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Post by indiehouse on Feb 4, 2020 21:05:43 GMT -6
So, the Solaris/Dangerous DA thread got me thinking about conversion. I’ve got a Motu 16a and 828ES for conversion, and I mix with HW. They are solid, affordable workhorse converters. Not the best, not the worst.
How important is conversion quality after the initial AD stage? Let’s say that I were to add on a Dangerous DA for monitoring and an AD for tracking. Would that be negated if I were to send those tracks out to HW using the Motu conversion during mixing?
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Post by wiz on Feb 4, 2020 21:18:51 GMT -6
Personally, with most home recordings... conversion ..... even 4 or 5 AD-DA conversions of a signal..... are so far down the chain of having a negative impact on the tune as to be something to not concern yourself about.
I use the MOTU 16A... everything you have heard of mine, has had at least 4 AD DA conversions by the time its mastered, as well as a Sample Rate reduction.
More important is convertor stability as far as the manufacturers driver and your host software and daw software, at the buffer size/sample rate you wish to run at.
Cheeers
Wiz
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Post by gwlee7 on Feb 4, 2020 21:50:42 GMT -6
Personally, with most home recordings... conversion ..... even 4 or 5 AD-DA conversions of a signal..... are so far down the chain of having a negative impact on the tune as to be something to not concern yourself about. I use the MOTU 16A... everything you have heard of mine, has had at least 4 AD DA conversions by the time its mastered, as well as a Sample Rate reduction. More important is convertor stability as far as the manufacturers driver and your host software and daw software, at the buffer size/sample rate you wish to run at. Cheeers Wiz wasn’t you who said that you record all of your stems with focusing only on as cleanly recorded of a track as you can get and then run them back OTB through your hardware preamps, compressors, eqs etc? And, then you go OTB agin with your busses and final mix? |
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Post by Blackdawg on Feb 4, 2020 22:22:01 GMT -6
Im torn on this subject. For one, I've experienced mixing with analog and not being happy with it after rerecording it due to converters/sample rate.
On the other hand, the converters you have now are better than a lot of converters back in the day and that certainly didn't stop great work from happening.
So really...I wouldn't sweat it much. To see a big improvement with the I/O you have now, you'll have to invest close to 10k in just converts.
You're likely just fine.
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Post by wiz on Feb 4, 2020 22:23:16 GMT -6
Personally, with most home recordings... conversion ..... even 4 or 5 AD-DA conversions of a signal..... are so far down the chain of having a negative impact on the tune as to be something to not concern yourself about. I use the MOTU 16A... everything you have heard of mine, has had at least 4 AD DA conversions by the time its mastered, as well as a Sample Rate reduction. More important is convertor stability as far as the manufacturers driver and your host software and daw software, at the buffer size/sample rate you wish to run at. Cheeers Wiz wasn’t you who said that you record all of your stems with focusing only on as cleanly recorded of a track as you can get and then run them back OTB through your hardware preamps, compressors, eqs etc? And, then you go OTB agin with your busses and final mix? Yes pretty close.... each track goes out thru desk eq and outboard compressor, then the daw stereo bus goes out and thru Zulu and buss comp. I don’t do bussing of groups. cheers Wiz |
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Post by wiz on Feb 4, 2020 22:24:15 GMT -6
My headphones runoff a behringer ada8200
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Post by mrholmes on Feb 4, 2020 23:19:16 GMT -6
So, the Solaris/Dangerous DA thread got me thinking about conversion. I’ve got a Motu 16a and 828ES for conversion, and I mix with HW. They are solid, affordable workhorse converters. Not the best, not the worst. How important is conversion quality after the initial AD stage? Let’s say that I were to add on a Dangerous DA for monitoring and an AD for tracking. Would that be negated if I were to send those tracks out to HW using the Motu conversion during mixing? I make this short a shitty Behringer ADA 8000 had such an subtle impact on the music that in blind ABX testing very young colleagues heard a slight difference in the top end compared to some middle-class converters. I think a difference that is obvious in conversion = big bucks.... The last big difference I heard was my DA10 but the DA10 is old now. ADDA conversion went on it's not the same what it was 25 years ago. It wasn't even the same 15 years ago. I still use RME conversion from this period ... still sounds good enough for me.... |
