QU32 as a main USB recording interface/latency and Ableton control questions

[xonetacularParticipant]

So I just sold my midas f24 and am looking to pick up a new interface or mixer.

I was thinking of picking up a Motu 1248 and 24ai for 32 analog ins and going the separate route to not worry about compatibility and having a mixer not be supported or perform well. And AVB/usb/thunderbolt would mean not worrying about chaining interfaces or using aggregate devices.

But I was also looking for control surfaces for ableton with motorized faders and found the qu series supposedly can double for that and handle it well. although I have not seen how this works anywhere, I know ableton support is lacking on a lot of motorized fader controllers.

Looking further I could get a QU 32 for about the same price as the motu interfaces with just as many analog inputs, could mix on it or mix in ableton and use it as a control surface, and it has a class compliant interface so wouldn’t worry about driver support. Being digital with lots of features I could see maybe doing real mixes on it and not missing fancy digital EQs/compressors/etc.

I like being able to jam with all hardware, then recording and doing final mixing itb.

My concern is just how well the usb interface performs since I don’t want to run into issues again. I would like to just have one interface and not mess with aggregate devices. I use mostly hardware and would want to multitrack it, but I sometimes use ITB reverbs and master compression, so not sure if latency would be an issue. I would also like to be able to have the option to use some hardware reverbs for final mixing after multitracking.

Just how good is the built in USB interface and will it be enough? I would probably get a seperate monitor controller like SPL crimson or maybe try the behringer monitor2usb, which would give me headphone monitoring and I could switch to use the built in interface when I’m using the studio computer for other things without switching on the whole mixer.

[Dick ReesParticipant]

There is a separate section for dealing with DAW issues. You should probably post there. Also check out the Knowledge Base.

[xonetacularParticipant]

Hmm skimmed every thread in the DAW forum going back 3 years, only a few relating to ableton issues and nothing that says much about it working.

[Dick ReesParticipant]

This is the Internet. Most posts are made about problems and glitches, very few about things working properly. My feeling is if you search diligently and find no issues, there are likely no issues.

You might try searching some other forums like Pro Sound Web and Gearslutz. Around here Andreas can likely spell out any potential gotchas regarding your use.

[[XAP]BobParticipant]

How likely are people to post that it works?

Even people who have had issues solved through the help of forum members don’t always say ‘yay it worked’

[xonetacularParticipant]

I can’t even find anyone talking about using it for ableton. But I ordered one so I guess I’ll find out.

[Anonymous]

Good on you!
I use 2x QU32s and sometimes a 32 and a 16 linked.
They’re a great desk.

I USE MAC

[Author]

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