PRESONUS INSPIRE 1394 (audio interface)

[Anderton]

 

The inputs on the rear of the unit (3 & 4) obviously accept line level, but could the front “instrument” inputs (1 & 2) also be used the same way without “boosting” or affecting the signal?>>

 

I threw a bunch of line level signals into inputs 1 and 2, no problem as long as you don't turn the gain way up. So I would say that yes, you could definitely use Ins 1 and 2 in the way you describe.

[Anderton]

After seeing what PreSonus posted, I went back and tested 3+4 trying to be as critical as possible now that I knew what to look for.

First, my initial comment about how plugging in anything gets rid of the noise on 3+4 holds up. It doesn't matter whether what you plug in is on or off, or has signal or not. So basically, if you're not using 3+4 and have the volume down, no problem. And if you do have something plugged into 3+4, no problem.

Also, I think you would rarely use gain at the levels where you hear the noise -- with almost all line inputs the gain could be at 1/3 - 1/2 and the signal would be comfortably loud. But it is nice to know that if you have an older piece of gear with lower outputs, or vintage "stage" gear that was meant to plug into amps, the Inspire 1394 can handle it.

Bottom line: Inputs 3+4 get a clean bill of health; the noise is a non-issue unless you turn the gain up all the way with nothing plugged in, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense anyway.

[Anderton]

I dunno, maybe the PreSonus guys read the Mackie Onyx 400F Pro Review because the Inspire 1394 definitely has plenty of gain on the line ins (and also on the instrument ins if you use them with line level signals).

There was quite a bit of discussion about whether there was enough gain on the Mackie line ins for such keyboard synths and stuff, and the general opinion was that many, if not most, signal sources would need more gain. That is definitely not an issue with the Inspire 1394, which again seems to point to this product being designed with musicians in mind, who may have older gear, lower level gear, etc.

[Anderton]

Each of the two front panel mic/instruments inputs has a pair of physical inputs, one XLR jack and one 1/4" jack, but you can only use one at a time. I wondered what would happen if I did something "wrong" and plugged into both the XLR and 1/4" jack for the same input. (What with drop-testing the thing, taking it apart to snap pix of the insides, and deliberately doing things the wrong way to find out what happens, I hope the PreSonus guys aren't putting my picture on the wall and throwing darts at it...)

Anyway, it seems that the instrument input takes priority over the mic pre, so you'll hear whatever's plugged into the instrument input and the mic pre is effectively muted. The instrument inputs are definitely dead quiet, by the way.

[Anderton]

>

An excellent point...I have the Inspire sitting on my desk out of force of habit, guitar and mic going into it, but after reading your post -- you're right!! Why take up space on my desk?

This is why I like doing Pro Reviews so much....

Glad you got your noise problems fixed. Hey PreSonus people -- maybe you need to add some of the comments here to the next version of the printed manual, for the troubleshooting section, so that others don't make the same mistakes James and I made.

[ricknaqvi]

I didn't expect to like not having knobs to tweak

 

 

I felt the same initially as well. Nowadays I typically put my CPU under my desk and my Inspire sits on top of it with a piece of velcro to hold it secure. It's one of the nice tradeoffs with not having to deal with a piece of hardware for control. I'll be the first to agree that knobs are a lot more familiar to people. But my workflow is so mouse-dependent that it doesn't bother me anymore to have a control panel hanging around. I typically use the small version of the control panel (select the long dash icon in the top right corner of the control panel) and have the thumbtack selected so that it resides in the right lower corner of my screen at all times on top of my recording software. {editor's note: To see a screen shot of the small version of the control panel, click here.}

 

 

maybe you need to add some of the comments here to the next version of the printed manual

 

 

You're absolutely right. We'll make sure that we add that to our next manual revision. Thanks for bringing this issue up to us.

 

Regards,

[TeleCarlos]

A silly question since I'll be getting one for my new MacBook that's on the way...

I already have monitors (Alesis mk1 powered) that have an 1/4 input. I don't want to get more cables so, I guess I'll get some female 1/4 to male RCA adapter thingys so I can plug it to the Inspire.

Do you thing the weight of the 1/4"plug plus the adapter plugged into the back of the Inspire be a bit much on the RCA outs?
Does it seem sturdy to handle that, long term?

I'm I going about this the right way?


BTW, the no-knobs seem to be something many like and I'm starting to believe rightly so. Seems very logical, I guess.

Thanx a bunch!!!

[Anderton]

 

Do you thing the weight of the 1/4"plug plus the adapter plugged into the back of the Inspire be a bit much on the RCA outs?

