|
Post by nick8801 on Sept 15, 2019 8:40:36 GMT -6
My current converter is a blakface apollo 16. It’s great for tracking full bands, which I do occasionally, but most of what I’ve been doing is one or two tracks at a time. I’m also mostly in the box these days, and I’d like to put most of my focus on the front end. If you guys had to pick one really great AD to pair with the Apollo for a more high end flavor, what would you choose? I’m thinking Burl is the obvious choice, but what else is out there? JCF? Apogee? Looking for something that can up the sonics by a few inches. I’m happy with my pres/mics/room, so let’s hear it? Any suggestions I should be considering?
|
|
|
Post by delcampo on Sept 15, 2019 10:47:53 GMT -6
Burl is great for solid center image and depth but, if mix capture is also a concern then not as great. Top end can be a bit compromised IME and, gain staging into it a bit too tricky. Can loose width at times.
In the process of preparing to compare the Dangerous AD+ & the Crane Song AD side of the HEDD Quantum. Problem is CS is not yet caught up with getting orders out. Should be next few weeks, they say.
It's said the AD+ has a special width and punch. May be the way to go. The CS more-so a nice low mid / low end spaciousness, appealing WC options. More floaty and less solid black background than the AD+ it's been said.
If it wasn't for the CS clocking options ("could" really help whatever converters come after) I'd just get the AD+ and get on with it. But, will try to compare the two in a few weeks if CS sticks to its ETA ship dates. Just to hear in my own space.
|
|
|
Post by aremos on Sept 15, 2019 11:07:53 GMT -6
Agree with delcampo and look into: 1) Crane Song HEDD Quantum, 2) Dangerous AD+, & 3) the new Apogee SE 2x6
|
|
|
Post by trakworxmastering on Sept 15, 2019 11:20:15 GMT -6
'Been using Burl since they first came out. Awesome weight, tone, depth, clarity and width. I use them for mastering as well. Many thousands of successful mix captures and tracking sessions with these beasts. Burl is going to give you a different flavor than what you already have, which is the point I would think. The AD+ would be the other obvious option, with lots of bells and whistles, but for my money the 100% Class A ,discrete, capacitor free analog front end of the Burl is the real deal. Dangerous doesn't specify what type of circuitry they use, which suggests to me it's nothing to brag about. If it were class A discrete then they would say so. But to be honest I have not personally compared the two. Best,
|
|
|
Post by kcatthedog on Sept 15, 2019 14:47:12 GMT -6
It would seem a lynx Hilo might suit nicely? There is a used one on GS, guy’s been asking $1500 for like 6 months
|
|
|
Post by nick8801 on Sept 15, 2019 17:46:27 GMT -6
Good suggestions so far...mix capture is not an issue as I’m basically all in the box. No need for DA. I’m happy with what I have at the moment. Just looking for something to give the tracking a little extra love so my in the box work is better. Looks like the Burl is still top of the heap. I’m doing a lot of rockish and popesque stuff so I think that might be the best option. Appreciate the input!
|
|
|
Post by ragan on Sept 15, 2019 23:51:44 GMT -6
I come across tracks I did with the Burl sometimes (particularly acoustic guitar tracks) and I miss it.
That said, for my meat and potatoes main interface, the Symphony MKII isn't going anywhere. I love its sound.
|
|
|
Post by johneppstein on Sept 16, 2019 1:28:50 GMT -6
Burl is great for solid center image and depth but, if mix capture is also a concern then not as great. Top end can be a bit compromised IME and, gain staging into it a bit too tricky. Can loose width at times. In the process of preparing to compare the Dangerous AD+ & the Crane Song AD side of the HEDD Quantum. Problem is CS is not yet caught up with getting orders out. Should be next few weeks, they say. It's said the AD+ has a special width and punch. May be the way to go. The CS more-so a nice low mid / low end spaciousness, appealing WC options. More floaty and less solid black background than the AD+ it's been said. If it wasn't for the CS clocking options ("could" really help whatever converters come after) I'd just get the AD+ and get on with it. But, will try to compare the two in a few weeks if CS sticks to its ETA ship dates. Just to hear in my own space. You wording leads me to believe that you have not actually used the Crane Song?
