CHANGSTAR: Audiophile Headphone Reviews and Early 90s Style BBS
Lobby => Music and Recordings => Topic started by: RexAeterna on January 08, 2012, 09:29:37 AM
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hey, i just have couple questions i'm technically not sure how it works. i recently bought myself a used Echo Audiofire 2 audio interface since i was desperately in need a 24-bit interface and needed something with much better converters and so forth. it's also my first ''firewire'' component i ever used in my life so finding out what firewire host my motherboard was and so first was very important(mine uses Texas Instrument on my Gigabyte motherboard, so i was lucky and told it's a sin if i don't go with firewire over usb lol). very happy with it so far. question i have is it's software gain. i notice lot of interfaces has this. i heard cause it's meant for balance uses so it can output higher voltages at the output. it has a -10db and +4db gain and it's near impossible listening with +4db gain with some stuff,even with my main amp with it's -20db muting switch on, so i kept it at -10db gain.
recently though i found out i should keep it at maximum gain the interface can output and lower the volume control till the red is no longer showing at peaks of music. with lowered volume in the software with +4db it's very reasonable listening to most stuff now. that's how i have it now. i'm just wondering if there is a better explanation to the gain levels on audio interfaces and anyone knows.
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Gain is just a multiplier. How much to amplify the signal going into it.
More gain = less volume knob needs to be turned up + less effect of inherent noise.
-10db is mostly for RCA. +4db is pro-audio XLR voltages.
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thanks! i would of responded last night but when i got home i fell right asleep lol. i read about it last night and found my amp is more then fine running at the professional output cause it depends on how the amp's topology design handles the output voltages. i'm using balanced rca to dual 1/4'' cables now hooked directly to my amp. glad i bought it too cause i wasn't expecting much really to be honest when came to sonic improvement but seem to defiantly open new world when listening to music. don't know if cause better converters it uses but it's defiantly a nice improvement over my old interface. finally got it all set-up though and even got foobar2000 taking full advantage of the ASIO drivers. gonna start going to fl studio once again after months of not using it and try to make more stuff as well.
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I use an Audiofire 12 (mrgreen on head-fi).
Chiming in to say that purrin is correct, but I wouldn't hesitate to try -10db if your amplifier has a rediculous amount of gain, and you want to try having a bit more control. You can always measure the device easily, to see if it's affecting performance.
Hows your latency? Mine is sub 1ms. :)
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yea. i played around with it when i first got it. i keep it at -10dbv setting cause i use active preamps with my power amps so i'm already sending more then couple of volts to the power amps. i also notice bit cleaner sound going -10bv than +4dbu.
i haven't checked the latency on it yet to be honest. i just pugged it up and use it. makes a nice difference in fl studio running at 24-bit/96khz over 16-bit/48khz, especially the ballad and grand piano present on nexus2 sounds more ''real'' and can finally hear the hammers hit when i play around with it. for playback like on foobar2000, to be honest, i don't notice much difference between settings at all but kinda expected since it's just playback from a music player. for DAW's though makes good difference for some reason.
i also notice slight better sound from my desktop compared to my laptop too but it's probably cause my computer's motherboard has much better firewire chip in it or so and my rig at home is like billion times more faster haha. only my laptop i only use for playback and browsing. i never use it for messing with daw's. i probably kill it since it runs really hot itself already lol.