So I'm finally gonna upgrade my rig...

[TheIllicitOne]

I know I've been talking about it forever but now I am finally going to do it. I've pieced together a little system that I think will be nice, however I need a little bit of help deciding on some pieces. I'm trying to find mostly used stuff but we'll see what happens. I'm pretty sure I'm ready to pull the trigger on the following pieces.

RME 9652
API 3124+
Presonus DigiMAX LT
Little Labs Redeye
KRK v8s

I still need to decide on converters so I can run the API unit into the RME via adat. I also want 1-4 more channels of GOOD preamps. ADAT or through the converters it doesn't matter. Preferrably at least one channel of something odd/fun to play with. Any suggestions/help you guys could give would be greatly appreciated.

 

[J.DavisNJ]

If I were you, I would check out the Lynx Aurora stuff for conversion.

-Joe

 

[Metaltastic]

I assume you wanna go PCI and not firewire if your getting the 9652, but why not get an RME Multiface? It has A/D conversion, and it's plenty good enough for metal (IMO the only time you'll REALLY notice a difference with better converters is with really airy acoustic music or when tracking a band live). Then for the rest of your conversion and more preamps you can get a Focusrite OctoPre LE with the ADAT option, which is supposed to sound pretty damn good for the price (Lasse thinks so )

 

[TheIllicitOne]

I assume you wanna go PCI and not firewire if your getting the 9652, but why not get an RME Multiface? It has A/D conversion, and it's plenty good enough for metal (IMO the only time you'll REALLY notice a difference with better converters is with really airy acoustic music or when tracking a band live). Then for the rest of your conversion and more preamps you can get a Focusrite OctoPre LE with the ADAT option, which is supposed to sound pretty damn good for the price (Lasse thinks so )

Correct me if I'm wrong, as I am new to this type of gear, but I was looking at it in terms of expandability. The 9652 seems to be the more expandable piece of gear. I wanna avoid boxing myself in like I did when i first got into recording and bought the firepod which isn't really that expandable at all. I realize that even though the multiface with the card is the more expensive piece of gear, the 9652 will probably be more expensive in the long run because I'll have to buy external converters if I want to use anything other than ADAT (which I do). But I am still leaning to the 9652.

Like I said, I'm after expandability so if anyone has any other suggestions please let me know.


EDIT: I also just found out I can get expansion cards for the 9652 such as the RME AEB 8-I which allows 8 more analog inputs as seen here: http://www.floridamusicco.com/proddetail~prod~aeb8i.htm However, I am not sure how the four jacks = 8 analog inputs or if I can still use all three adat connections and the spdif connection with the expansion card. Any ideas?

 

[LSD-Studio]

list looks promising.
I'd get the RME ADI 8...works flawlessly with the 9552 and sounds really good.
it's a good match for the API as well since you can switch between "high gain" and "+4dB" that way you can drive the API hooter (which makes a lot of sense!)

for you single channel "funny to play with" get the safe sound audio P1
pretty cheap, AWESOME compressor, great DI, great limiter, good expander and decent warm sounding pre (like using it for vox)