|
|
|
Post by delcampo on Sept 16, 2019 7:28:18 GMT -6
Burl is great for solid center image and depth but, if mix capture is also a concern then not as great. Top end can be a bit compromised IME and, gain staging into it a bit too tricky. Can loose width at times. In the process of preparing to compare the Dangerous AD+ & the Crane Song AD side of the HEDD Quantum. Problem is CS is not yet caught up with getting orders out. Should be next few weeks, they say. It's said the AD+ has a special width and punch. May be the way to go. The CS more-so a nice low mid / low end spaciousness, appealing WC options. More floaty and less solid black background than the AD+ it's been said. If it wasn't for the CS clocking options ("could" really help whatever converters come after) I'd just get the AD+ and get on with it. But, will try to compare the two in a few weeks if CS sticks to its ETA ship dates. Just to hear in my own space. You wording leads me to believe that you have not actually used the Crane Song? Correct. The CS "should" be here in a couple weeks to do the comparison with the AD+. Two different respected people in the biz shared the thoughts I previously mentioned. I thought the OP might gain some insight as a starting point as I did.
|
|
|
Post by svart on Sept 16, 2019 11:06:17 GMT -6
Been using SSL converters since they bought Sydec over a decade ago. If my current setup ever dies and I can't figure out a way to fix it, I'll probably go MOTU unless SSL gets back into the studio converter business.
|
|
|
Post by nick8801 on Sept 16, 2019 17:50:58 GMT -6
Been using SSL converters since they bought Sydec over a decade ago. If my current setup ever dies and I can't figure out a way to fix it, I'll probably go MOTU unless SSL gets back into the studio converter business. I have a friend who swears by his old ssl converters. I also have a friend with a motu and his stuff sounds great. Perhaps I’m barking up the wrong tree with the converter hunt, but I’ve always needed to touch the pot to see if it’s hot lol.
|
|
|
Post by wiz on Sept 17, 2019 18:33:46 GMT -6
Been using SSL converters since they bought Sydec over a decade ago. If my current setup ever dies and I can't figure out a way to fix it, I'll probably go MOTU unless SSL gets back into the studio converter business. I have a friend who swears by his old ssl converters. I also have a friend with a motu and his stuff sounds great. Perhaps I’m barking up the wrong tree with the converter hunt, but I’ve always needed to touch the pot to see if it’s hot lol. I really can't imagine, in todays age, how converters at a certain point (MOTU AVB type, Apogee, RME etc) could really have a big enough bearing on the end result vs the amount of money spent. Connectivity requirements are probably the biggest driving factor. If its got the right amount of gozintas, and gozoutas, is stable... its probably good enough. Cheers Wiz
|
|
|
Post by kcatthedog on Sept 18, 2019 3:21:56 GMT -6
With the price of box’s you are considering, perhaps you should consider the apogee 2x6 se mastering module in a symphony mkii chassis ?
|
|
|
Post by svart on Sept 18, 2019 7:58:28 GMT -6
Been using SSL converters since they bought Sydec over a decade ago. If my current setup ever dies and I can't figure out a way to fix it, I'll probably go MOTU unless SSL gets back into the studio converter business. I have a friend who swears by his old ssl converters. I also have a friend with a motu and his stuff sounds great. Perhaps I’m barking up the wrong tree with the converter hunt, but I’ve always needed to touch the pot to see if it’s hot lol. I started using them because they had 24 analog I/O and 24 ADAT I/O. At the time I bought in, they were the only ones that gave you all that in one 2U system with a DSP card interface. Since I was/am running a 24ch mixer, it gives me all the I/O I need for every channel. I use the ADAT I/O to cheap behringer ADA8000's for talkback and headphone streams. Unfortunately, they were never that good at support of their converters after the initial Sydec products. I had a few ongoing issues at first and pretty much had to figure them out myself since my specific questions to their support system would get vague and generic answers, or outright "never heard of that error before" and closing the support tickets. Documentation was poor and you needed multiple 100 page books to figure out all the small details, some of which conflicted with each other on nomenclature and descriptions too. However, once set up and running correctly, the two setups I've had have been relatively flawless over more than a decade and besides the large amount of cheap I/O, this is what sold me on upgrading to their newer MADI system even though I had no real issues with their older Mixpander system. I do love that I have DSP to run SSL branded SSL emulations on as it frees up a lot of the computer for DAW stuff, but that MADI DSP card was only available for a couple years before silently being removed from their website. One day it was there, the next it was gone and they almost pretended that it never existed the next time I had a question about something.
