TC ELECTRONIC KONNEKT 24D (FireWire Audio Interface)

[greenkidd]

Thanks Craig and Mike for everything!

 

The v1.03 is working great on my system. Much tighter under Sonar 6.01. I'm running on Vista RC2. Yes Vista. Konnekt 24D does run fine although the Konnekt doesn't show up as a sound device under Vista's Windows Sound but it works great under Sonar 6.01 nonetheless. I've been using a EMU 0404 PCI soundcard for Vista system sound.

 

Mike

I know that Vista is not officially supported yet but was wondering if TC has plans for a Vista update soon?

 

thanks again for the v1.03 update!

 

BTY, I had stuttering issues inside Sonar initially but deleted the aud.ini and reprofiled the Konnekt and everything was then fine.

 

The only anomaly I've seen is within the TC Control panel. The "autoshow" button still doesn't stay selected. It always reverts back to "show". I have reported this to TC Dev but it's still not fixed unless I'm not understanding how it works. This was a problem when I was running on Windows XP as well.

 

Brian

[Mike Martin]

 

Originally posted by greenkidd Thanks Craig and Mike for everything! .....The only anomaly I've seen is within the TC Control panel. The "autoshow" button still doesn't stay selected. It always reverts back to "show". I have reported this to TC Dev but it's still not fixed unless I'm not understanding how it works. This was a problem when I was running on Windows XP as well. Brian

 

 

Brian,

I haven't seen a bug with the "autoshow" feature. Just so we're clear, you're refering to the item on the SETUP page? I've attached a screen shot below.

 

Are you using the ADAT or SPDIF inputs? I'm always using both in my desktop setup so perhaps I haven't noticed but I'll keep an eye on it.

[greenkidd]

Hi Mike

 

Yes, The "autoshow" under Setup. If I select it then close the TC Near control panel the "autoshow" that I just selected goes back to "show". Like I said, this has been logged by TC support and was supposedly fixed in the last update (v1.02)but I noticed even on the latest it's still an issue on my system anyway.

 

I'm using SPDIF but I noticed it doesn't stay selected if I choose ADAT as well.

 

I'd be curious if anyone can confirm.

 

thanks

Brian

[Mike Martin]

Brian,

 

Did you also install the firmware update when you put in 1.03? On the ABOUT page you'll find the update firmware selection.

[greenkidd]

About reads FIRMWARE VERSION 1.03 build 952

 

Yes, I did the flash after the driver upgrade.

 

Brian

 

Sorry Craig, didn't mean to hijack your excellent thread.

 

 

Gigabyte GA-K8NS Ultra-939 NForce 3 Ultra (bios F10

w/latest NVidia drivers)

Athlon 64 3500

2 gigs of Corsair Value Select DDR 3200 (Dual Channel mode)

ATI Radeon 9550 AGP Video (no fan, quiet)

Dell 1800FP (digital LCD monitor)

Antec Phantom 500 watt power (no fan, quiet)

(1) 120 gig Seagate Barracuda 7200rpm

(2) 160 gig Seagate Barracuda's 7200rpm (EIDE for all

drives, no SATA)

Vista RC2 (build 5744)

TC Electronic Konnekt 24D (firewire soundcard)

ADS Tech Pyro PCI64 firewire card (TI chipset)

EMU 0404 (PCI soundcard)

Edirol PCR-M30 keyboard

Lite-On External DVD-RW/CDRW

[Cmusicmaker]

Originally posted by Mike Martin I asked our engineers for a little more feedback on this question and I got a detailed answer. The Konnekt (and the DICE II chip) has a jitter level of 47 pico seconds RMS (band width limited to 100 Hz to 40 kHz). It is difficult to compare with the numbers of the Saffire directly (without knowing what is the band width and is it peak or RMS etc.) What is jitter? Here is an AES paper that was written on the subject by the engineer that designer of the clock circuit in the Konnekt 24D, as well as AIR, EQ Station and System 6000. http://www.tcelectronic.com/media/frandsen_2000_clock_synchr.pdf There will be more on the subject posted on our website very soon. -Mike Martin TC|US

 

Cheers Mike.

 

The 1.03 update looks great judging by the comments on this thread. Great work.

 

Someone managed to get the Konnekt working on Vista...what time frame do you have for official Vista support?

[Anderton]

Sorry Craig, didn't mean to hijack your excellent thread.

 

Not a problem at all! That's the whole point of a Pro Review, we have the option to dig really deep and go into tangents related to the product.

 

I'd like to think that our putting the spotlight on the Sonar issues helped resolve them...if so, TC is really responsive, and if not, then that's just as good because it means they're doing their own digging.

 

And Mike, again, thanks for taking the time and bandwidth to be such an active, involved participant.

