PreSonus FireStudio Mobile 10x6 FireWire - Users please

My prvious post was asking about a MOTU interface. Now I'm wondering about the Presonus Firestudio if there are users out there- sound quality, features, drivers, etc. Using Sonar X1 Producer. 
 
THanks !!

I have a Firestudio Project since 2007 and love it.

As Karyn said, pres are very good and the driver has been very stable in my experience, just a couple of glitches at the beginning but after a couple of months they fixed it.

Mine works great in a desktop with TI Firewire card and in my laptop with a RICOH FW chipset.

Hope it helps!!  

 I have a Firestudio Tube and it also works flawlessly with Win 7 64. I would look at compatability with the firewire chipset in your computer though. There have been a few problems with the via chipsets and almost no problems with the Texas Instruments chipset.

normally all non-TI chipsets CAN have problems with firewire audio devices in sonar.

you can find your chipset by right clicking on MY COMPUTER and choosing MANAGE and then click on HARDWARE DEVICES, then scroll down until you find 1394 and open it and see if it says VIA or TI or something else.

I've never heard of AGERE.  one of the computer builders like Jim or Scott probably have or someone else might be able to tell you more about it.

but bottom line most of the time Jim and Scott recommend putting in a PCI Firewire card which has the TI chipset.  that's what I did for my MOTU.  the VIA chipset on the motherboard didn't work well (popping and clicking during playback).

 If you already have the computer and are seeking a FW interface to go with it,then the type of FW interface you get most likely won't  influence whether or not it works with your computer because a chipset determined not to work well with one FW interface  doesn't play well with the others either in the cases I am aware of.

 FW was and still is mostly used/intended for video transfere as a percentage of total FW usage and some FW chipset manufacturers fail to consider that their setup might also be used for audio work, so they don't always design it accordingly.
 
   If you like Presonus (and I highly recommend them). I would get that interface and give it a try to see what happens. If you determine the FW is not working correctly and you have an upgrade path, like a card slot that will accept a TI FW card then that is what I would do if it were me doing it.

  If you don't have a way to upgrade with a card slot should the setup not work due to the FW chipset , I would reconsider the computer or the type of interface and maybe look at USB as another option or  a setup that will allow you to get a TI FW solution.

while I don't want to discount what Starise has said, when I knew I was buying a firewire soundcard I decided to buy a TI chipset PCI card at the same time so that I wouldn't have any "down time" in case the onboard chipset didn't work well with the firewire soundcard. 

technically I have a MOTU HYBRID which means it has both USB and Firewire, but I use the firewire connection on it because the USB connection on it requires higher latency buffers than the firewire does.

that's interesting, Karyn - you're the first person I've heard having a problem with a TI chipset with anything.  are you sure that's m-audio (avid) that makes it?  I wonder if anyone else who uses that has problems with TI?

Yeah, I was wrong (again)

Echo audio, not m-audio.

It looks like a version of the Audiofire2 but massively customised.
 
 
But the point is that the Edirol and Presonus work fine, but the Gibson Echoaudio crackles.

 I looked up some details on the vostro. It has a few extra card slots on the MOBO so I believe you can easily upgrade it if you had a problem with what you have. I am partial to Intel so I liked the MOBO being an intel one but that's just one of my biases. I base this on the fact that many pro DAW builders use only Intel parts and I am on my second build using Intel with no problems.
 
  I can't comment on the Focusrite although I have heard a lot of good feedback from users on the web.

  If you hook up your interface and discover popping and clicking, I would not automatically assume that it is an interface problem. Buffer settings are important. I would disable all onboard audio. The things that windows has added to make life easier can cause problems for a DAW. Just a few are automatic updates,power saving,virus software,unecessary graphics like those nice screensavers all rob cpu cycles. If you only run a few tracks at a time recording maybe these things are not quite as important as they are if you record multiple tracks at once. If you load 50 tracks and try to play them back and all of a sudden your automatic updates kick in or your adobe updates or your power saver tries to put the monitor to sleep..........well then you could be in trouble,especially on a middle of the road PC.
 
Best of luck to you. The good news is that you can upgrade your PC if you need to!

 Karyn- I think your computer must be partial to Fender... JMO

  Yes you can turn off automatic updates completely. Let us know how it all pans out!