TM FX latency is about 1 sample. Yes, we render everything in real-time. BUT you do not have access to these 1 samples. Because you need to get the signal to TM FX, either by analog I/O (see manual for a few samples more), or via Core Audio (play/record from the Mac), which involves the DAW set buffer size plus Safety Offset. I would expect around 4 or 5 ms RTL with a buffer size of 64 samples (can't check this right now).

Sorry, I just realised i may not be explaining this clear.. to give a perfect example of what I am after..

the figure in the apollo console hardware mixer would be 1.1ms a/d to d/a through the dsp mixer with no plugins at 96K, and 2.23 ms at 44.1K.

Avid pro tools HDX would be 0.7ms at 96K..

and so on.. I hope this clears it up. What i am after is the total monitoring latency just through the hardware mixer itself.. Again, i will always bypass the DAW.. Even if i do not buy the product for my main studio room, i am very much looking for a second interface to use with my laptop.. in that case i might get the thunderbolt one though.. I may stick with my apollo in my studio, even though the latency time in console is abysmal when using FX.

So, in a nutshell.. I have all my synths, a vocal and a guitar plugged into the analog ins and monitor them in total mix and use total mix FX where needed.. This is simply replicating an analog desk for me and the way i am used to working.. When i want to use native fx and mixdown time has come, i simply record all those tracks dry to audio in one pass. What i am talking about here with total mix is purely for analog style monitoring purposes.. if the delay is under 2ms at 44K, that's what I am after.

Ok i am afraid that perhaps I can't be any clearer.. wow this is a little frustrating. what i am asking has nothing to do with the latency of the asio driver through the DAW, or the core audio driver! I want to know what the latency is when bypassing the daw, from input to output, using only the dsp mixer! I know what the DAW latencies are because TAFKAT has posted them at gearslutz! This is so far from what I am asking.. please if no one understands what I am asking, just say so, and i will try to explain even further.

I understand you but I don't know. It is converter latency plus the one sample MC mentions. I have seen the converter latencies on this site or in the specs.

In my measurements, it's 34 samples at 44.1 kHz

And now, can you tell me exactly how much NOX is getting out of my VW Caddy?

That is not fully true. He asks for stand-alone operation (one simple word to understand the question...). In that case some unexpected samples from internal routing FPGA to/from DSP will be added. I can measure this tomorrow.

What about Durec, could you require this ?

I mean the UFX .. its one of the rare occasions where the former flagship interface is still available where new products hit the market
UFX+ - € 2699
UFX II - € 1936
UFX - €1599
802 - €1394

All three UFX* have Durec. The very little price difference of around €200 between 802 and UFX fully justifies to take the former flagship interface UFX.

With the UFX you get on top of the 802:
- Micstasy Mic Preamps with parallel converter technology (2 converter per channel)
- 65db Mic Gain
- +12dBU max input level
- 2x MIDI
- Durec
- Digital Gain Controls which you can store in snapshots and workspaces
- Autoset
- Fully standalone via Color Display (the 802 needs the old ARC to switch between the 6 standalone profiles)
- Standalone profiles accessable for Display

As you want to work in standalone mode and maybe want to switch between up to 6 setups, the 802 is not recommended IMHO anymore as you really require the old ARC to switch between the standalone profiles. The old ARC is not available in the market anymore.

For a device in this price range I would say the UFX, which costed before the same as the UFX II now, its a present to get the UFX now for only €200 more and it makes IMHO no sense to invest into the 802, if you can get all the listed features for only €200 more.

See my blog article here
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/inde … B-MADIfac/
And an overview about features of the different RME interfaces:
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/index.php … 17-01-pdf/

> I am a bit disappointed the UFX inly has FW400, but it's nice it has usb backup for win machines.