[Dr. Gruv]

Can't thank you guys enough - this really looks promising...

 

Very esoteric question for comparison... and this shows how far other manufacturers have come...

 

Could any end users or moderators provide a comparison between (1) the metric halo unl-2 and (2) the konnekt 24D and (3) the focusrite saffire 26 i/0?

 

Any insight would be helpful...

 

JUST the fact that i'm trying to compare the konnekt to another piece (over 2x the price) speaks volumes...

 

Issues for me - (1) Stablilty and (2) Sound - if any could compare these features between these units that would be great!

 

thanx in advance

 

-michael

 

I went an copied and pasted features from the various webiste of the specs... here is the pdf file...

 

http://www.musicrowsongs.com/firewire.pdf

 

but this doesn't relate to my two issues - stability and sound...

[greenkidd]

Here's my impressions of this device so far.

 

I think I'll chime in since I've had some time to think about this device. I bought this device about 6 weeks ago and was probably one of the first to get one. I promptly installed v1.01 drivers under Windows XP and had pretty good initial results. Strangely, I didn't have the exact kind of problems that Craig Anderton and others using Sonar experienced. My initial impressions were that the device worked OK but latencies inside Sonar weren't great.

 

I was seeing 11.6ms with both ASIO and WDM. Anything below that would produce pops and crackles. I got in touch with TC devs and they were reporting that they were getting 5ms\128 samples with their internal testing. I started to think about what cards I had installed on the PCI bus and to look at that a bit.

 

First, I noted that I had a generic PCI USB card and my firewire card had a NEC chipset. Since I wasn't new to how different chipsets can affect firewire performance I decided to try a firewire card with a VIA chipset. It didn't make much of a difference. I continued researching and discovered that Texas Instrument chipsets are "in many cases" the preferred chipsets for video and audio devices. I then bought an ADS firewire card which actually improved things a bit but was still getting snap, crackle, pops at 5ms with ASIO or WDM.

 

Next, I decided to remove the USB PCI card. This made all the difference. That USB card turned out to be the biggest culprit as USB is known to be "chatty" and was probably taxing the PCI bus more than I realized. I simply replaced the USB card with a powered USB hub that connects to the motherboard USB ports. After this I was able to run 2.9 ms ASIO and 5.8 ms WDM with medium size projects 20-30 tracks, 2-3 softsynths, 10-15 VST effects. Not bad but could be better.

 

Since this time, TC has released 2 updates (firmware and driver) in a fairly short timeframe. They are definitely not dragging their butts in putting together a stable and reliable driver. This means a lot to me. I had a feeling they would produce a stable driver as I have used their Powercore Element and was impressed.

 

This unit sounds great. The converters are excellent. How good? Well, I owned the EMU 1820m and would probably have a hard time distinguishing between the 2 in a blind taste test. The effects are TC.....clear and smooth. I own the TC M350 multi-effects unit and have owned the M-One XL. The quality of effects is comparable to those FX units.ADAT ports for expandability. True networking capability meaning chaining multiple Konnekt's together. Standalone mode. Auto sensing inputs. The list goes on. They will no doubt be refining it capabilities as time goes on. The bottom line is get the right firewire card (TI based) and it's clear sailing. That's a hell of a lot better than what I can say about other manufacturers out of the chute with a new product.

 

I'm actually using it under Windows Vista RC2. Except for the fact that Windows Sound system doesn't detect it (Konnekt 24D) the current driver works great under Sonar 6.01. I'm using a EMU 0404 PCI soundcard as my Windows sound playback device under Vista. Life is surprisingly good on the bleeding edge.

 

Brian

 

Gigabyte GA-K8NS Ultra-939 NForce 3 Ultra (bios F10 w/latest NVidia drivers)

Athlon 64 3500

(2) GB's of Corsair Value Select DDR 3200 (Dual Channel mode)

ATI Radeon 9550 AGP Video (no fan, quiet)

Dell 1800FP (digital LCD monitor)

Antec Phantom 500 watt power (no fan, quiet)

(1) 120 gig Seagate Barracuda 7200rpm

(2) 160 gig Seagate Barracuda's 7200rpm (EIDE for all drives, no SATA)

Vista RC2 (build 5744)

TC Electronic Konnekt 24D (firewire soundcard)

ADS Tech Pyro PCI64 firewire card (TI chipset)

EMU 0404 (PCI soundcard)

Edirol PCR-M30 keyboard

Lite-On External DVD-RW/CDRW

[shawn fin]

Hi Craig. I followed your tutorial for using Fabric R as a send/return effect in Acid 6, but I am unable to monitor the reverb when it has been selected as the output on a given bus. Even with the input monitor feature engaged in Acid, I cannot hear the reverb being applied to a dry track. Any more thoughts on this?

