Tascam FireOne

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ken
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by ken »

i don't get it. Do you not understand how the MOTU works? What unit did you buy? I've had MOTU stuff for years and think it works great. With the Mackie, you get a lot of ins, but only 2 outs. What advantage do you see to this system?

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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by signboy »

The ins don't bother me so much, it's the outs. My MOTU 8pre has main out, and a headphone jack. I find myself frequently trying to african american engineer a way to get stuff to several places, and it just doesn't work with only a single main out. (okay, 2, L&R) The Mackie looks like a dream, at least on the website, with all channels going individually to cubase, plus the option of a couple aux channels, inserts, and tape rca out. And proper channel mutes. All the MOTU has is a 20db pad. Annoying as hell. Although, I AM extremely happy with the sound quality and latency of the MOTU. Do they make something comparable to the Mackie? I guess I can not be so lazy and look that up for myself...
and no. It looks like everything they offer is in the rackmount format, which just aint working for me.
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ken
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by ken »

Remember this?

Musician's Friend is selling B-stock of the Fireone for $120. Not bad.

http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/pr ... ku=241179V

Ken
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by Lunkhead »

Well, after nearly seven years of tireless excellent service, my trusty FireOne has started to flake out a bit. It seems to have some kind of power or electrical issue. Sometimes when I turn it on it doesn't really turn on properly, it gets stuck in a bootup loop or something. That's been happening for a few weeks. Last night it went into that mode in the middle of me trying to record. I can't believe I only paid $149 for it and have been able to use it to make practically everything I've recorded for almost seven years! That's some value! Looking around for a replacement I don't see anything in that price range that provides all the functionality of the FireOne. It's very hard to find anything with two headphone outs, for example. So maybe I'll just buy another FireOne on Ebay. Or if any of you who also bought one many years ago have one that still works fine and you're looking to sell it, let me know.
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Billy's Little Trip
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by Billy's Little Trip »

I've had great results from my Focusrite Saffire Pro interface. But as you mentioned, you want 2 headphone outs. I didn't think I cared and chose not to get the Saffire Pro 24 "DSP". It has 2 headphone outs and they are under $300 new. But you get a ton more with it. 16 ins/8 outs
After I bought mine, I started recording with friends, so I bought a Y splinter for my single phone out. Unfortunately no independent volume control with the Y splitter.

But I love all of the outs of my Pro 24. I go out to phones, monitors, a stereo receiver for finish listening with A/B to large speakers and small speakers, a mono single speaker to check phase issues and how the vocals are sitting in the mix.
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by Lunkhead »

I've heard good things about Focusrite gear. It doesn't seem like the Pro 24 DSP is widely available anymore, but the Pro 26 looks pretty good. I like that it has both FireWire and Thunderbolt, making it more future proof if I upgrade my desktop Mac some day. The other option I had been looking at was the Steinberg UR 44, which has two headphone outs, four mic preamps, and DSP effects, including a DSP powered amp simulator that sounds pretty good.

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/UR44
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Billy's Little Trip
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by Billy's Little Trip »

Yes, I've watched a review of the UR 44. It's priced pretty much in line with the Saffire Pro. I guess they can only give you a peak led per input because the put 2 extra inputs on the front. I do love my Cubase, so I'd have no problem giving the Streinberg gear a try.
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by jb »

I have a Saffire Pro 40. Has more stuff than I'll ever need-- including 2 headphone outs. ;)
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Billy's Little Trip
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by Billy's Little Trip »

One thing that's cool with the Saffire units are all of the different com ports. Although USB is the standard, I like that besides the mic and instrument inputs, you can go out to a physical mixing board, PA, etc. They have optical, firewire, midi, and spdif. In fact, your Pro 40 unit has them as in and out and for Mac users, the firewire port is your thunderbolt port. I'm not a Mac user, so I don't know how that works.
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by Lunkhead »

I already have another interface that has eight preamps, ADAT in/out, S-PDIF in/out, etc. I think I got it as a stupid deal for $200:

http://www.alesis.com/io26

I leave that at the BSS rehearsal space though. I'm just looking for something simpler and smaller to keep at home.
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by jb »

I also have a Focusrite Saffier 18i6 which is smaller. Only one headphone out though.

So far I like the sound I can get from them. Though honestly the last couple things I did for reals were using an Apogee USB MiC. :-/ Little sucker sounds damn great.

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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by fluffy »

I still love my Presonus FireStudio Project, which is the interface I brought to SFLive this year. It has a buttload of line outputs and the ability to set up arbitrary submixes. For multiple headphones I just use a Behringer splitter-amp.

It does take up a bit of space (being a 1U rackmount unit), though, and also it requires FireWire which is getting pretty uncommon, even in Macs.
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by Lunkhead »

I wound up buying one of these:

http://tascam.com/product/us-4x4/

It was a stupid deal of the day at $149 but then I saw it on Amazon for the same price with an additional 15% off, so it was only $135!

It's got two headphone outputs, though they don't have individual volume control. It's got MIDI. It's got four preamps and inputs, which is two more than I had before, as well as four line outs, which is two more than I had before. Nice! I wound up not using the jog wheel and transport stuff much anyway, so, I won't really miss that.
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Re: Tascam FireOne

Post by fluffy »

Looks pretty solid, and I like that it's class-compliant. Definitely let us know what the latency is like when you get it working, and if you can do different monitoring mixes to the outputs (in direct monitoring mode). I'd be interested in a mobile 4x4 device since my Firestudio is a bit unwieldy for mobile use, and the monitor mixes would be a huge bonus.
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