Does it seem sturdy to handle that, long term?>>

 

Well, as you said the Alesis speakers have 1/4" inputs, why not just get a 1/4" male to RCA male cable? Plug the 1/4" into the Alesis speakers, plug the RCA into the Inspire 1394.

 

Also FWIW the Inpsire outs are paralleled with an 1/8" stereo jack. So you could also get one of those 1/8" male to dual 1/4" female cables and not really have to worry about weight.

 

Make sense?

[panthalassa]

Craig,
Sorry for what may well be a question with a glaringly obvious answer; but is this device bus-powered? It doesn't have to be for me but I think it would add to the much-touted "convenience" of the unit, unless of course this feature would in some way diminish its performance.

Also, in the last review you mentioned you would go over the revamped M-Audio Oxygen V2. Just curious: is a review in the works? Still, as I look over the Inspire's software applet, I'm thinking I like mouse mixing after all; yet if you could midi-assign those parameters in the applet that'd be killer.

Finally, as someone who's followed your reviews since the Musician magazine days (late 80s), on up through your "Home Recording for Musicians" book, I thank you for helping out those of us who are perpetually curious; I'm continually amazed by all this innovation, especially nowadays!

[ricknaqvi]

is this device bus-powered?

 

 

Yes, it is with a standard 6 pin firewire cable. You can daisy chain up to four Inspires together and they will all be powered from a single 6 pin FW connector. We include the AC adaptor for those who are using 4pin firewire on PC laptops.

 

 

Regards,

[Anderton]

>

As far as I know, you can't assign the applet controls to MIDI. You have to set them onscreen.

But these are things you don't mess with very often once you get the levels set. I think it would be more likely that you would want to MIDI-control levels in the host program you're using with the Inspire 1394.

[Anderton]

 

 

I gave it a pretty in-depth review in the HC Confidential Newsletter. I've since returned it to M-Audio.

[Anderton]

I received the following email:

>

The Inspire 1394 and Toneport UX2 have very different philosophies (I did an in-depth review of the Toneport UX2 in the HC Confidential newsletter and use it a lot). The UX2 is much more about modeling, guitar tone, and mic tone. It has some bundled software and uses USB, but has some clever under-the-hood driver action to give really low latency.

The Inspire 1394 is FireWire, but has no tone-shaping abilities. The phono preamp is something the UX2 doesn't have, and I'd say it would be harder to trash the Inspire.

Bottom line is that AFAIC, the Inspire 1394 is all about simplicity and ease of use, while the UX2 is more about tweaking your sound without having to buy lots of other effects (altough the Inspire 1394 does have quite a few plug-ins included with it for insertion into your host; we'll evaluate these shortly).

[TeleCarlos]

Thanx for the info on the monitor outs...

I guess since the Monster cables were close to $20 a pop, didn't want to buy same cable just to get a different plug at the end.

Anyway, the 1/8 stereo to female 1/4 plug seems like a better idea, didn't know it was available until you mentioned it. And it would make my Inspire "compatible" with my friend's monitors and other studios, since it will be a traveling recording setup. Super cool!

So, does anyone else think this laptop/Inspire setup makes for a great live instrument thingy? I'm a guitarist, but been thinking bout making the laptop/usb keyboard a live instrument and the Inspire's ease of setup just seems perfect for this.

Any ideas, tips, experiences on this?!?

[joel Oporto]

wow I've been looking at simple and cheap firewire interfaces for a while now. Been looking at m-audio, and even looked at the (oh my Gosh!!) behringer, but I always got back to the inspire.

My question although maybe a little ahead of the review is:

 

Are the preamps or the audio quality for that matter, the same as the firepod and firebox? Can I get firebox quality with the thing?

 

I very much like the idea of just making initial settings, forget all about them and just play into the thing time and time again.

[panthalassa]

"As far as I know, you can't assign the applet controls to MIDI. You have to set them onscreen.

But these are things you don't mess with very often once you get the levels set. I think it would be more likely that you would want to MIDI-control levels in the host program you're using with the Inspire 1394."

That's true; I hadn't even thought of that. Usually I have problems with controlling progressive gain stages. Didn't someone here mention the term PEBKAC? . . .

[ricknaqvi]

I'm not all that wild about the way the "virtual" knobs work, in that you have to swing the mouse pointer all the way around the knobs to turn them up or down.

 

 

You can change the behavior of the knobs on the Inspire from either 'circular' to 'up and down'. We wanted to allow the user to pick which type of knob behavior works better for them since everybody has their own preference on this.

 

Just right click on any area that is not a menu or button, you should see the knob motion options there.