[Anderton]

Is the Fabrik R set to Computer S/R stereo in the Setup page?

 

I know that it works because I got it working so the only question is what did I do differently that you didn't...hmmm...

[Anderton]

Could any end users or moderators provide a comparison between (1) the metric halo unl-2 and (2) the konnekt 24D and (3) the focusrite saffire 26 i/0?

 

Sorry, I don't have the other units here for testing.

 

Issues for me - (1) Stablilty and (2) Sound

 

I can't speak for the other devices, but the Konnekt 24D does have an extremely clean, defined sound. And since 1.03, I'd give high marks for stability. I haven't pushed the living daylights out of 1.03 yet, but so far, so good.

[Power Mac User]

....hi all:)

 

I like this Thread, too. Because, i'am very interested in the audio-quality of that unit. Not for the Sound of the Pre-amps( ok, nice that they sound good), but of the symetrical Output to my aktive Monitors.

 

I'am using a Lexicon Omega desktop Studio USB interface and i have no problems....but, i would like to upgrade the DA converters....so, does anyone can describe the Sound Quality which comes out of this nice box?

 

And second, does anyone use an Intel Mac with this box? Is that Konnekt 24D Intelready?

 

Thanks a lot for Reading my bad english.....maybe, if i try more (in this thread:freak: ) it becomes better...

 

Cheers,

 

Thorsten

[rpsx]

hello,

 

1st, just have to say this is the best review format ever. and, super excellent review. the future? i hope you get paid per word for this, becuase each is super helpful.

 

anyway... i'm super keen on getting a firewire based io box for my new macbook. previously, was using a rme multiface and g4 laptop. as part of this setup, becuase i do this for fun and like loud playback, i was running my final mix into a tripple c compressor as kinda of a "poor man's finalizer." anyway...

 

i'm wondering if there is a way to route my final ableton live mix through the strereo frabrik c compressors then their output direct to the main outs/headphones of the konnekt 24d? i'm hoping i dont have to make my main live outs goto the fabrik c in, then it's return back to ableton, then the return routed to the konnekt's main sw return. please, let me know.

 

also, that said, i was running my ksp8's returns direct into the main out mix of the multiface, also saving lag time by avoiding mixing in the returns into ableton live. is this also possible on the konnekt24? sorry if the questions are a bit amateur, but... that's what i am!

 

also, curious, any reports on 1.03 resolving use with ableton live? was reading on the forums some trouble:

http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=50746

 

again, thanks for the amazing review. this goes 1000% in favor of me considering this unit as my #1 choice. cheers!

[Mats Nermark]

Hi Craig and Mike,

 

I have been looking for a new sound I/F for my new desktop (Dual Core) and I just stumbeled on this thread and finished reading 5 minutes ago.

Since helping Kim and the guys betatesting the original 2290 in the mid 80's I've always liked/used tc stuff.

 

Since I stopped reading I have been phoning my pro audio supplier and ordered a Konnekt 24D.

 

Thanks for a great effort for a good and open review!

 

Cheers,

 

Mats N

FUZZ Magazine

 

PS See you at NAMM.

[Mike Martin]

 

Originally posted by rpsx i'm wondering if there is a way to route my final ableton live mix through the strereo frabrik c compressors then their output direct to the main outs/headphones of the konnekt 24d? i'm hoping i dont have to make my main live outs goto the fabrik c in, then it's return back to ableton, then the return routed to the konnekt's main sw return. please, let me know.

 

 

Currently this is not possible without the return back to Ableton.

 

 

also, that said, i was running my ksp8's returns direct into the main out mix of the multiface, also saving lag time by avoiding mixing in the returns into ableton live. is this also possible on the konnekt24? sorry if the questions are a bit amateur, but... that's what i am!

 

 

I have a KSP8 too. I was actually a product manager at Kurzweil once upon a time. I have my KSP8 hooked up through the ADAT I/O on Konnekt 24D. You can direct monitor any of the inputs in Konnekt 24D, so you could send signal to the KSP8 and monitor it FROM the Konnekt 24D without having to go back into Ableton.

 

 

also, curious, any reports on 1.03 resolving use with ableton live? was reading on the forums some trouble: http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=50746

 

 

I've tried the demo of Live with the 1.03 driver and in the limited time I've spent with it, it sounded fine. I'll try to post a note over there to get those users to install the new driver if they haven't already.