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Post by drbill on Feb 5, 2020 0:40:55 GMT -6
The benefit of going analog / hybrid is going to far offset any conversion issues. If you want to know what it's doing, make 5-10 round trips out and back in and compare the original to the 5th or 10th generation. That will tell you all you need to know. Unless you're using conversion from the 90's or uber cheap ****, then you'll be good. I'm using AVID HD i/o's and I'm more than happy to make 5 round trips during mixing, and several more during mastering. I hear no appreciable degradation other than the "degradation" of the analog gear I'm inserting which is making me quite happy.  One thing though, I do like super good D/A on my 2 channel monitoring chain though. I'm using the Grace m905, and it's super sweet. |
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Post by indiehouse on Feb 5, 2020 5:32:27 GMT -6
So, what I’m hearing is making round trips out of the Motu while mixing will not make a substantial difference, but neither will having a high end pair of converters for tracking (e.g., Dangerous AD+)?
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Post by kcatthedog on Feb 5, 2020 8:16:46 GMT -6
Difference between degradation and improved detail, finesse and finish?
I think think the dangerous ad+ on your 2 bus adds the positive things above ?
maybe send Jerome a wav file ?
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Post by theglow on Feb 5, 2020 9:42:47 GMT -6
Whatever hardware you’re running through in your conversion loop (even just running it through a console or line driver with no further processing) is going to have 1,000x more of an impact on your signal than even the worst of converters. It’s a non-issue in my opinion.
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Post by svart on Feb 5, 2020 9:46:34 GMT -6
Not a big deal at all. Start with the best converter you can reasonably afford and just do it.
Remember (since we tend to forget) that many, many great recordings/mixes have been done on converters/gear that folks today would frown upon. It's the *end result* that matters, so use what you have, and twist and turn the knobs until it sounds good, because that's exactly what the pros do.
The limiting factor, by far, is the person doing the mixing. People(consumers) have been conditioned to think they can buy their way up the skill levels, but you can't. You can only buy gear that stays out of your way and lets your skill run free.
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Post by Blackdawg on Feb 5, 2020 9:46:54 GMT -6
So, what I’m hearing is making round trips out of the Motu while mixing will not make a substantial difference, but neither will having a high end pair of converters for tracking (e.g., Dangerous AD+)? I think you'd benefit more from getting a premium DA for monitoring than an AD for tracking. |
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Post by mrholmes on Feb 5, 2020 14:07:24 GMT -6
I hear no appreciable degradation other than the "degradation" of the analog gear I'm inserting which is making me quite happy.
 made me laugh loud..... another one I will quote if people haunt me with their "today you can have all this by plug ins, you don't have to do it anymore"
BTW drbill it's you and Jack White I quote....
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Post by drbill on Feb 5, 2020 15:16:41 GMT -6
I hear no appreciable degradation other than the "degradation" of the analog gear I'm inserting which is making me quite happy.
made me laugh loud..... another one I will quote if people haunt me with their "today you can have all this by plug ins, you don't have to do it anymore"
BTW drbill it's you and Jack White I quote....
Haha! Wow. Nice to be in good company. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 6, 2020 10:21:10 GMT -6
Very important ime but I’m itb now. I used to use outboard hardware, and Apogee converters. You can’t use anything that will strip out the warmth, flatten transients, dirty up the treble, and unglue things. Luckily multichannel conversion is good now and cheap for what you get. All of the current multichannel Apogee, MOTU, Lynx, Metric Halo, and Burl converters are great and made in the USA.
Old Avid is awful but the recent converters are DAD designs and very good. People avoid them because of the Digidesign 192 junk. They seem to have done the same thing SSL did with Soundscape with similar success. UA went the other way after the 2192.
