A16 Ultra VS RME Multiface

lysergide · Post by **lysergide** » Thu Aug 05, 2004 3:50 am

Hey people.

I'm visiting Frankfurt in a month, needing to get myself an I/O Expansion for my system (LUNA 2 card).

Heard lots of great things about the Multiface from RME, but now i also noticed that for about the same price range i could get an A16 Ultra.

Anyone ever used it? Are the convertors any good compared to the RME?

Any word of wisdom would be appreciated.

Lior

valis · Post by **valis** » Thu Aug 05, 2004 11:32 am

If you get the a16 Ultra you'll probably want to swap out your i/o plate on the Luna2 for a z-link plate (or alternatively just add a z-link addon plate).

Post by **garyb** » Thu Aug 05, 2004 12:05 pm

the converters are great.

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Thu Aug 05, 2004 12:23 pm

Valis I didn't think you could interchange the Pulsar plates with Luna. Do you know something I don't?

As for the A16 Ultra: I'm very pleased.

I've never A/Bed it against the RME, but I have read feedback from a guy who A/Bed it against the Kurzweil Rumour & Mangler. His unscientific opinion was that the Kurz sounded slightly better. Mind you the Kurzweil units have been getting rave reviews all around. So that's as good as praising the A16U in my books.

My only complaints about the A16U are:

Wallwart
It gets very hot

I generally get a noise floor around -75 or -80dbFS, which is great. And the little input LEDs are surprisingly helpful when adjusting your levels.

Cheers,

Johann

valis · Post by **valis** » Thu Aug 05, 2004 1:41 pm

I'm sorry I was under the impression that Z-link was an option for the Luna2 like it was for Pulsar2 & Powerpulsar cards (never owned a Luna2, just Pulsar1 & Pulsar2). It would appear that there is a Z-link port by default already (which is encouraging for the a16U option):

Hardware Features:
PCI board equipped with 3 SHARC DSPs for PC & Mac
analog stereo I/O and digital stereo S/PDIF I/O
24 bit/96 kHz supported by all I/Os
Z-Link port connecting to the A16 converter
expandable to 36 ins and 36 outs using the home expansion (2 × ADAT I/O + Z-Link)
http://www.cwaudio.de/page.php?seite=sc ... bmenu=home

That would make the adat/z-link expansion card unnecessary, but here's a link anyway for those who search out this topic in the future:

ADAT / Z-Link Expansion for Luna II, PowerSampler and Elektra
Via this I/O board, the number of available inputs and outputs of a Luna II, PowerSampler or Elektra system can easily be increased. The ADAT / Z-Link Expansion features two ADAT optical interfaces and one additional Z-Link* connector, thus adding 24 inputs and outputs to the basic system. The board also hosts a connector for the Sync Plate. The ADAT / Z-Link Expansion connects to the DSP card via a standard ribbon cable.
http://web.archive.org/web/200108160038 ... efault.asp

Incidentally I was considering an A16 Ultra myself when I bought the RME (I will still probably get one later on down the line). The reason I opted for RME was that it became sort of obvious that I would probably want to keep my dsp cards around for years to come, and this meant that sooner or later I would upgrade my machine to a faster PC (or possibly a g5-I use Logic) and the RME gave me a better exit path to a new machine as well as a lot of flexibility with signal routing between the RME and the Pulsar (and my analog i/o). My Pulsar1 & Pulsar2 now sit in a 2nd machine (p3-733) alongside my main daw/pc. Among other things this means I can now use the VORB (from Orbitone) that I've had for over a year now (for some reason it didn't like my main dual machine).

(edit: added z-link card info & commentary)

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: valis on 2004-08-05 14:47 ]</font>

valis · Post by **valis** » Thu Aug 05, 2004 1:49 pm

Btw someone has an a16 (appears to be an ultra) for sale in the Pulsar Purchasing area of the forums here:

http://www.planetz.com/forums/viewtopic ... forum=8&11

seems to be willing to be flexible with the price. Might be worth checking into?

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Thu Aug 05, 2004 3:49 pm

Valis, you can use the A16Ultra with ADAT Lightpipes, too...

lysergide · Post by **lysergide** » Thu Aug 05, 2004 3:52 pm

Thank u all for replying to my original msg.

What was most important for me to know was if the RME Convertors are better sounding or of higher quality than the ones of the A16 Ultra.

Actually i am currently not using ADAT or any other Digital i/o in my studio, but wanted this as an option for future expansion.

I've heard only good things about the RME Multiface, and as far as its' convertors i learnt that RME is one of the best sounding.

So to sum this up, what do u think are pros and cons in my situation? (multiface or a16 ultra)

notice that i'm using the creamware card mainly for the modular3 software + some effects. (i considered their option for the scope home + luna box now for 555 eur, but i've heard that it is pretty noisy, or i might be wrong?)

Lior

Post by **garyb** » Fri Aug 06, 2004 1:56 am

a very subjective subject. the a16 is not embarrased by the rme. you can like what you like, but the cwa sound quality is very good.

valis · Post by **valis** » Fri Aug 06, 2004 2:22 am

On 2004-08-05 16:49, blazesboylan wrote:
Valis, you can use the A16Ultra with ADAT Lightpipes, too...

I know but I tend to overengineer when I make purchases. Never regret that down the line (except on the pocketbook). Also I thought Luna2 didn't have lightpipe? That's what the bracket in the 2nd link (my post above) adds.

lysergide · Post by **lysergide** » Fri Aug 06, 2004 4:57 am

sorry for the ignorance, what is exactly lightpipe?

as i said i'm not familiar with ADAT formats, as i never used it.