 

-Mike Martin

TC|US

[Mike Martin]

Originally posted by Power Mac User ....hi all:) And second, does anyone use an Intel Mac with this box? Is that Konnekt 24D Intelready? Thanks a lot for Reading my bad english.....maybe, if i try more (in this thread:freak: ) it becomes better... Cheers, Thorsten

 

Thorsten,

Please don't appologize for your english. Welcome to the forum. (Sorry Craig, thats usually your line)

 

Konnekt 24D and Konnekt 8 support Intel Macs. The Konnekt Assimilator software that users can download for free is not currently Intel Mac ready.

[ribot]

Hi,

 

the konnekt 24 is now working due to the driver 1.03 update with a 64 buffer sample size setting.

 

This means that you can use guitar rig and actually play guitar!

 

It "feels" right and sounds is incredible!

Great piece of gear!

 

 

Thanks Mike and Craig for your help and kindness

 

Best wishes

Kai

Germany

[Retro749]

 

Originally posted by Mike Martin The Konnekt Assimilator software that users can download for free is not currently Intel Mac ready.

 

 

I will have my 24D tomorrow....I'll let everyone know how it goes....in the meantime thought it worth asking again...

 

Any idea on when the Assimilator will be ready for Intel Mac's?

[Marc Johnson]

 

Originally posted by sonicE 11-26-2006 03:49 AM ...regarding the headphone signal being tied to the main outputs of the unit. Does this mean that it would be impossible to use the unit in a DJing context (using, say, NI's Traktor) where one needed to have a cue mix for the cans?

 

I thought of Craig's earlier post (when I read the quote above) -

 

 

Originally posted by Anderton 11-18-2006 03:28 PM There's one other difference between the Konnekt 8 and K24D that's admittedly minor... The front panel DSP select button in the K24D is replaced by an AUX in monitor button on the Konnekt 8. When pressed in, this monitors the rear panel AUX inputs.

 

 

Marc Johnson

formerly of TC|US

[gonzzo]

hi , My name gonzo,,

I have been reading all the wonderfull reviews about konnekt..(by the way, very pro-reviews)

I just got the MBOX 2 just two weks ago, at guitar center , I liked the fact that it came whit a lot of plug ins and the the "portools" SOFTWARE...

Im trying to learn the software..

 

But the KONNEKT 24D with its built in effects is giving me a hard time to really decide where to go..

in other words..

IS THE KONNEKT 24D BETTER THAN THE DIGIDESIGN MBOX 2?

 

im just starting up,, I dont know mush about recording, but know the basic stuff..

I just want the best interface an software posible in this range price..

thank you.. AndPlease help me aout.

 

" I m not a native english speaker..so escuse my English.."

[h1pst3r]

Hi Gonzzo,

 

Use that 30 day GC return policy and get the Konnekt...there, everyone else is off the hook.

 

I just ordered mine -- to be used with Cubase 3sx in the studio; with my archtop and tube amp for live jazz gigs.

 

Cheers Craig and all contributors for this excellent review...though where IS that Fabrik C and Assim review?

 

h1pst3r

[gonzzo]

Originally posted by h1pst3r

Hi Gonzzo,

 

Use that 30 day GC return policy and get the Konnekt...there, everyone else is off the hook.

 

I just ordered mine -- to be used with Cubase 3sx in the studio; with my archtop and tube amp for live jazz gigs.

 

Cheers Craig and all contributors for this excellent review...though where IS that Fabrik C and Assim review?

 

h1pst3r

THANKS FOR ANSWERING, but tell me, whuy should i return the mbox 2, is Konnekt that good?

 

 

(The 30 day return policy on GC DOESNT inclued software) , in ither words, I alrready oppened te software they wont take it back.. But I can still sell the whole thing,,Mbox 2 ..LOL,,

[Anderton]

where IS that Fabrik C and Assim review?

 

They got hijacked by the driver update That threw a wrench into things because now I had to test performance all over again. At least the results were positive!

 

One additional driver note: At least with Sonar, it seems that what you use as a timing master does matter. I seemed to get better results with Line 1 as playback timing master than using the ADAT 1 -- maybe because nothing is connected to the ADAT input? It's all a mystery...but hey, as long as it's working, I'm happy.

[2deep2112]

Hi folks,

 

Great review Craig! Thank you very much for your time and comments:thu:

 

Iam a proud owner of a Konnekt 24D (among other T.C products). I think T.C has done a great job with this audio Interface and will be a clear winner once people are more confident with this new product.

 

Before I buy a product, I always look through Harmony Central as Iam very confident of the reviews here, and till date everything I have bought has turned out great. Thank you Harmony Central and all the people that make this happen

 

I have made a review for the Hispanic side of the world regarding the Konnekt 24D which you can find here: Hispasonic Konnket Review

 

Keep up the great work T.C and thanks again Craig.

 

Good care and enjoy your Konnekt!

 

Bye for now...