Gear / Technical Help > Battery Boxes, Preamps, Mixers, ADCs, and Processors
MOTU M-series (M2 & M4)
jerryfreak:
treated myself to an M4 because i needed more gear ::)
so many shows to tape these days :sleepy:
pretty versatile unit for what it costs ($170 for the 2-channel M2, $220 for the 4-channel M4). its market seems to be the home musician/podcasting crowd
like all products in this market segment they are backordered, took me about 3 weeks to get mine from sweetwater
will probably be even more scarce soon with the recent AKM factory fire
edit: as of today 11/18 sweetwater has M2s in stock
-is a USB "DAC" for the workstation (I put "DAC" in quotes because while it can function as a USB DAC it doesnt have any other spdif in)
-has a half-decent headphone amp
-is a 4-channel ADC to computer/iOS device
-2 of the channels have P48 with decent preamps (+60 dB gain)
i see it as a good computer interface for the homefront and a good field unit taboot. Rugged enough, yet affordable enought that i wouldnt hesitate to take it in the field (would be cooler if it had 'field protected' front controls but hey at this price its hard to complain). With its featureset the M2 is kind of the same functionality of an RME ADI-2 PRO (plus a bonus P48 preamp!). 90% of the RME's SOTA performance at about 10% of the price :coolguy:
is USB-C bus powered and seems to sip power (doesnt get warm really)
could also be used as a 4 to 2 channel mixer in the field if thats your bag
great value for someone with a handheld who wants to add a P48 preamp, it operates in stand-alone mode (sans computer) and can feed a handheld with its unbalanced outs or an HQ ADC with its balanced outs. ill try to compare it as a standalone pre vs the V3 and FP24 (AKA mixpre) into the AD2K to try to isolate preamp quality to the best of my abilities
product pages
user guide
review
another review with links to the specs of the ADC,DAC, and preamp chips
i have yet to do my own measurements on it but based on others' measurements i expect it to meet or exceed my other pro-sumer gear like the mixpre6 and zoom F6 in quality
voltronic:
Thanks for starting this thread. I've had my M2 for a few months now, and have been extremely pleased with it.
Here is another great review. This is the one that sold me.
Some points to add:
- The headphone amp is more than half-decent. It drives my HD650s loudly and cleanly, which is no small order. I sold my headphone amp after receiving the M2 as a result.
- The preamps are very clean. I've been doing a bunch of home recording of solo vocal tracks, and it's every bit as good as the much more expensive Focusrite interface it replaced.
- While it isn't touted as a headline feature, the M2/M4 can record in 32-bit float point.
- Overall build quality is very high, with no evidence of corners being cut on casework, knobs / buttons, or connectors. It is very lightweight, but not in a cheap-feeling way.
- Loopback / loopback mix function is a real killer feature, and it saved my bacon teaching my music classes remotely. Very few interfaces have this flexibility. I would connect to my online meeting, set the audio input to Loopback Mix, play local audio tracks while singing and playing piano via my VST instruments, and have that all be received by my students perfectly in sync.
Wish list items:
- There are no numeric divisions for the level indicators on the front LED. It looks pretty, but it's not at all useful for monitoring. Perhaps a firmware update could change this.
- I would love to have a virtual mix console / routing matrix like Focusrite provides with their interfaces. The MOTU software only lets you change sampling rate and latency.
jerryfreak:
--- Quote from: voltronic on November 07, 2020, 07:49:08 AM ---- The headphone amp is more than half-decent. It drives my HD650s loudly and cleanly, which is no small order. I sold my headphone amp after receiving the M2 as a result.
--- End quote ---
i wasnt sold
as a quick listen an non-strict AB, it definitely could get my HD600 loud than i care to listen to but lacked a lil somehtin somethin - ill try to AB it vs grace O2 or benchmark HPA
voltronic:
--- Quote from: jerryfreak on November 08, 2020, 03:12:55 AM ---
--- Quote from: voltronic on November 07, 2020, 07:49:08 AM ---- The headphone amp is more than half-decent. It drives my HD650s loudly and cleanly, which is no small order. I sold my headphone amp after receiving the M2 as a result.
--- End quote ---
i wasnt sold
as a quick listen an non-strict AB, it definitely could get my HD600 loud than i care to listen to but lacked a lil somehtin somethin - ill try to AB it vs grace O2 or benchmark HPA
--- End quote ---
Funny you mention the 02, because the 02+SDAC is what I sold after I could hear no difference between it and the M2. The 02 could go louder, but we're talking levels I would never listen at.
carpa:
I'm also interested to get an interface in the next future. The standalone feature looks very interesting as could be used as a preamp for handheld ( think about my Zoom h6 when more of a bit of gain is needed); also it could become sort of portable if powered via a 5v usb battery.
Only thing - I bet you know - the mic input signal goes through AD and then DA to the output of Motu m2/4; if you feed a handheld with this line level signal it will be converted again in the recorder's AD. Has any of you checked the quality of M2/4 as an external preamp?
As far as I know only a few interfaces ( the costlier RME Babyace or the cheap Behringer on the other side) can act as a true analog preamp, thus skipping the AD/DA process.
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