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Re: mac sound card with augustus loop

On Sun, Aug 10, 2008 at 1:00 PM, Gareth Whittock
<buddhamachine@live.co.uk> wrote:
> Hi everybody,
> A friend of mine wants to get into looping. She's mac based and might go
> with augustus loop software. What we're looking for is a soundcard for 
>her
> saxophone for live work. Basically a 2 in 2 out will do, usb & a midi
> interface. What's your experience?


There are two scenarios here.

1) If she already owns a mic pre amp that she prefers.
Then she could go with one of the least expensive firewire interfaces
that supports line level. I dare to recommend the Echo Audiofire2
which BTW also has digital ports, since I sometimes use one myself.
Over here I own a Presonus VXP analog mic pre amp with great filters,
compressor and expander functionality and that analog box gives me a
better sax sound than anything else I have tried. I used to bring it
together with a line level computer audio interface but I don't do
that anymore because it is uncomfortably big, being a normal rack
mountable device.

2) If she needs also a mic pre amp.
Then she could go with the little more expensive firewire interfaces
that also offer built-in mic pre amps. I have an RME FireFace400 that
is know for having good mic pre amps. But it doesn't sound as good as
my analog VXP rack box mentioned above. Good enough though. There are
some less expensive interfaces that also work well (MOTU Ultralite,
ESI, TC Electronic Konnekt... and some more) but I can't recommend
them since I have not used them but went directly for the FF400
because of mic pre amp fidelity reasons.

Since she is not planning to run the Pro Tools software I would advice
her to not buy any of the Digidesign supported interfaces (M-Audio
etc). They are very good with Pro Tools but can be annoying with other
software. Augustus Loop is available as AU and VST, as far as I know
not yet as an RTAS plug-in either (the Pro Tools format).

-- 
Greetings from Sweden

Per Boysen
www.boysen.se (Swedish)
www.looproom.com (international)
www.myspace.com/perboysen
www.stockholm-athens.com