Firebox Or Traveller, Help me choose my new interface Options

[minskybabs]

Hi all,
I currently use 2 Macs a Powermac G4 tower 466 (Digital Audio) with 512Mb Ram and running OS9.1 and a 15" Alu Powerbook 1.25Ghz w 512MB Ram running OS10.3.9.

I use logic platinum 4.8.1 on the powermac tower with a Audiowork 2 sound card. and don't use the laptop for music much except itunes and a bit of garageband.

I am thinking of upgrading the powermac and powerbook to tiger, and buying a new soundcard to use logic on both, I guess I will upgrade to logic 7.2 as well.

I like the look of the Presonus Firebox, or the MOTU traveller or 828 mk2 but can't decide between them, I want to be able to use with both machines.

Will this be possible, the tower is below the minimum spec for the presonus, but I only normally record one or two tracks at once.

I hope to be able to get rid of my mixer (soundcraft F1) and use the interface as the mixer, as due to impending birth of number 1 son I have now got space issues!!

Any ideas, will they work with both machines etc.?

Thanks a lot,
Minskybabs

[lepetitmartien]

First thing, I strongly advise you not to upgrade the powermac to Tiger before you upgrade its processor. A G4 466 will work under Tiger but will stress to do something meaningful outside mail/web stuff. OS X is a power hog!

I think you'd benefit a lot from either doing that (I don't have the CPU upgrades in mind but it may end more powerful than the powerbook) or…

Turn the powerbook into your recording station, sell the powermac, buy RAM for the laptop, an external firewire drive and choose the interface without having to stress about the compatibility of systems.

I'd keep keyboard and mouse btw If the screen you have is bigger, use it with the laptop!

On the interface itself, if you don't record more than 2 tracks at the same time, maybe a smaller one would be a better idea, like the Presonus inspire maybe else the firebox, you don't need the 828.

Now I thinks it's rather well covered, save on the mixing side, where I'd like some input from powerbook users.

[ColdPack]

I'm currently using the Firebox and I love it.

HOWEVER!

Motu has unveiled the Ultralite that will be shipping in the next few weeks.
It'll retail for around 599. It's like a half-rack Traveller.
It's got 10 ins and 14 outs. Take a look at www.motu.com for more info.

But for the price, the Firebox performs like a champ. I mean, I paid 245 for mine and it's been fantastic.

CP

[cliffmoon2]

Yeah, the Firebox is really a great sounding interface for the price, but it does not work well with Digital Performer. Even with the latest version 4.61 you get a lot of pops and clicks during playback. I called tech support when I purchased mine a few months back and was having play back problems. They said they know about the problem and hopefully MOTU and Presonus would resolve the issue soon. Unfortunately, I had to return mine. But now that you've mentioned the MOTU interface, I'll give it a look.

[minskybabs]

Thanks all for thr responses.

LPM, is it just Tiger you would not recommend for the powermac, I have Panther, could try that, or do you think that a 466 processor will struggle full stop? I do not really want to upgrade the processor on the powermac, it is quite expensive and I hear you can get strange problems with processor upgrades? Also it feels a bit like chucking good money after bad. What would you recommend as a minimum spec processor if I sold the old powermac, the G4 powermacs are going quite cheap at the moment?

I need two machines as the wife is a graphic designer (when not having a baby!!) and she mainly uses the powermac for quark/Photoshop work... I guess I could mainly use the powerbook, better processor etc. Then it sounds like I would need a new external hardrive?

That new MOTU Ultralite looks good, I was torn between the need for the firebox or firepod, now I am even more confused!

Anyone used the new MOTU?

Thanks Jake.

[ColdPack]

The MOTU Ultralite is not shipping yet for a few weeks.
cp

[cliffmoon2]

Yeah, the MOTU Ultralite will be here around April/May. The specs look very, very good to me. And for $250 more than the Presonus Firebox, for me it would be well worth the wait.

If you are going to upgrade, do that with your Powerbook. Invest in more RAM, at least a gig more if your doing music. RAM keeps dropping in price. Tiger is a cool OS to upgrade to. Your Powerbook 1.25 mhz and upgrading to Logic 7 should work for you.

I wouldn't upgrade the G4 “466”. Save your money for a new computer. Use your “466” for whatever apps that demands OS 9.1 (you should upgrade your “466” to OS 9.2.2) and for emergencies, if anything should happen to your laptop. I do graphics also. Depending on how cpu extensive your graphic project is, you can get by with what you have.

[GitGeezer]

Interesting, I answered this question for myself several months ago.

I had problems (pops, hangs, no SPDIF I/O) with the Firebox on my Powerbook 667 so I returned the Firebox and bought the Traveler. The Traveler worked much better, but now on my current system (I haven't tried SPDIF I/O yet) I have to toggle the optical input settings after booting to "wake up" audio output. Still no definitive word from MOTU (they suggested the output toggle exercise) on a real fix, but at least now once it's "awake" it works until the computer is power-cycled again.

As you can see from my sig I moved up to a Quad G5 from the Powerbook. I'm in this seriously, so I seriously abused my retirement savings. So far I haven't regretted it. Logic 7.1 is actually easy to use on this system, and Reaktor 5 may occaisionally make some (unintended) strange digital-lockup noises, but the CPU is still less than 35%. The funny part was I thought the lock-up was part of the Reaktor patch I was using so I recorded it. I didn't know it until I looked at the waveform in Logic. So much for my 30 years of synthesis experience...

I don't currently daisy-chain a FW drive from the Traveler, but I did on the Powerbook and it worked as a recording target drive. I do use FW400 drives on the Quad G5, but I intend to get a FW800 drive for recorded sound files. I've been told that the FW800 bus is independent of the FW400 bus (which is used by the Traveler) so I'm expecting pretty good performance.

Stay tuned...