USB Studio D scheduled to ship beginning December '99 |
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NEW PRICING: USB StudioD . . . $849.00
DEPARTMENTS      
Offers 2 microphone inputs, 2 high impedance instrument inputs, 4 stereo line inputs, 1 tape/phono input (with switchable phono input amplifier), digital input (optical/coaxial) Record enable switch and volume pot for every input USB interface (compatible with Mac OS 9) for recording and playback to and from your Mac. Recording output for tape Monitor output for amplifier/active monitoring with volume Headphone output with volume Digital output with volume (optical/coaxial) Special zero latency configurable monitoring 19" case with internal power supply
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Compact rackmount mixer with USB digital audio interface A reader's tip sent us in the direction of a company called Swissonic. To our chagrin, we'd not heard of them. More so, thanks for the tip as this manufacturer has been very responsive and enthusiastic towards ourselves and our readers. So, what did we find? USB Studio and USB Studio D are the first innovations of Swissonic to support the USB interface. The USB Studio is not only way to get audio into the computer, it is also a complete mixer that connects all audio sources in a typical home recording studio. This is not a multitrack unit per se, as it's multitude of inputs are parsed to one stereo set of audio data. Could be great in a rack with a rackmount iMac studio. You can record from all inputs simultaneously, but only two channels are recorded in one pass. It is full duplex recording. Company spokesperson Geoffrey Clegg is very forthright regarding multitrack & USB "We are not going to provide any USB multichannel solution." Continuing, "Because of the limited USB bandwidth. Multitrack recording is really something for a proper soundcard. With multichannel converters. If not, The new iMac's have 2 independent 12Mbit USB ports. Would that fix it? Theoretically yes. But they also have FireWire, and we will come up with some very nice FireWire converters." This is the first audio manufacturer to go on record with MacRocks.com regarding FireWire audio converters. We feel more will follow. But let's get back to the inputs. USB Studio and USB Studio D offer 2 balanced inputs with insert, phantom power and phase inversion switch to connect microphones along with 2 high-impedance inputs for acoustic pickups, 4 stereo line inputs for electric instruments and a stereo line input with a switchable phono pre-amp for turntable connection. Each input has a separate volume control potentiometer. The units have separate analog outputs for left/right master, monitoring and stereo headphones. Each input features a record selector for the USB interface, a VU meter and a level control. Each input signal can be send as a stereo digital audio signal to the computer at 44.1 or 48 kHz. Single and multiple inputs can be selected for recording via the USB interface. If an input channel is selected for recording, the user can select between monitoring the input signal or allow the application software to switch between input and playback monitoring to simulate the punch in function of a multitrack tape recorder. This feature eliminates latency problems. The USB Studio can be used with the Mac OS 8.7 sound manager. It is not recommended to load the USB with a variety of bandwidth hogging storage devices or some kinds of adapters (serial, SCSI, etc.). As an extension of the USB Studio, Swissonic offers the USB Studio D with additional digital inputs and outputs (optical/coaxial). The digital inputs operate with a sampling frequency range of 32-50 kHz. The volume of the digital input can be adjusted for recording. "We are proud to present our first designs using the new and very popular USB interface. When we decided to use USB for digital audio transmission, we simply thought of an easy way to get audio in and out of the computer. Thinking more about that led us to the idea of building a complete mixer around the USB interface. The USB Studio and USB Studio D are not only perfect units for home and project studios, but also for multimedia use," says Daniel Feusi, General Manager of Swissonic AG. "A user can connect to virtually every sound source in a typical home studio, allowing high quality digital audio recording without the use of any soundcard. The mixers can be used stand alone or with any USB Macintosh, including powerbooks for mobile recording. Swissonic will introduce more innovative USB audio products in the near future".
For more information about USB Studio and USB Studio D, please contact: USA: International:
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