1. USB2 is not only for windows machines. Apple doesnt build machines with Firewire interface anymore.

2. There is absolutely no reason to be dissappointed. 30 channel interfaces do not require more than USB2 and FW400! This has been mentioned very often by RME in the user forum. And also the 802 has "only" USB2 and FW400. RME only mounted a FW800 connector to make it easier to connect to FW800, but actually the FW800 adapter then needs to fallback with speed to FW400, because the 802 is a FW400 interface.

And even the UFX II has only USB2. Why .. Because it also has only 30 channels and its sufficient.
UFX II btw has only USB2, no 2nd interface anymore, because even Apple doesnt build Laptops with firewire anymore
and to get Firewire to run can be challenging at times and also with the new Win10. I read reports about that in this forum.

> So, the question is, can firewire 400 handle 30 channels of audio being inputted simultaneously at 96k?

Yes and yes. BTW with 96k you reduce the amount of ADAT channel because of channel multiplexing.
At the end the "load" stays the same. Either all 30 channels in and 30 channels out @44.1/48
or a reduced numer of total channels because of channel multiplexing at higher sample rates up to 192kHz.
But even then there is no issue with USB2 and FW400.

> PS wasn't durec improved in ufx+ etc? is the first revision still useful?

For years people used Durec with UFX. You simply had to look for a proper Disk or USB stick that can deliver the throughput sustained without interrupt. I have such a 64 GB USB3 stick, that ran perfectly with Durec/USB2. Here is a thread in user forum which details which devices are proven to work reliably with the total amount of Durec channels.

The improvement with UFX II and UFX+ is, that the newer devices have a real time clock, so that you get timestamps on the recorded files. And the compatibility to some drives has been improved. But this is at the end no big issue.

Of course, if you want, you can get the UFX II, if you want to have the latest and greatest.

BUT then you are back to the old "flagship" price in the range of €2000.

All that I tell you is .. if you want to go now for a 802 and are not willed to pay €2000 for UFX II or €2700 for UFX+.
Then you definitively SHOULD look at the UFX as long as it is available in the market.
You cant get any better interface in terms of features and functionality.

When UFX II and UFX+ were not yet available in the market, then it was the flagship interface superior to all other interfaces (802, UCX, etc ...). So .. you do nothing wrong by getting it now for a much reduced price.

Ok i read the rest.. durec is useless for me then.. at least i need the timestamps. The way it is now, i would be having to chop every audio file i imported to pro tools to line up perfectly and i hate doing that.

I don't do any live situation where durec might be useful.

But still, If i can find a UFX, of course it makes sense to get it over an 802 with what you have said..and the fact it is only firewire 400 on the 802 after all, well, all good then. If i can not find a reasonable priced ufx in australia within 10% of the 802 price, then i might still get that. It's hardly going to be a bad interface..I do one vocal and one guitar but everything else is synths.. most of them old.. they can only sound as good as their own DAC and the the 802 ADC is way better than any of my synths as it is.

Of course these points are all moot if MC comes back tomorrow and the throughput dsp mixer latency is no better than apollo.. i'd then stick with that. It all comes down to the total mix latency for me, i need it to be as close to analog (0) as possible.

No, this is not true. You dont know the workflow.

The Durec File is ONE file containing all tracks multiplexed.

So after a recording of lets say 4h of 20 tracks, you have only ONE big file.

This file you can either directly drag and drop to your DAW (Cubase allows for this)
or
You can extract it with RME multi-channel batch processor and then import the single tracks to your DAW.

Of course all the files of one Durec Recording start at the beginning at the same timestamp.

With timestamps I only meant, that on the Durec Medium (Stick, Disk) the big Durec files have no Date and Time.
On UFX you can differentiate the BIG multiplexed files only by its sequence number in the file name.
On UFX II and UFX+ there is a clock inside the device, there the Durec Files have a timestamp.

BUT ... if you do one or more recordings ... you can easily differentiate them by the number in the file and by content when playing back which is also possible.

i read the manual and you are right, i really do not understand durec at all.

