RME PCIe Soundcard > Creamware A16U ?

dawman · Post by **dawman** » Fri Nov 09, 2007 4:41 pm

I would like to get sound from my future DAW into Scope.

It will be a GS4 DAW running Vista.

I am curios though if there are benefits in using a PCI-e 1x sound card.

I would like to use ADAT into my Scope cards or analog I/O's into the A16U.

The only benefit of 64bit that I have seen is the bypassing of the small memory addressing of 32bit apps. Even w/ the 3GB LAA Switch I doubled my content loads, but this makes me nervous, as it is not recommended.

But I cannot use this w/o my Scope mixers and effects. I would love to use the horsepower of the 64bit DAW to load tons of libraries, and have Scope be it's incredible mixer, and of course a giant Modular, and Prowave synth.

This and Solaris will put me in the poor house, but my sound live and in the studio is that important to me. I will drive my beat up pick up truck to have it.

Any experiences routing audio into Scope from another DAW would be appreciated.

You guys have never steered me wrong yet. So I will confide in you once again in a decision I deem crucial.

BTW, I will be buying Klangboxes to allow more DSP for effects and synths, and mixing.

Too bad they don't have a Prowave Klangbox.

The Prodyssey and B2003 will have to do.

sonolive · Post by **sonolive** » Fri Nov 09, 2007 11:07 pm

hi jimmy

look at this

http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/P ... -main.html

you don't need to install any pci card .... this mean that it can also work with a laptop !!!!

you can send/receive 32 ADAT via 1394 (firewire)

i have not tried it yet ... but will do it soon !!!

cheers
olive

Post by **garyb** » Fri Nov 09, 2007 11:18 pm

looks good.
it might need some velcro and a rackshelf for Jimmy's use..

sonolive · Post by **sonolive** » Fri Nov 09, 2007 11:20 pm

price is less than half a motu ... for 32 ADAT instead of 8 ...

Post by **garyb** » Fri Nov 09, 2007 11:23 pm

yep, looks good.

by the way, i'm enjoying the dynamics and eqs. good job there!

sonolive · Post by **sonolive** » Fri Nov 09, 2007 11:34 pm

thx gary, we are very glad you enjoy ...
you're welcome ...
cheers
olive

dawman · Post by **dawman** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 3:01 am

Yeah,

And BTW tonihjt was the DAS MM FOH's first night in action w/ the Psychedlics.

I was the sound man.

Set and Forget................................Awesome.

dawman · Post by **dawman** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 3:47 am

Good tip Olive.

I finally might get to use Firewire afterall, it always so logical.

Maybe Soniccore will find a use as well.

I am getting the one that has the extra features w/ MIDI.

VSL 64 bit shell will play tons of articulations on 1 MIDI channel. Over 34,000 !!

Just in case I need to serenade some folks w/ quality String and Orchestral Ensembles.

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 7:58 am

didn't trust my eyes on the responses

if you want reliability stay away from Firewire, M-Audio and in particular untested devices with a fancy brush-up.

I'd stick with RME as an experienced supplier - technology leader in it's market segment.

cheers, Tom

Janni · Post by **Janni** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 8:43 am

Hey Jimmy!

I'm using the m-audio profire at the moment with my macbook and
logic 8 & live 6 and I have to say it works great! (profire ist WC master)
But I'm sure RME does the job ways better and much more stable!
There's only one advantage of the profire: it's portable...
But since you will use a racked pc, I'd definately vote for RME since
it's absolutely rock solid with smallest latency and under full!!! channel usage!
Btw. I have to say that I worked for years with a RME HDSP PCI to route my
sequencers signals to a seperate scope pc... Best solution ever!

So, I all want to say is:
There's no choice, RME HDSP with ADAT is your new german shepherd!
Does it job accurate, reliable and loyal...

Cheers,
Jan

sonolive · Post by **sonolive** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 9:02 am

hi

as far as i understand ... jimmy simply needs to route few audio outputs from a 64 bits VISTA DAW to his scope system ...

i didn't tried the m-audio yet but i will try the one of one of my friend soon, next week i think if i got time , but he regularly records 24 / 32 track with it ... using 2 A16 as converter ... synched via BNC WC ...

so , for this cheap price ... it could be a good alternative ...

@ astro ... about fire wire (1394)...

do you know Motu ? Mark of the unicorn ?
it doesn't seem that they dislike Fire wire 1394 ... see here ...
http://www.motu.com/products/motuaudio/

and definitely, instead of RME, and if my budget was ok, i would go MOTU ...

any way, i will try to post a review (just my impressions ...) when i test this box ...

@ jimmy : how to use it :

[ DAW 1 (64bits / Vista) ] < ------- firewire (32 busses)------> [ M-audio Profire ] < ------ ADAT (8 to 32 busses) -------- >[ DAW 2 (Scope - 1 or two boards with {24 ADAT I/O Plate} or {2X Classic or Plus I/O Plate} ]

cheers
olive

valis · Post by **valis** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 9:05 am

With the amount of gear you're using there's no need for budget studio gear (unless it's truly special somehow). The RME will have insanely better drivers (current HDSP products can do 32samples) and the routing with the fpga on the HDSP cards is incredible.

