Interface for guitar recording?

[Ermz]

Hey guys,

A friend of mine is after an interface, with a budget of $500 AUD, that will let him DI his guitar and use software amp sims like Revalver to record some demo material. XLR inputs would be a bonus, but not necessary.

He is currently eyeing the M-Audio Firewire Solo, but I figured I'd ask here and see if there are some other interfaces around more bang for the buck.

If you could give any suggestions, that would be great.

Cheers!

 

[Amberience]

Mackie Satellite.

 

[GuitarHack]

Ermin

I have an M-Audio Firewire Solo which I used before I bought the Firepod. It seemed OK for DI's and the Mic Input/preamp worked fine for micing a cab also. I did some comparisons when I bought the Firepod and of course the sound was different, not better or worse, just different. I will see if I can find the clips. He must have SP2 if he is on XP though, it will not work on SP1.

If he is looking at a new one, he could save some money on this one which is in perfect condition and has been stored in it's original box. I don't normally sell my stuff but since it is just sitting around... I bought it from Hyde's in Flemington and when I got it home (almost 1.5 hours away) I realised that it had a US 12V adaptor. Since it is Firewirebus powered anyway (adaptor is only required if you use a 4-pin firewire cable in a laptop) I didn't worry about it. Even if I need an adaptor I wasn't going to drive all that way for a $10 12V adaptor I could buy from anywhere. If you are interested I can take some photo's. It would be much much cheaper than the $500 mark.

EDIT: Found some samples. They are unfortunately 2 different mic positions (can't find all of the samples). The M-Audio mic position was centre of the dustcap, the Firepod clip mic position is slightly closer to the edge of the Dustcap. Anyway you get the idea of the preamp sound.... i didn't have a reamp box at the time so the samples aren't the same performance either. Good comparison hey

Ermin.rar

 

[Ermz]

Thanks guys.

GH, that's a cool offer and my friend will likely consider it. He needs the unit more for actually DIing his guitar and using pure soft amp sims to generate tone. All the same though, your comparison clips are appreciated, cheers. Oh, also, he's using OSX.

 

[aortizjr]

Just for laying down guitar ideas and such in my office. I got an Emu 0202. I think I paid $100 US new. The kicker is all the free software it comes with. Cubase LE, Amplitube LE, etc. More than enough to get going. And you can get the latency down pretty low too.

But they were the cheapest around, USB powered, etc. Works great.

They also have the 0404 and a new Tracker Pre.

But the 0202 is pretty stripped down. Pretty much 2x2 IO The pre is actually pretty good. The DI is great.

Since they are basically Soundblaster, I am guessing you could probably get it in AU for fairly reasonable.