Digi 003 or M-box with pre-amps Help Me Please

[deshawnpenrose]

I wasnt sure will it be a better choice to get the Digi 003 or get the m-box with a focusrite pre-amp......
right now I'm just going to track my beats with Pro tools and lay scratch vocals.... but I need protools to work on sessions at home....and transfer to other studios.

 

[d.C.]

depends on how many ins/outs you need...

which m-box? 1? 2? mini? pro?

 

[carl_fo_shizi]

..i'm assuming it's the old classic mbox

I haven't really gone thro' the specifications for the new 003. But at a glance, I know it's HD (High definition), and Mbox only max'es 24 bit/48kHz (..i'm assuming it's the old classic mbox, but my response will be applicable to the mbox 2, pro, and mini).

Here's the deal tho'.. a commercial CD only has 16bit/44.1kHz. This means that no matter the audio resolution or samplin' rate, the audio would eventually be dithered to a 16 bit audio.

That being said... if you don't need the Midi I/O, the faders, audio channels, and additional input/output, don't GO for IT!!!


WIth your classic Mbox, you can do every -and any- thing you want to do on it. You can even hook up your favorite drum machine or keyboard to your mbox through a midi interface, and with a little configuration, you're good to go.

Lastly, I would go for an external preamp over the crappy mbox preamp anyday.

 

[cwrite]

I haven't really gone thro' the specifications for the new 003. But at a glance, I know it's HD (High definition), and Mbox only max'es 24 bit/48kHz (..i'm assuming it's the old classic mbox, but my response will be applicable to the mbox 2, pro, and mini).

Here's the deal tho'.. a commercial CD only has 16bit/44.1kHz. This means that no matter the audio resolution or samplin' rate, the audio would eventually be dithered to a 16 bit audio.

That being said... if you don't need the Midi I/O, the faders, audio channels, and additional input/output, don't GO for IT!!!


WIth your classic Mbox, you can do every -and any- thing you want to do on it. You can even hook up your favorite drum machine or keyboard to your mbox through a midi interface, and with a little configuration, you're good to go.

Lastly, I would go for an external preamp over the crappy mbox preamp anyday.

I'm rockin an M box 2 and I get by all right. But what preamps would u reccomend I cop instead of using the ones that r built in???

 

[carl_fo_shizi]

I'm rockin an M box 2 and I get by all right. But what preamps would u reccomend I cop instead of using the ones that r built in???

mmm....
solid state or tube?
First read up on these two types and decide which one you want (based on the kind of sound you're tryin' to achieve).

I personally use an Avalon 737sp, and I must tell u... It's NICE!!!

snoop, ryan leslie, will.i.am, john mayor all use it.

U can get it on eBay for about 1.5 Gz ($1,500).

What kinda music are u makin'? What's ur pocket size? do u play live instruments or u rely solely on midi implementation? what's ur set-up (computer, DAW, midi controller, drum-machine, preamp, mic, EQ n Comp etc).

 

[cwrite]

mmm....
solid state or tube?
First read up on these two types and decide which one you want (based on the kind of sound you're tryin' to achieve).

I personally use an Avalon 737sp, and I must tell u... It's NICE!!!

snoop, ryan leslie, will.i.am, john mayor all use it.

U can get it on eBay for about 1.5 Gz ($1,500).

What kinda music are u makin'? What's ur pocket size? do u play live instruments or u rely solely on midi implementation? what's ur set-up (computer, DAW, midi controller, drum-machine, preamp, mic, EQ n Comp etc).

I makin hip hop so mostly just rap vocals with some singing here and there. Right now I got a Sure KSM and I'm runnin on a pc.

 

[carl_fo_shizi]

sorry it took so long to respond. I'd say if u can afford it, go for the avalon. If not, focusrite's got some pretty decent preamps.

 

[cwrite]

sorry it took so long to respond. I'd say if u can afford it, go for the avalon. If not, focusrite's got some pretty decent preamps.

Good lookin, imma research a couple others but the Avalon lookin nice. Now I got a new toy ta hustle for

 

[Ekzpi]

Get the cheapest way to get ProTools running on your PC/Mac ie. MBOX1 and buy the best outboard gear you can afford. If your looking for a dope signal path for that lead vocal, buy a cheap channel strip and make sure it has spdif, use that to plug your instruments. For your mic, get a single mic preamp, possibly some good A/D converters, then start saving on some dope monitors.

Good Luck.

 

[cwrite]

Get the cheapest way to get ProTools running on your PC/Mac ie. MBOX1 and buy the best outboard gear you can afford. If your looking for a dope signal path for that lead vocal, buy a cheap channel strip and make sure it has spdif, use that to plug your instruments. For your mic, get a single mic preamp, possibly some good A/D converters, then start saving on some dope monitors.

Good Luck.

