Which Interface Is Best For Me And Imac G5?, Mbox, Spike, Omega, Firewire 410? Options

[bigheadjoe]

In a couple weeks I will be getting a new imac G5. I am fairly new to recording music. I've used Cakewalk Sonar on my friends computer as well as Cubase SX. I prefer to use Cubase SX. I need a good solid interface, but I don't really care about the software that comes with it since I will be using Cubase SX3. I am a singer songwriter and currently I don't need more than two channels of audio recorded at the same. I am stickler for low latency. I've heard a lot of good things about Digidesign's Mbox, however it sounds like I'd be paying mostly for the software that comes with it. I've also been looking at:

Mackie Spike
Lexicon Omega
M-Audio Omni
M-Audio Firewire 410

Any suggestions?

P.S. Is the 600 Mhz bus worth the extra 200$ for the new iMac G5's

Thanks,
Derek

[Don't EVER put your email in full in the forums! We don't give them away, don't do the job of spammers! People can always write to you with the link in your profile. LPM ]

This post has been edited by lepetitmartien: Tue 14 Sep 2004, 03:26

[pebulus]

I have found it to be very flaky - the only thing to cause my mac to crash. It has a minimum latency setting of 512 which, by todays standards is not great. Zero latency monitoring is one thing, but that's no use for monitoring effected audio or soft synths. Plus it makes a huge pop when you plug it in (which you will have to do lots!).

You're definitely paying for the name with the m-box - it's not a patch on any of the other digidesign hardware, and it is a piece of c**p when trying to use the coreaudio drivers with other apps like Logic and Live.

I actually bought mine on the recommendation of someone else, but I personally have had nothing but trouble with it and am investigating alternatives - Metric Halo sound really nice to my ears. Or the Mini-Me mmmm..... just got to sell my car....!