My only use for Digital i/o will be for future use for live situations maybe combined with a digital mixer i guess. (none of my current gear has ADAT connections)

Immanuel · Post by **Immanuel** » Fri Aug 06, 2004 5:09 am

Light pipe = adat

Isn't the z-link interface limited to 8/8 channels?
I have the old a16 and the Luna 2496 box. I think my noise floors are like -83 and -80 dB - with the a16 being the quieter one.

And ofcoarse my DBX mini-me adds some noise to the picture, so for mic use it will usually be in the -80 to -65 range. But I don't think I can blame the converters for that.

lysergide · Post by **lysergide** » Fri Aug 06, 2004 9:19 am

I still dont know which one to choose...

Do u think i should better off buy the A16? it is twice the multiface's i/o's.. although i saw it has lower dbA SNR than the multiface...

valis · Post by **valis** » Fri Aug 06, 2004 10:18 am

Z-link isn't limited to 8 channels as its the only way to do a full 16 channels of i/o when working above 48khz (2 lightpipe channels get combined into 1 for 88.2/96Khz). Also I suspect that its a bit more robust to varied wiring conditions as its an electrical cable and not an optical cable.

I would probably decide if you want to run 2 audio interfaces or just 1 and work from there. Also confirm that the Luna2 does indeed have a Z-link port (looks exactly like a firewire port, wider than a usb port with 2 angled corners).

lysergide · Post by **lysergide** » Fri Aug 06, 2004 11:23 am

is there any limitation of how many channels can i pass on a single z-link cable?

with the a16 i can use 2 adats x 8 + 16 inputs = 32 channels

all of these inputs are available to me simultanously within the scope software?

with the multiface i can only use i believe 8 channels at a time.

valis · Post by **valis** » Fri Aug 06, 2004 2:20 pm

I don't know what the limit is on the Z-link cable, but since the A16U supports 16in/16out and the adat connectors I would imagine they are all available at the same time (?).

As for the Hammerfall/Multiface, you actually have18 'software' outputs, 18 physical inputs, and 20 physical outputs. The 18 ins are 8 analog, 8 adat and 2 for spdif or aes/ebu. The 20 outs are the the same as the ins with the addition of a stereo headphone output on the front. You do only have 8 physical i/o however, so that's correct.

RME's "TotalMix" application allows you to actually freely route anything to pretty much anything, and even have multiple sources & destinations per TotalMix channel (there's even a matrix view). Its not as graphically nice for routing as SFP as you just use dropdown selectors and the channel level controls but its rather flexible. Another plus for the RME solution is their DigiCheck 4.0x software which I really enjoy using (I have a few vst & sfp spectral analyzers as well but this allows me to monitor certain signals a lot easier, including its RMS function.

However I would tend to think if you need analog i/o and your card does support z-link then the a16u is a better buy. I wanted to personally move the Pulsars into a 2nd PC so I had more options on the DAW end of things.

lysergide · Post by **lysergide** » Fri Aug 06, 2004 6:23 pm

yes the luna (or as it is called now Scope Home) has a Z-Link connector.

Let me get this straight - when using the Multiface under CUBASE, u get only 8 inputs using the RME Asio driver? i understand that these 8 inputs can be freely selected and defined using the RME software console, but still - only 8 available at a time? if so this is a little annoying? (keep switching back inputs in the RME software everytime i want to select a different input source..)

valis · Post by **valis** » Sat Aug 07, 2004 4:05 am

No. With a hammerfall you get 18 inputs and 18 outputs in the ASIO driver (or wav/gsif as well). In other words in Logic or Cubase tc I see 18 ins and 18 outs that are freely routable to/from any or all of the 8 analog ins & 8 analog outs, the adat ports and the spdif (simultaniously). HOWEVER the A16U has as many ASIO i/o as you define in SFP (up to 64 I believe with the right ASIO driver) and that is routable to SIXTEEN analog ins and SIXTEEN analog outs, all at the same time. It also has adat i/o as well.

Both the Multiface and the A16U also have ADAT i/o (though only the multiface has spdif and midi on it as well).

So basically for sheer number of ANALOG i/o A16U wins hands down (especially since you have z-link). Also unless you need the specific features of the Hammerfall (again I wanted to move the Pulsars to a 2nd PC) you're probably better off going for the A16U. Check that for sale thread I posted

lysergide · Post by **lysergide** » Sat Aug 07, 2004 5:42 am

OK, so in both cases i can use all i/o's simultanously... got that

and yes the A16U wins the Analog i/o hands down, but 2 things still bother me:

1. Rme's sound quality perhaps sound a little better than the a16u.. (?)
2. the multiface has the option for the cardbus - laptop connection.. this is a very big advantage for future expanding isnt it? i couldn't do this with the a16u...

i still dont know what to get.. i think i'll just pick at the store next month the box with the nicer packaging ... or something...

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Sat Aug 07, 2004 7:42 am

Theres a rather crucial difference between the two which I could not see anyone mentioning - the RME is a soundcard and audio interface (the audio interface cannot be used without being connected to the soundcard) while the A16U is purely an audio interface, with the added benefit of supporting CW's proprietary Z-link format in addition to ADAT.

I've heard that they both use the same or very similar converters. I don't have an A16U but I have a Multiface and Cardbus/PCI cards and I can say it sounds very nice. However, remember that the converters cannot be used without the soundcard.