What i would need is something that can start recording only when the audio playback starts, perfectly on time, so i could insert right on the grid in my daw.. if it can't do this, i won't use it. From your explanation i still don't understand whether it can. The way i read the manual it says i have to hit the record button manually, so no matter how fast i am, it still won't be sample accurate to the beat when dragged into daw.. if i can do this, let me know! Pro tools is well known to give errors when recording even with fast hard drives, so a backup system is not a bad thing!

Hi, thanks!

is 44k the same latency as 48K All were done but the main one i asked for lol! But surely it couldn't be much higher!

Which interface is this? The 802 manual shows higher  figures than that for the ad da..

BUT, i can still work it out, cause i can add 33 samples to the result.

it's exactly 1ms at 44k for the 802'w A/D/DA rountrip, so add another 0.75ms to that for the FPGA..

basically it's 1.75ms at 48k but i wonder if it's still under 2ms for the 44K.

Still, even the first gen UFX would be faster than this yes?

As it stands, even the 802 looks like it is no higher than 2ms complete RTL at the 44 sample rate.

This is huge news, and means rme dsp AND the converters are MUCH faster than the UAD.

If the figures you just gave, cause you didn't specify which interface, are valid for the UFX, it would mean the UFX RTL with FX at 48K is only 1.45 MS.. this is as close to analog as we will ever get, and faster than all digital mixers i know of.

If 44K on a UFX first gen (this is as high as i will spend and i want firewire as said) is 1.45 ms RTL, WOW, this is amazing. Vocalist would never complain about monitoring, i can put a bit of dsp verb for him or her, and a compressor, and all my midi synths will play in perfect time with my daw project playback, unlike the apollo dsp mixer.. it means i can stay in the midi domain instead of having to record everything to audio all the time like i do with the apollo. For a bit of fun i might even invest in a little patch bay and an external lexicon 400 as well, still keep me cheaper than a second apollo 8.

the scarlet octopres has word clock out but the octopre mark 2 has only in.

So this is how i do it on apollo and i presume on the RME.. i would use RME as master clock, take bnc out into scarlett octo pre, then out of the scarlett pre into the octopreMK2, then the adats of both into the RME via optical cable. This works perfectly with the apollo as master.

Tell me, does the AES EBU digital input of the RME gear have a "resample" option at input, just for that channel? This is important to use the virus via digital, it causes clicks and pops otherwise. If not, no matter, i am still happy with 28 analog ins and could buy a 2 channel a/d to aes sometime in the future to make use of all 30 ins, if i needed to.

Thanks for your work MC

Thanks! I agree 9ms is much to high. And wow those are great figures for TM FX! On top of this, if you ever play your Kontakt libraries live, you will notice an improved low latency experience with RME. In my humble experiences it is night and day, usable 64 samples buffer under heavy load!
And as a side note...I am still on UAD1's

Simply also record your audio playback as well by using loopback then you have all tracks together in the Durec file.

Does it really matter ?

If you have all relevant tracks in the Durec recording (which I suggested, to record also the playback track)

then you can import this to your DAW

And there you can use cut the recording

More important is that all the tracks have the same time base which is the case by recording them all.

Maybe RME can comment to this.

As Durec recording, stop, playback can be controlled by the ARC USB I would guess that its either possible or maybe not so tricky to implement this via MIDI.

Simply forget Durec for the time being then .. its a nice feature, but maybe not for you now.

Nevertheless the UFX is compared to the 802 advanced.
Its, as I said, a nice thing to be able to get it now for only a few bucks more.
With or without Durec ... doesnt matter.

no u wrote 0.7ms + 33 samples.. it's the initial figure im asking about in 44k

so 802 has more up to date converters than old ufx?

i'll read the online manual again, cheers, must have read it wrong

You can find it also in my PDF under "Wandler Verzögerungen in samples AD/DA"

http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/index.php … 017-01-pdf

You forgot the UFX II ...
Its the UFX+ without
- MADI
- USB3, Thunderbolt

Otherwise the same and USB2 only because of the 30 channels.