Just got my Events in the mail couple weeks ago so my monitors are covered. Picked up the TR8XL's and I'm liking them a lot.

 

[audiotecnicality]

I know it's HD (High definition), and Mbox only max'es 24 bit/48kHz

a commercial CD only has 16bit/44.1kHz. This means that no matter the audio resolution or samplin' rate, the audio would eventually be dithered to a 16 bit audio.

Just to clarify - HD usually refers to High Definition television picture quality.

Dither is noise added to the lease significant bit when converting audio from a higher bit depth to a lower one. 24bit to 16bit for example. It has nothing to do with the sample rate.

Unless your studio is worth more than $100,000 dollars, you likely don't have the quality sample rate converter needed to convert 48kHz to 44.1kHz. The best downsampling is done in perfect multiples. For projects eventually going onto CD, use 44.1kHz, 88.2kHz, etc. For DVD, use 48kHz, 96kHz, etc.

In most cases, 24bit/44.1kHz is plenty.

 

[selector waxx]

concerning preamps, the avalon mentioned is good, but for about that money you can buy way better, like the Vintech X73/Brent Avrill 1073/Aurora GTQ/Wunder Audio PEQ1 or other neve 1073 clones, A-Design Pacifica (my favorite), Rupert Neve Portico 5032 (the updated neve 1073), Great River ME 1NV, ... or if you want tubes the A Designs Audio MP1A, D.W. Fearn VT-1, Mercury M72s/1, Pendulum MPD-1, ...

but that may be over budget, if your budget is limited, i suggest a True Systems P-Solo in stead of the weak cheap focusrites. if you want to stay with focusrite, you got to take a look to the ISA series or the old blue series, but they won't fit in your budget neither.

 

[carl_fo_shizi]

I second what Ekzpi suggests.
Get the cheapest pro tools le hardware and a very very VERY good outboard gear. Also.. if you haven't purchased a mic yet, try lookin' into TLM 103... it's pretty nice and inexpensive (eBay).

Just to clarify - HD usually refers to High Definition television picture quality.

I'm not talking about HDV; I'm referring to HDaudio.
From mbox2 pro to digi003, digidesign refers to them as high-definition audio resolution.
Please check www.digidesign.com

Dither is noise added to the lease significant bit when converting audio from a higher bit depth to a lower one. 24bit to 16bit for example. It has nothing to do with the sample rate.

Dithering may directly have nothing to do with sample rates, but with higher sample rates, you have more flexibilty with the noise added in the higher spectrum.
Plus higher sample rates mean better quality. A 44.1kHz has less data than a 48kHz. With a lower sample rate, you get to save more space but you get a compromised sound.
So before a song makes it to Compact disc, it goes through dithering and sample rate conversion, which as a result affects the audio quality.

 

[audiotecnicality]

I'm not talking about HDV; I'm referring to HDaudio.
From mbox2 pro to digi003, digidesign refers to them as high-definition audio resolution.
Please check www.digidesign.com

I'm only saying that the "HD" moniker (or brand almost) is commonly used for video, not audio. I suppose you could use those words, high-definition, as Digidesign apparently has, but it's confusing. There is no such thing as "HD" audio. If you say "HDaudio" people immediately think "oh, audio for my HDTV".

Dithering may directly have nothing to do with sample rates, but with higher sample rates, you have more flexibilty with the noise added in the higher spectrum.
Plus higher sample rates mean better quality. A 44.1kHz has less data than a 48kHz. With a lower sample rate, you get to save more space but you get a compromised sound.
So before a song makes it to Compact disc, it goes through dithering and sample rate conversion, which as a result affects the audio quality.

I'm going to drag my feet on this one. I do agree that higher sample rates give you a higher data rate, more data to work with. However, if you record in 48kHz for a CD project, you are *hurting* your project more than helping it. The downconversion from 48 to 44.1kHz is extremely dirty unless you have a $20,000 unit to do it for you. For CD, you are best off using 44.1kHz unless 88.2kHz is available to you.

And by the way, the *reason* for using higher sample rates is not for flexibility with *noise* in the "higher spectrum", but for more accurate sampling of your audio up there. Say you record a 22kHz sine wave: at 44.1kHz sample rate, that's barely 2 samples per period of the sine wave - hardly enough to even see the sinusoidal form if you looked only at the sampled data. And your anti-aliasing filter will disallow you from recording anything higher than about 20kHz audio anyway. But with 88.2kHz sampling, you would see a *lot* better waveforms - more than 4 samples per period - and your anti-aliasing filter would let you record frequencies past the audible spectrum.

 

[RelicRecordings]

PS- the 003 is NOT IN ANY WAY AN HD SYSTEM. The going USED rate for an HD1 is about 5 grand or so. With an 003 you are still very much operating in a Le (ram based) system, so you'll only get the amount of processing that your computer has (recommended 2G or higher ram..).