Presonus Firepod, Anybody usin' it? Options

[whickus]

Is anyone out there using the FirePod yet? I have a friend looking to buy a PowerBook (finally taking my advice) and I'm curious to know about anyone's good or bad experiences. I hear OS 10.3.5 has the drivers already installed...I love Apple.

[BullSanchez]

I am trying to use it but not much luck yet. I think my problem is trying to learn Logic. I have it set up as the audio drive and that works great, I am just not getting any levels on the interface when I connect a mic or guitar to it. But like I said, I'm still trying to figure it out.

[ideaslinger]

From what I read, the Firebox is 'class compliant' which means that it needs no drivers under Mac OS X... I don't have one but been looking recently and read this review on AudioMidi only yesterday:

http://www.audiomidi.com/aboutus/reviews/e...dge_firebox.cfm

Sound on Sound just reviewed it this month too, their comments:

Very compact, excellent feature set for the price, brilliant zero-latency monitoring via software...

Just my 0.02c worth...

[zlatko]

I have one and am very satisfied, very straightforward, no problems yet, did flawless 8 tracks record in dp4.5, with iBook 1.2, only drawback is the need for manual syncing after sleep....

[lucky13]

Im also looking at the FirePod as a prospective purchase. Its different to the firebox..no? the firebox is smaller?

[SadPandas]

I am using the Firebox and have been happy with it so far. Im using it with the cubase l.e. that was packaged with it. The pre amps sound nice and warm to my novice ears and it was very easy to set up since, as someone stated earlier, there were no driver issues since the firebox uses the native audio drivers that were made by apple. I was thinking of upgrading from 10.3.8 to 10.4.2 but found that cubase l.e.'s installer (the one that is provided by presonus in the bundle on earlier purchases) wouldn't work on clean install of tiger so i called Presonus and a week later recieved an updated cubase l.e. disc. Anyyway, if the firepod sounds anything like the firebox then i am sure you will be pleased but then again i use it for very basic things like recording guitars from my podxt pro and i have never used any other interfaces other than the mkii that we have down at the space. good luck with your purchase.

pandas

[blueskybluesguy]

Been using a Firepod with GarageBand since Apri, '05. Very satisfied with it. Clean, crisp recordings with a lot of depth.

One issue, if anybody out there has advice I'd appreciate it: When recording with the Firepod apparently your instrument is heard realtime along with the previously recorded playback, so that there are no latency issues. However, the same knob that controls your instrument volume also controls the intensity of your instrument signal into the computer, and if you dial back your instrument's volume it dials back the 'saturation' level of the recording.

Are there any ways around this, to keep 'saturation' optimum, while lowering instantaneous volume level on your instrument? Garageband's track volume slider seems to work only on playback, not while recording.

[edge100]

Been using a Firepod with GarageBand since Apri, '05. Very satisfied with it. Clean, crisp recordings with a lot of depth.

One issue, if anybody out there has advice I'd appreciate it: When recording with the Firepod apparently your instrument is heard realtime along with the previously recorded playback, so that there are no latency issues. However, the same knob that controls your instrument volume also controls the intensity of your instrument signal into the computer, and if you dial back your instrument's volume it dials back the 'saturation' level of the recording.

Are there any ways around this, to keep 'saturation' optimum, while lowering instantaneous volume level on your instrument? Garageband's track volume slider seems to work only on playback, not while recording.

In a word: No.

This is a common problem for many people with the Firepod: you cannot separate the monitoring levels from the recording levels. You can only adjust the relative levels between the pre-recorded tracks (i.e. DAW output) and your inputs.

The Firepod, unlike the Firebox, does not contain a software mixer to be used for latency-free monitoring. This is, IMHO, a serious omission. All of the Firepod's direct competitors (i.e. Tascam FW series, MOTU 828mkII) have this feature in one way or another.

[miaba]

A question for the firebox users: an add stated two mic-pre's and two line ins located on back. Does this mean 4-track simultanious or only two?

[blueskybluesguy]

Re: Firepod

Thanks, Edge.

I agree the lack of control over current instrument volume relative to pre-recorded tracks is a serious omission. When trying to lay down an intense guitar riff, planned to have burning in the background, i find myself backing off so that i can hear and respond to the rhythm section. So far I've been able to work around it, but it's a pain.

Another thing I notice is that sometimes the tone and amount of effects on the guitar is different in playback than while recording. Specifically, the playback is much more treble-y.

The quality of Firepod recordings is so good other than that, it's a shame they haven't come up with a patch and/or a solution.