The UFXII / UFX+ got many enhancements compared to the UFX.

You can read them here:
http://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/inde … 8-RME-UFX/

Should not be too hard to read the german and translate it into english, I substracted here the UFX+ bits and pieces:

- Überarbeitung der analogen Schaltkreise und des DSPs
- verbesserte SNR und THD Werte
- Direct USB Recording (DuRec): bis zu 76 Kanäle können gleichzeitig aufgenommen werden (ie 12 analog, 64 Madi)
- Interne Real Time Clock, ermöglicht Zeitstempel in Dateinamen für DuRec
- Erhöhte Zuverlässigkeit bei Verwendung langsamerer oder "multi partitioned" USB thumb devices
- Mikrofon Eingänge mit +18dBU max, kein PAD
- Mikrofon Eingänge haben 75 (!) dB Gain Range, das sind 10dB mehr im Vergleich zu UCX/UFX und 15dB mehr im Vergleich zum 802.
- Kopfhörer Ausgänge mit nur 2 Ohm Impedanz, mit +19 dBU max output Level
- Neue Remote Control "ARC USB" (Details siehe unten) für regulären und stand-alone Betrieb
- Die beiden Drehgeber rechts vom Display regeln nun individuell die Lautstärke von Phones 9/10 und 11/12.
- Fully stand-alone. Es gibt im Vergleich zum UFX zusätzliche Einstellungsmöglichkeiten.

Suggestions, ask your dealer. Get the two (802, UFX II), decide then. USB only is not a real reason to say no to an UFX II.

don't give up, i misunderstood.

so it's 0.7 TOTAL rtl at 48K?

wow that's incredible which means even the ufx is only 1ms total not 2 like i thought.

ufx it is then for extra features.

huh? i have checked the best australian dealers by phone since 9am this morning.. ufx 2 is at least 1 grand more than ufx or 802/

i said i want to have some money in the bank.

btw, found the 802 remote in stock for 200

regardless, the ufx is a better buy as you said.. i misunderstood the latency figures.

To have that much nicer screen and extra midi is a good thing.. also the 802 misses the monitoring knob as i said as well as the detailed level meters.. just noticed that.

UFX is a 7yo interface though.. i might try hear them side by side to my apollo.. the apollo d/a seems to be better specced, although RME measure unweighted, apollo is a weighted.. i need to do some research on this..

usb is no good in my case, as i said both busses are already struggling to cope with the bandwidth i have asked of them. Adding 30 inputs of audio in realtime is impossible . I know this, because i tried a babyface pro of my friends to listen to the rme compressor, and it couldn't cope with 12 live inputs as usb bandwidth was exceeded. All i got was clicks and pops.. I have already 2 x 10 hubs on two of the 4 usb 2 outputs (only 2 busses actually though).. and on each of the other usb ports has a motif streaming audio and data and a virus streaming 6 channels of audio and midi.. on the hubs i have drives being maxxed out, dongles, and another 8 midi devices, as well as my 5x5 motu usb midi. Forget it.

I'd need to buy a thunderbolt hub with a pass through, to access another usb buss.

The unused firewire bus is working perfectly, i tried a motu interface on it and it was great.. rme can only be better.

Finally, the new problem i may have discovered is that the combo jacks on the front of the ufx and 802 are XLR or unbalanced TS only for the line ins, so i presume for guitars or microphones.

Does this mean my synths won't work in those inputs?

anyway, the total recall of the pre levels in UFX, the bonus that i *may* use some day of durec, the screen and meters and extra midi port means that will be the one i get, and make do with the extra 0.5ms output latency.. it's still only 1.22 total RTL at 44.1K which is incredible and almost half the apollo at 44k using no effects.. but the rme measurement is through the eq, comp and i can use verb and delay as well. On apollo one must add yet ANOTHER 32 samples to use the aux buss.. the devil is all in the very hidden details. Uad console latency sucks.