edirol fa-101

gomi · Post by **gomi** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 3:07 pm

has anyone tried one of these? i am thinking of ditching my m-audio 410 for one.
the fact that the fa-101 natively supports coreaudio in osx greatly apeals to me.
m-audio drivers have never given me any love. my requirements are very low
latency for realtime input/monitoring of processed signals. which i can do beautifully
with the line in and core audio, but not so beautifully on the 410. also the prospect
of getting 8 lines in _and_ 8 lines out is drooltastic. the 410 only has 2 in..

if anyone has used one with success i would love to know..!

http://edirol.com/products/info/fa101.html

spiderprod · Post by **spiderprod** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 3:18 pm

check this one as well ,it's coming out next month & expect a very low latency with this one plus dsp fxs with it .
http://www.emu.com/products/product.asp ... tegory=754

Schmidi · Post by **Schmidi** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 3:21 pm

fa 101: from what I've heard you cannot setup a cue signal on the phones, just the master out signal of your mix.

emu 1616: dont even do it unless you wait untill word of good drivers is heard. their cards have all the right features but have terrible drivers, not kidding. Ive seen this first hand in ableton (an 1820m system) and the cpu load was permanently at 85%...on an amd 64 3400+...not normal.

gomi · Post by **gomi** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 3:22 pm

spiderprod wrote:check this one as well ,it's coming out next month & expect a very low latency with this one plus dsp fxs with it .
http://www.emu.com/products/product.asp ... tegory=754

that would be nice if I had a cardslot in my laptop butI don't.

gomi · Post by **gomi** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 3:23 pm

Lightyear wrote:fa 101: from what I've heard you cannot setup a cue signal on the phones, just the master out signal of your mix.

what if I were just to send a cue mix mono out of channel 8 on a return.
i'm not to into the dj techniques, i use it more for live input modification
and mangling my guitar/other players.

emu 1616: dont even do it unless you wait untill word of good drivers is heard. their cards have all the right features but have terrible drivers, not kidding. Ive seen this first hand in ableton (an 1820m system) and the cpu load was permanently at 85%...on an amd 64 3400+...not normal.

thats good to know.

gomi · Post by **gomi** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 3:33 pm

oh yah ok i just found a review... outputs go to 1 and 2 only? wtf?
i'll need to rent one for a weekend and find out.

spiderprod · Post by **spiderprod** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 3:59 pm

to be honest i used a few maudio products , found them very unreliable ,bad drivers ,easily breakable ....on the other the few products i have used from edirol had very good drivers ...

gomi · Post by **gomi** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 4:01 pm

spiderprod wrote:to be honest i used a few maudio products , found them very unreliable ,bad drivers ,easily breakable ....on the other the few products i have used from edirol had very good drivers ...

i know, thats why i want to switch.. m-audio have had unreliable osx drivers
from the get go... why can't they just make them use core audio.

j · Post by j » Thu Jun 09, 2005 5:01 pm

Hey Gomi,

I use a FA-101 with Live4. I'm pretty new to audio but am happy to answer any questions. I'm at work now so I'm kinda busy but I can tell you I do have a cue set up and it works well.

IMO there are some good and not so great points about the unit. I'd be happy to discuss.

j

gomi · Post by **gomi** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 5:44 pm

j wrote:Hey Gomi,

I use a FA-101 with Live4. I'm pretty new to audio but am happy to answer any questions. I'm at work now so I'm kinda busy but I can tell you I do have a cue set up and it works well.

IMO there are some good and not so great points about the unit. I'd be happy to discuss.

j

awesome, any info would be great.

basically i want to know if live can use the ext out with channels other then
1+2.. and if it can have all 8 inputs coming in at once. hearing everything on the headphones is fine, as long as i can route individual returns out individual outs..
if it can't do that, it's retarded

D K · Post by **D K** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 7:41 pm

greetings
i have an fa101
yes, it can have all 8 analog ins operate simultaneously
as well as all outs.
d

gomi · Post by **gomi** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:07 pm

D K wrote:greetings
i have an fa101
yes, it can have all 8 analog ins operate simultaneously
as well as all outs.
d

sweet.
and does everything get monitored through the headphones?

D K · Post by **D K** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:30 pm

the main outs are the headphone source, with a mix knob for non-latency monitoring for ch 1/2 inputs.
not sure of cue fexibility, as i've only used it with an external mixer.
the power unit(optional to buss-power) made a hella lotta noise unless ground lifted.
cheers
d

gomi · Post by **gomi** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 9:10 pm

D K wrote:the main outs are the headphone source, with a mix knob for non-latency monitoring for ch 1/2 inputs.
not sure of cue fexibility, as i've only used it with an external mixer.
the power unit(optional to buss-power) made a hella lotta noise unless ground lifted.
cheers
d

are you on a mac or a pc?
how is the latency?

j · Post by j » Thu Jun 09, 2005 9:13 pm

I run my outs on 3/4 and cue on 1/2.

Like i said it's a cool little unit, but it does eat some cpu.

Also no mixer software.

And finally, it makes my pbook buzz , but once I start up Live that goes away. You can also get rid of the buzz using the CHUD tools that come with OSX. This has been discussed on the OSXaudio site (hardware forum?). Could this have been solved with newer pbooks? I don't know...

I am able to daisy chain my external Lacie drive off of it and it works great.

Signal seems clean to me and separation seems good (but I have limited experience).

No driver issues what so ever. That is unless the cpu hit is a driver issue. I don't know...That's one thing about drivers being "native", I have mixed feelings because then any development is up to Apple (I guess) and that may not be a big priority for them (i dunno). Having said that, the unit is always recognized and stable.

I like it overall.
Have you looked into that new Focusrite unit. Seems pretty cool.

Best of Luck,
j