Topic: Fireface UFX+ vs Fireface UFX III? What are the real advantages?

Hello dear RME community!

I'm a happy user of RME Fireface UFX+ with M1 Mac.

In March 2023, RME released UFX III.

Does anybody know, what are the real advantages of UFX III over UFX+?

I made a comparison via Compare tool on the site, but I don't see differences. The same quantity of I/Os, the same overall specs.

I really love Thunderbolt connectivity of my UFX+ since it uses less CPU instead of USB-connection.

Also I'm wondering which chips UFX III uses for AD/DA? Is it now SABRE? Personally I'm trying to avoid SABREs since I don't like the "harsh" sounding of them.

- Fireface UFX III + ARC USB + [Genelec 8331 + 7350]/[Genelec 8341 + 7360]
- ADI 2 DAC FS
- BFP FS

Re: Fireface UFX+ vs Fireface UFX III? What are the real advantages?

> The same quantity of I/Os, the same overall specs

The compare tool is only "high level", you need to look more into the details.

Why didn't you look to the products page on web, it contains also a nice summary of changes.
You could also compare technical specs in the manual to see the improvements in the analog and digital section.

You can get this information also from my blog, I wrote an article about the changes and make some pictures of the tools and environment. The link you find in this posting on forum:
https://forum.rme-audio.de/viewtopic.ph … 63#p204163

So it's worth to read the RME forum regulary wink

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub14

Re: Fireface UFX+ vs Fireface UFX III? What are the real advantages?

ramses wrote:

> The same quantity of I/Os, the same overall specs

The compare tool is only "high level", you need to look more into the details.

Why didn't you look to the products page on web, it contains also a nice summary of changes.
You could also compare technical specs in the manual to see the improvements in the analog and digital section.

You can get this information also from my blog, I wrote an article about the changes and make some pictures of the tools and environment. The link you find in this posting on forum:
https://forum.rme-audio.de/viewtopic.ph … 63#p204163

So it's worth to read the RME forum regulary wink

Thank you, ramses!

Now it’s clear. No important advantages for me.

I’ve also read your article RTL comparison of different RME products (EN/DE) and UFX+ via Thunderbolt is still a winner in terms of latency.

- Fireface UFX III + ARC USB + [Genelec 8331 + 7350]/[Genelec 8341 + 7360]
- ADI 2 DAC FS
- BFP FS

4 (edited by ramses 2023-06-23 13:33:43)

Re: Fireface UFX+ vs Fireface UFX III? What are the real advantages?

borisovonline wrote:
ramses wrote:

> The same quantity of I/Os, the same overall specs

The compare tool is only "high level", you need to look more into the details.

Why didn't you look to the products page on web, it contains also a nice summary of changes.
You could also compare technical specs in the manual to see the improvements in the analog and digital section.

You can get this information also from my blog, I wrote an article about the changes and make some pictures of the tools and environment. The link you find in this posting on forum:
https://forum.rme-audio.de/viewtopic.ph … 63#p204163

So it's worth to read the RME forum regulary wink

Thank you, ramses!

Now it’s clear. No important advantages for me.

I’ve also read your article RTL comparison of different RME products (EN/DE) and UFX+ via Thunderbolt is still a winner in terms of latency.

The difference in RTL between UFX+ with TB and UFX III with USB3 is just around 0.35ms. At a speed of sound of around 343 m per second, the distance is just (only) 12 cm. Musicians on stage have to live with much higher latencies, right?!

Would you consider that as a significant difference for your applications? Especially since the RTL quickly rises to significantly higher ranges of over 10 ms with increasing buffer sizes anyway? Then the 0.35ms differences are really quite insignificant and can be ignored.

Or name your use case in which this statement of yours this should be relevant.

The purpose of my table is not to demonstrate any "night and day" differencies of products, the opposite is the case, I want to demonstrate how efficient the drivers are and how close all these values of different products are no matter whether we talk about USB2, USB3, FW, TB or PCIe.

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub14

5 (edited by borisovonline 2023-06-23 14:31:39)

Re: Fireface UFX+ vs Fireface UFX III? What are the real advantages?

ramses wrote:
borisovonline wrote:
ramses wrote:

> The same quantity of I/Os, the same overall specs

The compare tool is only "high level", you need to look more into the details.

Why didn't you look to the products page on web, it contains also a nice summary of changes.
You could also compare technical specs in the manual to see the improvements in the analog and digital section.

You can get this information also from my blog, I wrote an article about the changes and make some pictures of the tools and environment. The link you find in this posting on forum:
https://forum.rme-audio.de/viewtopic.ph … 63#p204163

So it's worth to read the RME forum regulary wink

Thank you, ramses!

Now it’s clear. No important advantages for me.

I’ve also read your article RTL comparison of different RME products (EN/DE) and UFX+ via Thunderbolt is still a winner in terms of latency.