 

Regards,

[Anderton]

Actually, I already covered the knob thing 12 or so posts into the front page:

>

[rsleonard]

Had a few questions about the Presonus Inspire and Firebox:

1. Can the Inspire handle two inputs (i.e., one mic & one guitar) at once that will both be recognized by GarageBand simultaneously...in other words, could you theoretically play guitar and sing at the same time and have two independent tracks in Garage Band?

2. Same question with Firebox, except with four total inputs being recognized by GarageBand simultaneously?

3. Do either or both of these pieces of hardware require a concurrent piece of software to be run in order to be recognized by GarageBand? I have a TonePort UX-2 (Line6), and one of my great dissapointments is that I have to run the Line6 software ("GearBox) in order for GarageBand to recognize it...and I don't always need "GearBox"

What I'm looking for is recommendations on a direct input (via firewire) to a MAC that can go direct to GarageBand with either 2 or 4 inputs (with speaker outputs). I thought of M-audio Fast Track USB, but it's USB...I'd be interested in comments on that comparison, too.

Thanks to all for your help!

[Anderton]

I don't have Garageband, but both inputs show up as available inputs in all other programs I've tried. The one thing you can't do is plug into the mic and guitar jacks on the SAME input channel.



Same answer, except because the FireBox uses a combi jack, you are obliged to plug in either an XLR or phone plug into each of the two front channel inputs.

>

You may not, but the TonePort does

With the Inspire, you do need to run the applet to vary levels and such, but I don't see that interfering with any other app.

>

Haven't used FastTrack. In some ways, USB is less critical than FireWire, but USB 1.1 is a LOT slower...USB 2 is way better than 1.1. No matter how direct a path you want, there will almost always be an applet of some type sitting between the interface and the application.

[Anderton]

FYI, PreSonus is sending out the replacement Inspire 1394 on Monday! That will let me finish things up.

[WillyDavidK]

Hey there, great review on the inspire so far.

A couple of things I was confused about.

Is the outside of the box plastic or metal, it appears to be plastic from the pics but I can't really tell.

Also I originally thought that all 4 inputs were mapped to the connectors in the front; ie the xlrs are channels 1 and 2, and the 1/4"s are channels 3 and 4, and the rca lines in the back were alternate inputs for 3 and 4, but it sounds like it might be a different configuration, where inputs 1 and 2 are mapped to the front, where there is an xlr and 1/4" for each, and then inputs 3 and 4 are solely the rca lines in the back. Which of these configurations is correct?

Thanks again for the great review, perhaps there are others with the same predicament as me.

[Anderton]

>

Good question. The box itself is all-metal, BUT there's a plastic "shell" around it that's actually pretty tough.

>

No, that's not the way it is.



The second is the one that's correct.

[Anderton]

I got a box from UPS with a replacement Inspire 1394. The omens were favorable: This box didn't look like it had been used for a quick pickup game of football.

So it was time for another try. I unpacked the new one, plugged it in place of the old one, and booted up on the dual G5 Mac. I plugged into the front panel FireWire jack, and although there was an improvement, it was not as much as I'd hoped.

But I then I plugged it into the rear FireWire jack. Whoa!!! Big difference. It was far quieter. The only way I could hear noise was to enable Boost on the mic preamp, put on headphones, and crank the volume up. And it wasn't much more than you'd expect from a standard mic pre, except that there was a trace of that "firewire whine" to which people alluded on the Mackie thread.

Onward to Windows...

[Anderton]

nd this is where I realized that the real issue had something to do with Mac vs. PC. Or at least, the Mac and PC in my studio.

I plugged the Inspire 1394 into my ADK dual core Windows machine, and went through the same kind of tests I did before: Mic, guitar, input shorted, with gain, with boost, etc.

First, it was clear that the first unit must have suffered some problem during shipping, because out of the box, the new one was quieter. With the mic pre gain at max (but Boost off) and a dynamic mic plugged in, the noise floor was a respectable -55dB, as indicated by Sonar's meters. These levels were confirmed in Wavelab as well.

With these gain settings, I was able to reach full scale on vocals, at "non-screamer" levels. In my judgement, this is the typical performance you could expect with the Inspire 1394, using standard mics and singers. There was occasional spiking higher levels (around -40dB), but although I could see these on the meters, I couldn't hear them.

Puzzled, I did a spectrum analysis and saw that this noise energy was happening between 20 and 40Hz. No wonder it wasn't really registering on the headphones I was using to try and hear as much detail as possible.

With the instrument input, the results were excellent: Setting the gain to drive the input to full scale gave a noise floor lower than -80dB. Again, this was mostly in the under 40Hz zone.