Hi I've seen one suggestion of the TC electronic impact twin Firewire to Spdif interface being slightly better than a HiFace for sound, so in terms of daily use with iTunes playback from a MacBook will this actually work, in practical terms and something that is hassle free during set up/ installation and continuous usage?
There is the Stello thingy which could go up against this however the TC electronic has many additional features that may come in handy like the guitar interface, then again its packed with stuff that might never be used..
Posted on: 14 February 2013 by Andy Too
Hi,
There are any number of audio recording interfaces that will do more or less the same thing as the TC Electronic at a huge range of prices; why this should be any better at a digital-to-digital transfer than any other is anyone's guess, but if experience says it is then maybe it is... if it works like my M-Audio Fast Track Ultra I wouldn't expect any practical problems - recording musicians (which is who this is aimed at) certainly don't want kit that is picky about set-up. It won't have been designed with use in a hi-fi system as top priority though... good if you're planning to record yourself singing and playing guitar though!
Check your spec carefully - I thought current (and presumably future) MACs had moved to usb rather than Firewire.
Andy
Posted on: 14 February 2013 by Guido Fawkes
It is not better than the Stello U3 in as much as it doesn't support integer mode, nor has it got the level of clocking or isolation ... However, it will work and Firewire is async so it should sound fine .. The M-audio device is similar and that sounds good enough. given you want to use its other functions then it is not a bad choice. If you just want the very best from a Mac front end then I'd suggest Audrivana and Stello U3. Audrivana cannot support direct mode in to Firewire.
