RME Fireface 800 vs. Apogee Rosetta 800

I have not used the Fireface but I own a Rosetta 800 and it is a FABULOUS sounding piece of gear. I would highly recommend it to anyone.

The following is taken from a post on the RME newsgroup.

The fireface has the same converters/preamps as the ADI-8.

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All of Saturday I've compared these two converters. The RME has a very usable gain switch on the front (-10dBv, +4dBu or Hi Gain), both for input & output, which is sadly missing on the Apogee.

Apogee Rosetta 800 is approx. US$4.900 in Denmark.
RME ADI-8 DS is approx. US$3.000 in Denmark.
(Yes, it's an expensive country. Prices are probably around half in the US or other countries)

So far 1 - 0 to RME on the price.

11 stereo tracks in Logic Pro (piano from SampleTank Piano Collection, strings from Peter Siedlachez Library, bass from ES2, drums and percussion from Hit Kit V2, + reverb from SpaceDesigner) have been sent individually using a sync'ed ADAT output from a RME Hammerfall 96/52 PCI card to the converters. Then in the converter going D/A and back again A/D using HQ D-Sub cables. So D/A and A/D on 11 stereo tracks on the same machine are being accumulated instead of just comparing a single stereo mix. The 11 tracks are summed in Logic Pro, and I have two virtually identical mixes which can be compared. I have used the RME for listening to the two mixes, monitoring on ADAM S2.5A's.

The original internal mix bounce peaks @ 0.0dBFS in Logic Pro.
Both Apogee and RME mix peaks @ -0.5 dBFS (which would be expected when simply going D/A - D/A without any gain or trim).

First impressions of the Apogee mix is very clear and nice top frequencies. The low end is apparently ever so slightly less than the RME mix (which isn't so actually, explained later). Great stereo perception. A top converter, no doubt.

The RME mix seems to have a bit less top freqs, with more bottom. But no, actually the RME mix just seems to be slightly louder. Hm, both peak at -0.5dBFS. Okay, I need to do some RMS measurements with Waves PAZ.

Aha!

Original mix RMS -7.6
RME mix RMS -7.7
Apogee mix RMS -8.1

So the 0.4dB difference may has caused more bass perception (Fletcher-Munson theory), volume down 0.4dB on the RME mix and the low freqs seem to be equal in both mixes now. Problem solved. However, that's points to RME for being closer to the original mix with truer output.

2 - 0 to RME.

While doing measurements, I might as well do a DC Offset check.

Apogee mix: 0.008% DC Offset
RME mix: 0.000% DC Offset

0.008% isn't much, but that's still 0.008% too much. Points for RME again.

3 -0 to RME.

However, just listening, no bias, both converters are excellent. I admit that I most likely wouldn't get it right everytime in a blind test. But with a price difference of around US$1.900, and the nice gain select switches, I would go for RME any day, so I think I'll buy that instead. Only negative thing about the ADI-8 DS is that the overload LED peaks at -2dBFS, which makes the LEDs pretty useless in my opinion.

While this comparison was done in 44.1kHz, both are capable of 96kHz. I will do a 96kHz test later, and also I will test the clipping sound of both (not the soft limit function in Apogee, which I dislike for anything else than live use). So far the clipping in the RME sounds amazing.

ORIGINAL: Vincent

Hi daverich,

I was curious if you also compared the Fireface to the ADI-8 DS.

I spoke to George at Syntax and he also mentioned that the Fireface had the same converters as the ADI-8 DS, but I didn't know about the Pre Amp as well.

He did say that the Fireface had newer circuitry and I was curious, in your experience, if this was noticeable in the sound quality.

Thanks.

Hi.

I didn't compare it, it was someone posting on the rme newsgroup.

The RME website lists what bits on the fireface are from what previous products.

Kind regards

Dave Rich