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Post by aremos on Feb 6, 2020 10:32:41 GMT -6
Very important ime but I’m itb now. I used to use outboard hardware, and Apogee converters. You can’t use anything that will strip out the warmth, flatten transients, dirty up the treble, and unglue things. Luckily multichannel conversion is good now and cheap for what you get. All of the current multichannel Apogee, MOTU, Lynx, Metric Halo, and Burl converters are great and made in the USA. Old Avid is awful but the recent converters are DAD designs and very good. People avoid them because of the Digidesign 192 junk. They seem to have done the same thing SSL did with Soundscape with similar success. UA went the other way after the 2192. Maybe the 888 stuff was, but things drastically changed with the Digi 192/Avid IO. Don't think you can call them "junk". Think I'd use them before some of the ones you mentioned [MOTU, Lynx (non HiLo) & UA (non 2192)].
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Post by Deleted on Feb 6, 2020 11:25:38 GMT -6
Very important ime but I’m itb now. I used to use outboard hardware, and Apogee converters. You can’t use anything that will strip out the warmth, flatten transients, dirty up the treble, and unglue things. Luckily multichannel conversion is good now and cheap for what you get. All of the current multichannel Apogee, MOTU, Lynx, Metric Halo, and Burl converters are great and made in the USA. Old Avid is awful but the recent converters are DAD designs and very good. People avoid them because of the Digidesign 192 junk. They seem to have done the same thing SSL did with Soundscape with similar success. UA went the other way after the 2192. Maybe the 888 stuff was, but things drastically changed with the Digi 192/Avid IO. Don't think you can call them "junk". Think I'd use them before some of the ones you mentioned [MOTU, Lynx (non HiLo) & UA (non 2192)].
Maybe. I haven't used a 192 in years but I remember the 192 sucked compared to Apogee a long time ago. The difference was big enough to have me sell off rare records to go Apogee. MOTU AVB and Lynx Aurora (N) are much better than their previous converters. Lynx closed the big gap between the Hilo and the original Aurora, which was a little nasty up top. The MOTUs right before the AVB, ES9016 DA, converters were okay tonally but lacked detail. The older ones are all caps AWFUL like RME. UA Apollo, I'm not fond of but I dig the 2192. Even Apollo X AD sounded like I would need to glue vocals back into the mix ITB afterwards after doing it OTB and the included DA might not be best monitoring tool for that. |
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Post by drbill on Feb 6, 2020 12:15:08 GMT -6
The Digi 192's are decent. Almost as good as the new HD I/o's. A lot of people actually can't discern between them. I prefer the HD I/o's, but I've still got a 192 in the fray. It's fine for what it does.
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Post by trakworxmastering on Feb 7, 2020 10:38:49 GMT -6
How important is conversion quality after the initial AD stage? Let’s say that I were to add on a Dangerous DA for monitoring and an AD for tracking. Would that be negated if I were to send those tracks out to HW using the Motu conversion during mixing? You might be fine using your MOTUs during mixing but I'd want to at least have a high end 2 channel ADC for mix capture and a high end DAC for monitoring. I'd use the high end ADC for tracking when possible. I don't think it would be negated during mixing. Starting with the highest possible quality capture will still matter. |
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Post by soundintheround on Feb 8, 2020 11:02:13 GMT -6
I think one aspect of conversion is how it sounds (if and when) you may accidentally clip the converter. Although we all make sure to not do this...life happens.
The universal audio stuff to me (after coming from RME) sounds better in this respect.
I also heard the Burl is ok to run hot into and not worry about driving too hard.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 8, 2020 14:45:17 GMT -6
Apogee's soft limit is great for avoiding that in tracking.
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Post by Bob Olhsson on Feb 8, 2020 15:08:35 GMT -6
The thing about 192s is that they must be run balanced.
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made me laugh loud..... another one I will quote if people haunt me with their "today you can have all this by plug ins, you don't have to do it anymore"