In fact I run RME and Scope here on separate machines (and an external mixer or three) and the signal routing flexibility in such a small setup has had me happy for 5 years with no real inclination on my part to 'upgrade to something better'. Most likely I won't upgrade until my main DAW is lacking in PCI slots, and I'm sure I'll keep both RME & Scope around when that time comes.

Post by **garyb** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 10:10 am

well, i DON'T like firewire for mission critical jobs, it IS unreliable, especially compared to pci or pci-e, but the m-audio's configuration looks perfect for Jimmy's use....

it depends. if the money isn't an issue, the answer is RME hands-down, i would think. for convienience and price, i'd say the m-audio looks great.

Post by **hubird** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 10:16 am

dunno the M-audio, but playing life is a 'critical job'

Post by **garyb** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 10:28 am

well, when firewire works, it generally works. when it doesn't work, you need a reboot. once every hundred times or so, and usually not during actual use, a computer can(not will) lose track of the firewire port and the stuff on it. pci never does that, so that's why i said what i said.

all i said otherwise, was that the m-audio looked like what Jimmy needed, as far as connections go and that i was sure it worked. firewire issues are another thing.

Jimmy'll have to make the decision, but it's good that he can see his options more clearly.

i think it's all pretty extreme, but Jimmy's hardcore, so i'm wit' it.

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 4:38 pm

sonolive wrote: @ astro ... about fire wire (1394)...

do you know Motu ? Mark of the unicorn ?
it doesn't seem that they dislike Fire wire 1394 ... see here ...
http://www.motu.com/products/motuaudio/ ...

of course I do - impossible to overlook their OpenMidiSystem on the old Macs
a very interesting piece of software - 50% really smart and easy and 50% totally uncomprehensible, capable to produce some of the deepest crashes I ever saw on those machines.
Fortunately it usually worked when it seemed to work, but I never got behind the clues of that thing.
Obviously a Mac standard with few (if any at all) Mac standard programming. it's been a few years ...

on a less kidding level I have 2 concerns regarding FireWire
I have at least 4 damaged FW disk interfaces, 2 showing clear sign of electric short circuit, even though they were handled properly in the moment of failure.
There is evidence that other users have similiar experiences that make FW look much less 'hot-pluggable' than it actually is.

The software performance of the controller is extremely chipset dependant. Even a company as large as Apple supplied interfaces with severe bugs for years.
I may be wrong about it, but imho a significant part of the driving software is by M$oft - a design flaw on it's own (in context with performance and reliability)

and definitely, instead of RME, and if my budget was ok, i would go MOTU ...

well, no problem that a french consultant doesn't suggest a german product ...

but in this case I support the local supplier - a bit of Wertarbeit

on the other hand 3 of the 4 brands of cheese in my fridge are french:
Fourme d’Ambert, Comté 18 month, Pierre Robert ...75% make it the real fat bastard

#4 is english Cheddar to keep it balanced

cheers, Tom
(no, I'm not hungry, I'm not, but then...)

valis · Post by **valis** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 4:59 pm

I actually use firewire frequently, and the laptop gets the budget m-audio firewire soundcard treatment (and Serato scratch). Usually the only time there is an issue is with a cable unplugging or when returning from StandBy I forget to turn a device on that was on before the laptop went into standby (thereby confusing the drivers). The m-audio drivers actually deal with this rather well only rarely becoming unstable. However their latency and cpu usage leave something to be desired imo...

The main cause of my recommendation of RME over M-Audio is the rock solid performance of the RME drivers with extremely low latencies and far more flexible routing. Also I prefer Scope clocked off my RME rather than vice versa, but that's very subjective so...

dawman · Post by **dawman** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 5:01 pm

Damn !!

Thanks guys for the suggestions.

I must admit I was feverish for the M Audio as they make quality stuff for a good price. But the Gigastudio User Forum guys all are using PCI, and PCI-e w/ Hammerfall RME cards, well the guys that aren't smart enough to use Scope.

http://www.zzounds.com/item--RMEHDSP9652

Will this card suffice for my 64bit DAW ?

I like the dual MIDI I / O's, and 24 channels of ADAT into my ADAT plate will work fine. Still can use a Q20 w / the PCM91. I have to let the new FOH guy use my other DAW w/ the PCM81

.

Thanks Again Guys For Walking My Green Ass Through This Stuff.

Post by **garyb** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 6:50 pm

Post by **hubird** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 7:00 pm

that's the one I have

After having installed the thing, I never had to pay it any attention.
Any...
The mixer is automaticly placed in my DOC (in OSX this is what you M$ guys have polluting your desktop: all those shortcuts...), so you can check in/out signals instantly.
You could check my studio plan here , all RME card ins and outs are showing.
There's nothing better, and PCI keeps the hardware setup as simple as possible

No offend Sonolive, your advise was a perfect tip if mony is involved