. It looks like most of them have problems.

Can anyone recommend a good interface that I can just connect and use? If its not freakin expensive I am glad as well.

Thank you guys for your help.
LaForge

 

[Yebot]

I, for one, really like the M-Audio stuff.

http://m-audio.com/index.php?do=products.filter&ID=garageband

 

[faintember]

Look at the FireBox from PreSonus. Good price, good quality.
Also the M-Audio Firewire 410 is nice, but may be overkill for what you want to do. My only complaint would be that M-Audio's drivers sometimes have issues. I have experienced the drivers randomly muting the outputs for some strange reason.

Stay away from Digidesign. I hate it, but i really irritated at them. Unless you use the latest version of PT you will NOT have drivers in a timely fashion (that is when it comes to Tiger). Sorry, i am trying to NOT bash Digi, but it is very hard not to.

-cameron

 

[Duff-Man]

Duff-Man says...I will second the recommendation for the Presonus Firebox - it works extremely well right out of the box and uses the built-in OS X drivers - no messing around with m-audio's flakey drivers. The Firebox is a firewire device though, not usb (meaning, it is better than a usb device...)....oh yeah!

 

[CmdrLaForge]

Thanks guys

I know about the Presonus Firebox, but it has a Firewire connection. The problem is that I have my external drive (lacie d2 - triple interface - 300gig -good stuff) connected on my firewire port. Thats why I wanted a USB version.

Any chance ?

 

[Duff-Man]

Duff-Man says...you know, you *can* daisy chain firewire devices and have more than 1 thing on your port.....oh yeah!

 

[Mr. Monsieur]

I read some comments here on the forum and the more I read the more I freak out.

i *know* the feeling...it seems almost like one has to play russian roulette in the search for a non-headache solution...personally, i took what seemed to be the one best reviewed: the presonus firebox...you can find some good deals on them on eBay...there's also a very positive review of it in the latest issue of Sound on Sound (July 2005), which you can download as a pdf from the presonus website...

btw: i read in a forum somewhere that if you want to daisychain your firewire audio interface, you should have the audio interface attached to the computer and the external hard drive at the end of the chain...

 

[CmdrLaForge]

Duff-Man says...you know, you *can* daisy chain firewire devices and have more than 1 thing on your port.....oh yeah!

HOW ? My harddrive has exactly ONE firewire connector ? Does the Firebox have two?

 

[pulsewidth947]

The firebox does indeed have two firewire 400 ports for daisy chaining, which i saw from this image.

 

[CmdrLaForge]

The firebox does indeed have two firewire 400 ports for daisy chaining, which i saw from this image.

WOW - thanks. Thats great. Maybe someone can confirm that it works. If it does - I am all set and will go with the Firebox.

 

[faintember]

WOW - thanks. Thats great. Maybe someone can confirm that it works. If it does - I am all set and will go with the Firebox.

Well daisy-chaining other audio devices in the past worked well, so i dont see why the Firebox should be any different, although i have not talked to anyone that has done it with this particular interface.

 

[shir]

Driver to daisy-chain Firebox "still in development"

The firebox does indeed have two firewire 400 ports for daisy chaining, which i saw from this image.

I emailed Presonus, and received this reply on Feburary 8, 2006:

The driver (for daisy-chaining Fireboxes together) is still in development. We do not have a release date at this moment. As soon as it is available, it will be posted to the website. Regards, Mark Williams, International Sales Manager

So it's _going_ to be possible, but it isn't currently.

 

[ChrisA]

I emailed Presonus, and received this reply on Feburary 8, 2006:
So it's _going_ to be possible, but it isn't currently.

You asked the wrong question or they misunderstood. Read his reply again: It says that you can not chain multiple audio boxes. What he's saying is that they do two channels of audio and you can't do four channle buy using two boxes. He didn't say you can't chain his box with a disk drive.

If you plug in a disk his drivers will not even know about it.

You might want to send off another email to them

 

[faintember]

^^^^Whoa....wait a min. Maybe i am just misunderstanding what you are trying to say....

You can connect a Firebox to you mac, then connect an external HD to the firebox and every thing will still function fine.

And with the Firepod you can connect multiple (up to three at least) audio devices and run them as one big audio card provided that you are running 10.4.2. There is special link to this on the Presonus Firepod website, but there is no special link on the Firebox website, so it may be possible that the Firebox does not currently support daisy chaining multiple Fireboxes, even though it does have two FW ports.

 

[sintaxi]

My MOTU 828 has been so good to me. I have owned it for 2 or 3 years and would buy it again tomorrow if it went on me. I think there are many great options now days. not like when I got my 828.

I would base most my decision on the pre-amps. Thats what gives your interface lasting power.