On 5/7/06, Carlo Capocasa <capocasa@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi all... After my brief flirt with the Ultra-Low-End I decided it's time to look into something more fun. Following Paul's recommendations I looked into Apogee products and I have to say I like what I see. I want a mobile recording interface with excellent D/A conversion and four Mic pre-amps, preferably in one device. So the Apogee Ensemble looks very good. (Rosetta 800 might also be an option but I don't want to lug a rack to gigs and I'd be happier with a tried-and tested device for the complete analogue signal chain).
The Ensemble is a rack unit as well.
My goal is ultimately to have an all-MIDI four person band, plus vocals, and do all mixing, synthing and FX processing on x86 CPU. Could I kindly be educated on the linux compatibility of the Ensemble please?
Apogee makes some of the very best hardware. But linux support for these devices is just now starting to be useable, so be careful. With the freebob backend to jack (freebob.sf.net) Apogee's devices that use firewire connections are now supported. However this support was only merged into the jack CVS a couple weeks ago. It's probably not very stable. I know the Rosetta 200/800 and the AD/DA-16x units should work ok, but I'm not sure about the Ensemble unit. It uses some software to controll it, and it there is no other way to controll the device other than through the software they provide then you would be in trouble because that software is not designed to run on Linux. If all the functionality is accessable from the hareware interface though then you should be alright. But again, consider support for Apogee firewire devices on linux right now to be "experimental" and not really recommended for production use yet.
Thanks tons. Carlo