|
|
|
Post by subspace on Sept 18, 2019 7:59:33 GMT -6
Been using SSL converters since they bought Sydec over a decade ago. If my current setup ever dies and I can't figure out a way to fix it, I'll probably go MOTU unless SSL gets back into the studio converter business. Used the Sydec converters up until getting the MOTU 16A, and still use them for channels 17-24 via lightpipe from the MOTU.
|
|
|
Post by Ward on Sept 18, 2019 9:04:08 GMT -6
I'm very happy with the Avid HD i/o boxes. But . . . curious about finally upgrading from HD to HDX.
This seems like as good a place as any to ask.
|
|
|
Post by nick8801 on Sept 22, 2019 12:02:09 GMT -6
Just scored a Burl B2 for a very good price on Reverb. I looked at everything available out there, and the Burl was really the only thing that checked all my boxes. Looking forward to putting it to work! If I don’t find it makes enough of a difference I can easily flip it for what I paid. Will report back!
|
|
|
Post by adamjbrass on Sept 24, 2019 8:57:31 GMT -6
The JCF Audio AD8 is absurdly good sounding. It has a purity of input that I haven't heard elsewhere. It makes everything easier.
|
|
|
Post by Guitar on Sept 24, 2019 9:29:51 GMT -6
I think some of the old Benchmark, Lavry 1/3 rack or 1/2 rack stuff is going on the used market for decent prices.
Just tossing that out there. I agree with Wiz I wouldn't put a lot of emphasis on it. The pot for me is cold.
My "real answer" is buy a Tascam UH7000 but I think the price will scare some people off. They are about $200-300 right now if you can find them.
|
|
|
Post by sirthought on Sept 25, 2019 2:58:30 GMT -6
My "real answer" is buy a Tascam UH7000 but I think the price will scare some people off. They are about $200-300 right now if you can find them. I had looked at this long and hard for a while. I wanted a second desktop DAC that I could mix with and the converter spec was impressive. Mostly the reviews of people having so many driver issues turned me off from it. I notice it's now no longer on the market. Seems a shame that the product didn't pan out, as it was fairly well conceived.
|
|
|
Post by Guitar on Sept 25, 2019 8:38:56 GMT -6
My "real answer" is buy a Tascam UH7000 but I think the price will scare some people off. They are about $200-300 right now if you can find them. I had looked at this long and hard for a while. I wanted a second desktop DAC that I could mix with and the converter spec was impressive. Mostly the reviews of people having so many driver issues turned me off from it. I notice it's now no longer on the market. Seems a shame that the product didn't pan out, as it was fairly well conceived. The driver works fine on my end, but latency performance is fairly poor. I don't use the drivers, I just use them as AES/SPDIF expanders for my bigger interfaces.
|
|
|
Post by drsax on Sept 25, 2019 8:39:01 GMT -6
I use a Burl for tracking AD with the Apollo... killer results. For masterbuss and monitoring I use a Lynx Hilo which is much more transparent but still slightly euphoric sounding. Both great units.
|
|
|
Post by Johnkenn on Sept 25, 2019 16:21:46 GMT -6
Right now I’d love to have the AD+. Have used Burls gotten cheap yet?
That being said, after getting the Apollo X, I just stopped worrying about it. Also use the Svartbox.
|
|
|
Post by notneeson on Sept 25, 2019 16:25:17 GMT -6
Right now I’d love to have the AD+. Have used Burls gotten cheap yet? There's one for $1700 on Reverb. And a UA 2192 (it's antecedent, sort of) for $1500.
|
|
|
Post by nick8801 on Sept 26, 2019 4:45:22 GMT -6
I wouldn’t call what I paid cheap, but it was definitely much cheaper than buying new. I looked at that 2192 but decided the Burl would probably be a step up. Supposed to arrive tomorrow but I’ll be away all weekend. Just listened to the masters I got back on a solo ep I did. Everything was recorded with a Useful Arts tube preamp and the Apollo 16 mkii. I have to say I’m really happy with the sound of things. I did run my two mix out to my Buzz SOC 1.1 as I felt it added a little depth, but overall the sonics are pretty great in my opinion. I’m really curious to see what the Burl can bring to the table.
|
|