The difference in RTL between UFX+ with TB and UFX III with USB3 is just around 0.35ms. At a speed of sound of around 343 m per second, the distance is just (only) 12 cm. Musicians on stage have to live with much higher latencies, right?!

Would you consider that as a significant difference for your applications? Especially since the RTL quickly rises to significantly higher ranges of over 10 ms with increasing buffer sizes anyway? Then the 0.35ms differences are really quite insignificant and can be ignored.

Or name your use case in which this statement of yours this should be relevant.

The purpose of my table is not to demonstrate any "night and day" differencies of products, the opposite is the case, I want to demonstrate how efficient the drivers are and how close all these values of different products are no matter whether we talk about USB2, USB3, FW, TB or PCIe.


Yep, you’re right.

I just don’t like the idea of USB itself because of CPU usage and serial nature and prefer PCIe.

Anyway, I’ve never encountered any significant problems with my previous Babyface (blue gen.). Maybe had 5-6 times with synchronisation quirks in a DAW.

- Fireface UFX III + ARC USB + [Genelec 8331 + 7350]/[Genelec 8341 + 7360]
- ADI 2 DAC FS
- BFP FS

6 (edited by ramses 2023-06-23 16:08:23)

Re: Fireface UFX+ vs Fireface UFX III? What are the real advantages?

borisovonline wrote:
ramses wrote:
borisovonline wrote:

Thank you, ramses!

Now it’s clear. No important advantages for me.

I’ve also read your article RTL comparison of different RME products (EN/DE) and UFX+ via Thunderbolt is still a winner in terms of latency.

The difference in RTL between UFX+ with TB and UFX III with USB3 is just around 0.35ms. At a speed of sound of around 343 m per second, the distance is just (only) 12 cm. Musicians on stage have to live with much higher latencies, right?!

Would you consider that as a significant difference for your applications? Especially since the RTL quickly rises to significantly higher ranges of over 10 ms with increasing buffer sizes anyway? Then the 0.35ms differences are really quite insignificant and can be ignored.

Or name your use case in which this statement of yours this should be relevant.

The purpose of my table is not to demonstrate any "night and day" differencies of products, the opposite is the case, I want to demonstrate how efficient the drivers are and how close all these values of different products are no matter whether we talk about USB2, USB3, FW, TB or PCIe.


Yep, you’re right.

I just don’t like the idea of USB itself because of CPU usage and serial nature and prefer PCIe.

Anyway, I’ve never encountered any significant problems with my previous Babyface (blue gen.). Maybe had 5-6 times with synchronisation quirks in a DAW.

I felt the same like you in the past and even had Firewire as a preference over USB when I bought my 1st RME product, the UFX.

Then I found out that USB runs even better (at that time I had different HW and not all samplerates worked well at every ASIO buffersize) and it gave me the advantage to be able to perform firmware upgrades.

A little later I became interested in getting a PCIe based RayDAT and to use the UFX in standalone mode.
I noticed that it was possible, but at the end of the day I had no real advantage in terms of RTL. Finally I found out that having to operate two interfaces was a little but combersome.

Then finally I got the UFX+ with Octopre XTC and additionally ADI-2 Pro for the monitoring.
As I had no thunderbolt based mainboard I had to use USB3 and it was no issue.

The RayDAT was still in the PC but not in use, but I was able to perform some load / stress tests to compare UFX+ with USB3 vs. RayDAT (PCIe). Finally I noticed that there was no real difference in terms of stability. USB and PCIe performed both well.

400 tracks, 803 VST, 16 GB DRAM usage .. and playback worked well at the lowest ASIO buffersize at 44.1 and 96 kHz.

https://www.tonstudio-forum.de/blog/Ent … cks-de-en/

Since then I didn't worry anymore not having something PCIe or TB based ;-)

If you still have your preferences, fair enough. I only wanted to ask you to open your mind and that maybe experiences of the past do not necessarily have to be generalized. Best is to stay open minded. At the end this often gives you more options.

For my applications, it was more interesting to get the smallest converter latency, so UFX III. But this is also more a "gut" feeling, not 100% convinced whether the upgrade from UFX+ to UFX III was really needed. But I have a better feeling with the smallest latency, as I use the UFX III as parallel effect loop for two Marshall combos and also the guitar is connected to the UFX III (to be able to re-amp if needed) .. therefore I wanted the smallest AD/DA conversion latency, even if the difference appears to be small.

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub14

Re: Fireface UFX+ vs Fireface UFX III? What are the real advantages?

And? Was the faster converter latency more or less than 12cm in the end?

Re: Fireface UFX+ vs Fireface UFX III? What are the real advantages?

hselters wrote:

And? Was the faster converter latency more or less than 12cm in the end?

Who exactly are you asking the question to? smile Me or ramses?

- Fireface UFX III + ARC USB + [Genelec 8331 + 7350]/[Genelec 8341 + 7360]
- ADI 2 DAC FS
- BFP FS