• Registered: 2022-01-18
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Topic: UCX II,Babyface,UFX... hardware generations

Hello,

Is there a short description anywhere that could summarise the hardware 'generation' of current interfaces (analog stages, converters, etc.). Like how Metric Halo puts a simple converter/analog 'generation' for their interfaces. I can't tell how much 'better' in the conversion and analog stages this new UCX II is compared to the bigger boxes (if at all)?

I currently have a Babyface Pro FS, which I bought to see me through while I'm rebuilding my room, and I will likely be looking at RME for my next interface in a few months time, but I can't figure out how comparable various interfaces are currently. Pure numbers don't tell the whole story.

If you had to sort them all in conversion quality (DA more important than AD) for mostly mixing duties with at least 4 ins and 4 outs (don't care too much about mic pres, they seem good on all of them), would you go UCX II > UFXII/+, or is the UFX line still the daddy of them all?

(Fwiw, Babyface Pro FS sounds quite good to me right now, and I'd likely just keep it, but I'm going to need clock in/out so looking at possibly UCX II. But if UFXs are better in in/out quality then I'll just go for that instead)

2 Reply by vinark (edited by vinark 2022-01-18 16:48:07)

  • vinark
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Re: UCX II,Babyface,UFX... hardware generations

No way to use the clocking through the adat ports of your BF? I doubt there will be anything noticeably better then what you have now, only measurable and that is for the ADI-2 line.
And more powerfull headphone amps, because not on usb power, but that is it and the BF power is perfect for most headphones, wouldn't you think?

Vincent, Amsterdam
https://soundcloud.com/thesecretworld
BFpro fs, 2X HDSP9652 ADI-8AE, 2X HDSP9632
  • Registered: 2022-01-18
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Re: UCX II,Babyface,UFX... hardware generations

vinark wrote:

No way to use the clocking through the adat ports of your BF? I doubt there will be anything noticeably better then what you have now, only measurable and that is for the ADI-2 line.
And more powerfull headphone amps, because not on usb power, but that is it and the BF power is perfect for most headphones, wouldn't you think?

Maybe a little bit more context here:

My pre-pandemic room had Prism Titan, hooked to Elysia EQ, a SSL buss compressor and Culture Vulture for the analog buss processing, and headphones were serviced by a Benchmark DAC. I *love* Prism sound, but I wasn't too happy with the routing and there was no remote for it so had to keep mousing around to patch monitoring to various inputs. RME can solve that I hope.

If RME can match that sound (and I hope it can) then I'll go with it, mostly convinced by Totalmix to be honest. Just can't tell if UCXII will be good enough, or if I need to go UFX route - no shops in London have their demo rooms open yet, so can't easily test in a well treated room on a pair of good monitors (plus no one seems to have stock of UFX anywhere. UCXII can still be found, but not UFX).

Re. headphones - Benchmark DAC stays, so I'm not too worried about that. Been using it for headphones for years and it's just great.

The new room will likely have a pair of Neve 1073DPDs, with digital outs which I'd like to use for occasional recording, hence world clock would be nice to have.

4 Reply by ramses (edited by ramses 2022-01-19 11:53:55)

  • ramses
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Re: UCX II,Babyface,UFX... hardware generations

EDITED#2:

I would suggest a combination of RME recording interface with TM FX and ADI-2 Pro FS R BE for monitoring or listening to music.

The ADI-2 Pro would give you a lot of very useful features. See e.g. here in my blog to get an overview:
https://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/ind … ses-EN-DE/

And here how to integrate it into your setup: https://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/ind … our-Setup/

See also these two thread where I did the same proposal if money is no limiting factor:
- https://forum.rme-audio.de/viewtopic.ph … 12#p180512
- https://forum.rme-audio.de/viewtopic.php?pid=151356

Maybe my Excel comparison sheet is also of good use for you, as you can compare many technical inforation and features which I have taken from manuals, product pages and the forum, see my blog article here:
https://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/ind … B-MADIfac/
Direct link to the excel is here: https://www.tonstudio-forum.de/index.ph … -04b-xlsx/

I would consider: UCX II if you want a more compact form factor.
Better would be to consider UFX II or UFX+ when you have more ADAT channels which migt be helpful in case you want to connect an external preamps or ADDA converter with 8 channels with dual speed.
UFX+ with MADI gives you here most advantages in terms of scalability.

ADI-2 Pro can also be connected through AES (UCX II, UFX II, UFX+) so that you can use all ADAT ports for other purposes to connect external devices.

If you sometimes would need the llowest RTL (round trip latency) possible then the UFX+ is recommended.
You can connect it to the PC through USB3 or Thunderbolt.
Both drivers (the newer MADIface USB driver and the Thunderbolt driver) allow you to configure very low ASIO buffersize of 32 samples in single speed (like with HDSPe cards) if you would need that in certain cases.

Another advantage could be for you, that UFX+ and ADI-2 Pro use the same USB driver (MADIface). So you can directly access the ports of both devices from a DAW for recording or playback. They only need to be synchronized (e.g. through AES) and you need to ensure to use the same ASIO buffersize for both interfaces in the driver to stay sample synchron, not to get a few samples offset due to different buffering.

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub13
  • Registered: 2022-01-18
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Re: UCX II,Babyface,UFX... hardware generations

Hey thanks! That's a treasure trove of very good information! And now you got me thinking about ADI-2 Pro in combination with Babyface Pro FS I already have... the quality of the new ADI2 is non disputable, and Babyface is already a pretty decent 'remote' on its own, if I ignore the mess of cables I'd have around it... decisions, decisions!

6 Reply by ramses (edited by ramses 2022-01-19 12:06:02)

  • ramses
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Re: UCX II,Babyface,UFX... hardware generations

I added some more info, sorry, editing is sometimes an incremental process for me wink
Of course a combination of BBF Pro FS and ADI-2 Pro FS is possible.
Depends on what features you require.
UCX II, UFX II and UFX+ have some extremely cool features, question is whether you need them or whether it's worth the price difference for you personally.

Here a summary of features of the new UCX II:
https://forum.rme-audio.de/viewtopic.ph … 27#p171327

With useful features I mean e.g.:
- mic inputs with 75 dB gain
- Autoset (to get the proper gain quick and reliable, check manual)
- DURec (backup or standalone recording)
- Hi-power low impedance headphone output (UFX * even two of them, could be useful during a session with some ppl)
- more reference levels supported on analog ports
- full implementation of FX chip (BBF Pro: dynamics via PC CPU by the driver)
- Additional AES I/O
- word clock
- USB port to connect ARC USB e.g. in stand-alone mode (dedicated on the UFX II/+)
- more analog ports and digital ports in general to connect more stuff without having to buy an external device
- advantage of analog ports, number stays constant also when using higher sample rates (double/quad speed)
- more free ports available as a reserve when you need loopback

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub13