Alternative for a motu Ultralite-mk3 Hybrid

mrfart · Post by **mrfart** » Fri Jul 30, 2010 8:34 pm

Some time ago I bought an ultralite to replace my m-audio audiophile.
Main reason was I wanted better soundquality and better, more reliable drivers.

I wish i hadn't bought this motu.
It has been a dissapointment on all fronts.
The buildquality isn't as good (touching one of the jackcables is sometimes enough to let the audio drop out, my main out gives cracks and pops);
The drivers are embarisingly bad. glitches all over the place, routing problems that I still don't understand (I have to put the output in live on 3/4 and my actual cables in 1/2 and weird stuff like that). It takes very long for windows to find it again if it's accidentally unpugged or turned of, etc...
and their helpdesk doesn't reply me anymore after their standard "install the latest drivers" reply.

Anyway, I'm gonna sell it and buy something else, don't know what I should go for, and was hoping you guys could help.
I just want quality sound with rocksolid drivers (for windows vista 64bit). But that's a lot to ask apparently...

My friend has a tc konnect live.
He also had some driver issues initially, but now he's very happy with it.
The nice thing about it is that it imediatly reconnects when the firewire is accidentally unplugged (and this will happen at some point when playing live).
But again, it's a bit much for what i need.

Does anybody know if the Presonus reconnects immediatly after dissconnect like the TC. And how are their drivers in general?
Hope someone can help me.
It's these kind of things that suck the fun out of music for me.

mholloway · Post by **mholloway** » Fri Jul 30, 2010 9:55 pm

BUMP

I need a new audio interface and have been looking at the ultralite, but you are scaring me off here....I use an Audio Kontrol 1 and have mostly liked it, but I need something with multiple analog ins for my other hardware synths.....

-M

beats me · Post by **beats me** » Fri Jul 30, 2010 10:09 pm

I notice you have a Mac and a PC. Do you have this problem on both computers? Have you tried it on both?

mrfart · Post by **mrfart** » Fri Jul 30, 2010 10:30 pm

beats me wrote:I notice you have a Mac and a PC. Do you have this problem on both computers? Have you tried it on both?

No I have a mac that is still running windows (yes I know this is odd, but I got used to windows and have a lot of software that I don't want to buy again or doesn't exsist for mac.).
I havn't tried it on osx,
I'm guessing a lot of the problems come from the crappy windows drivers, since a lot of mac users like the ultralite.
I did try the card on an other windows machine with the same problems.

rikhyray · Post by **rikhyray** » Fri Jul 30, 2010 11:11 pm

Quality of Motu went seriously down in last 2 years, lots of defective units, this company is in trouble. Presonus shows opposite tendency, their newest units have very low failure rate and their new products are of much higher quality, the utility software is excellent thanks the Steinberg "defectors" who also designed the new DAW for them- Artist version comes free with interfaces, however does not feature the best of that software which is mastering section.
The Presonus mobile is the smallest lightest FW card on the market. Works with no issues on both Mac and PC.
T.C. sound amazing for the money 10x better than any Motu. Actually Presonus and Focusrite use same chips designed and made by TC, didnt compare them one on one but have feeling TC sounded the best (but has history, just like Focusrite, of bad drivers).

mrfart · Post by **mrfart** » Fri Jul 30, 2010 11:52 pm

rikhyray wrote:Quality of Motu went seriously down in last 2 years, lots of defective units, this company is in trouble. Presonus shows opposite tendency, their newest units have very low failure rate and their new products are of much higher quality, the utility software is excellent thanks the Steinberg "defectors" who also designed the new DAW for them- Artist version comes free with interfaces, however does not feature the best of that software which is mastering section.
The Presonus mobile is the smallest lightest FW card on the market. Works with no issues on both Mac and PC.
T.C. sound amazing for the money 10x better than any Motu. Actually Presonus and Focusrite use same chips designed and made by TC, didnt compare them one on one but have feeling TC sounded the best (but has history, just like Focusrite, of bad drivers).

Thank you for this info.
I might go for the presonus. It's cheaper, and not as huge as the TC.
And my friend does have some driver issues with the TC.
What you said about motu makes sense, since everybody I know that has one, bought it more than 2 years ago.

leedsquietman · Post by **leedsquietman** » Sat Jul 31, 2010 2:52 am

Are you using the MOTU on USB or firewire ?

MOTU is well known for having much better Mac OSX Core audio drivers and while some PC users have been happy with the Ultralite, a higher proportion than is satisfactory have long since had problems, with the 828 interfaces as well as the Ultralite. MOTU don't have the greatest rep at writing stable, low latency windows drivers (then again, Focusrite and TC also have some issues on this front). RME and Echo Audio are 2 companies who typically write solid well performing drivers on Windows.

Are you looking for a USB 2.0 interface or Firewire ??

Have you tried using ASIO4ALL as the driver on your MOTU interface instead of the native driver ???

hacktheplanet · Post by **hacktheplanet** » Sat Jul 31, 2010 3:32 am

I know you said you are using Mac hardware, but specifically which?
In my experiences, MOTU hardware is very particular about which firewire chipsets it is connected to (if you are using a firewire connection), and MOTU + OSX beats the pants off of MOTU + Windows.

Just asking because I haven't ever had any problems with MOTU hardware in OSX, especially my Ultralite! Windows was another issue however. I went through three different firewire cards before I got one that actually worked, and one time the drivers just decided to stop working altogether. A format/reinstall of XP was required.

Also, the build quality of my Ultralite has been great. It's survived countless falls from tables, being shuffled around in various backpacks, messenger bags, and suitcases. It's even been bounced around loosely in a large rack case when the ears that came with it snapped apart after a particularly nasty bump.

Not saying that your experiences are invalid. Plus, my MOTU equipment is all circa 2006. I don't know about the quality of the more recent stuff.

rosti · Post by **rosti** » Sat Jul 31, 2010 7:49 am

I had problems with my ultralite hybrid. I sent it back to the shop for repair. I just got it back and have to see how it performs now. I have to rebuild my setup first before i can put it to the test.

Only problem with drivers was that firefox (i think that adobe flash was the why) sometimes prevented OSX to regonize the ultralite. Other problems were broken mic pre and some cosmetic stuff. Probably it had some beating in the factory or something.

Apart from that the UL performs really nice. Latency and sound quality is good for my ears. I have to test it with my brand new Genelecs though ;D

Runnung on macbook pro. I have heard only bad things aobut running motu cards on windows.

coldbuggin · Post by **coldbuggin** » Sat Jul 31, 2010 1:42 pm

im using the ultralite on a windows 7 64 bit machine w/ 8.1.4 and having no problems, in fact, just used it at a festival, no problem.

Alternative for a motu Ultralite-mk3 Hybrid

Alternative for a motu Ultralite-mk3 Hybrid

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