Hi folks

First, a small introduction as background, since this is my first post.

I will be purchasing an RME interface within the next week. Which one is not yet decided.

I recently upgraded my 10-year-old recording PC to newest-generation stuff (Z270 MB, I7-7700, SSD, etc). I use 2 Presonus Firepods, and had some issues getting them working with the new hardware, but finally succeeded. However, the newer, much faster hardware has revealed a few issues with my 10-year-old Pods. So, I have decided to finally replace them with something current.

My Nr. 1 priority, after my experience with PreSonus, is support. PreSonus dropped support for the Firepod almost immediately after they stopped production. They provided one last driver for Win7 and that was it. It isn't difficult to get that driver working under Win10, but this lack of support burned me and I swore I would never buy another product from them.

So I investigated the current crop of interfaces, and settled on RME and UA as the two companies that provide excellent support, and in the end decided on RME.

Now, I am a hobbyist, and record mostly by myself (max 2 mics at a time) but also record my acoustic trio (3 mics, 2 line ins).
So I have limited need for mic pres, 2 would be fine, as I have a couple of standalone pres, but 4 would be more convenient. I record quite a bit of acoustic guitar and vocals, and am fussy about the sound (especially of the acoustic guitar, normally a very fine Martin OM) so the quality of the preamps is important. This is one reason why I rejected Focusrite; the preamps sound harsh to my ear.

In any case, I have three choices, given my needs and budget:

1) RME UCX
       advantages: apparently slightly better preamps (micstatsy vs octopre?) but will I ever really notice it?
                           

2) FF 802
        advantages: 4 mic pres, more i/o, 2 ADAT, newer converters (again, will I really notice?)
        disadvantages: costs more

3) RayDat
       advantages: free from firewire or usb considerations, very fast. Cheapest of the three (but .. must buy mic preamps)
                            4 adat i/o (but: will I ever need that? I think not. )
       disadvantages: obviously no mic pres, have to buy an ADAT-capable pre (or converter with the pres that I have), which,
                             if I buy a pre of quality comparable to the interface actually makes this the most expensive (but also
                             most flexible) solution.

I'm assuming that all three of them sound excellent (I have borrowed and tested a UFX to get a feel for the RME pres and quality), and that RME will not suddenly change their excellent support. So I don't think I can go wrong regardless.

Typing this out and reading through it, I tend towards the 802, simply for the convenience of having 4 pres. Have I missed anything important? Anybody willing to give me advice?

thx

steven