New RME ADI-2 Pro EX DAC

[Chanur]

Totally right. Here is the second unit. This one broke on the right side top corner.

View attachment 538366

Seems like a fairly serious design flaw to have happened multiple times to the same product line. Sketchy for sure.

 

[Chanur]

People who think the ADI-2 Pro EX is expensive, why not consider the Fireface UCX II audio interface instead. It costs significantly less (it's like 1 thousand euro on Thomann without tax) while offering far more functionality. You get many more I/O channels, effective 12-band EQs by onboard DSP for the output channels instead of the 5-band EQ on the ADI-2 series, real microphone preamps, MIDI I/O, and, most importantly, TotalMix support, the most flexible and robust routing matrix I've seen in the industry.

What do you lose? Louderness feature, DSD support, remote control, better analog specs, superior headphone output stage, and the black chassis. In practice, most of these don't matter. You won't hear a difference, and for most headphones the UCX II output is beyond just fine. The only thing I would personally miss is the spectrum analyzer on the front-panel display, which is very beautiful!

I'll be honest, the main road block to this for me is just lack of familiarity with their product lines. I also don't do music production so a lot of the stuff sounds not applicable to me.

 

[ShiZo]

I'll be honest, the main road block to this for me is just lack of familiarity with their product lines. I also don't do music production so a lot of the stuff sounds not applicable to me.

After a bit you get the hang of it. I'm not the best with audio interfaces and I figured it out. Once you do it works well

 

[Chanur]

After a bit you get the hang of it. I'm not the best with audio interfaces and I figured it out. Once you do it works well

Do they use the same headphone amplifier in the various products? Or does the top model have a better one?

 

[john61ct]

For my use cases, RME Digiface USB even more so, ADAT expanders for more analog ports can be picked up as needed for peanuts.

People who think the ADI-2 Pro EX is expensive, why not consider the Fireface UCX II audio interface instead. It costs significantly less (it's like 1 thousand euro on Thomann without tax) while offering far more functionality. You get many more I/O channels, effective 12-band EQs by onboard DSP for the output channels instead of the 5-band EQ on the ADI-2 series, real microphone preamps, MIDI I/O, and, most importantly, TotalMix support, the most flexible and robust routing matrix I've seen in the industry.

What do you lose? Louderness feature, DSD support, remote control, better analog specs, superior headphone output stage, and the black chassis. In practice, most of these don't matter. You won't hear a difference, and for most headphones the UCX II output is beyond just fine. The only thing I would personally miss is the spectrum analyzer on the front-panel display, which is very beautiful!

 

[ShiZo]

Do they use the same headphone amplifier in the various products? Or does the top model have a better one?

The higher models usually have higher power headphone amps. Looks like the pro ex has an even stronger amp than the 2/4 pro se and the 2/4 ex will likely be even better

 

[Andreas007]

Totally right. Here is the second unit. This one broke on the right side top corner.

View attachment 538366

The heat may accelerate this failure but primarily I think it is a manufacturing flaw of the supplier. The plastic likely has too high inner tension caused by wrong processing (too rapid cooling or pressure peaks) during injection molding. Plastics engineer speaking here. I‘ve seen this many times in comparable items. Sometimes the parts seem fine and few weeks later you open the box and all of them have tension cracks.

You can make the tensions visible with polarisation optics: Link to example (in German)

 

[respice finem]

They had to leave customers something to complain about

 

[rcstevensonaz]

For my use cases, RME Digiface USB even more so, ADAT expanders for more analog ports can be picked up as needed for peanuts.

Alas, the Digiface USB is not useful as an expander for digital inputs from consumer-grade S/PDIF devices (eg, Waxwing, WiiM, CD, Squeezebox, etc.).

 

[john61ct]

Alas, the Digiface USB is not useful as an expander for digital inputs from consumer-grade S/PDIF devices (eg, Waxwing, WiiM, CD, Squeezebox, etc.).

Can you give more detail on that use case and specifics on why this Digiface isn't useful?

In my case I am only want Digiface USB as Master Clock and primary "PC" (RPi) interface via USB, it is not not doing any A/D nor D/A itself.

Waxwing, CD, Squeezebox etc sources are selected (only one at a time) through my preamp/inputs switcher e.g. Wiim Ultra.

I do not want mic preamps, am not doing any recording, music mixing or production, the computer side is for routing control and DSP filtering only, recreational home reproduction all connections to audio gear are analog, 8-in and maybe 24-out.

To me, an "expander" means adding line-level A/D or D/A converters aka "breakout box" units e.g. Yamaha AD824 or Focusrite OctoPre MkII (DYNAMIC version) to the primary interface
– in other words, those are supplying all the analog ports (in or out) to Digiface via ADAT.

 

[LesterHiggins]

The heat may accelerate this failure but primarily I think it is a manufacturing flaw of the supplier. The plastic likely has too high inner tension caused by wrong processing (too rapid cooling or pressure peaks) during injection molding. Plastics engineer speaking here. I‘ve seen this many times in comparable items. Sometimes the parts seem fine and few weeks later you open the box and all of them have tension cracks.

You can make the tensions visible with polarisation optics: Link to example (in German)

Thats a really good theory. Someone on the RME user forum also said they had 2 units that didn't sit flat, so my hunch is that they're over-torquing the screws in the chassis, not to contradict you at all, certainly both could be true. For what it's worth, I recently purchased a Fireface UCX II to use mainly as a multi-channel preamp, kind of like a premium miniDSP Flex. It has been quite a challenge to integrate and configure, but I finally feel like it was very much worth the effort.

 

[Bland_username42069]

For my use cases, RME Digiface USB even more so, ADAT expanders for more analog ports can be picked up as needed for peanuts.

I was playing around with upmixing stereo to quad in foobar using free surround from turntable and CD out of RME and sending it back through. It works well.

 

[rcstevensonaz]

Can you give more detail on that use case and specifics on why this Digiface isn't useful?

I want all of my devices mixed (not switched) so they automatically play and mix with my PC audio. I don’t want only a single source active.

The underlying issue is that consumer devices can’t be slaved to the Digiface for clocking.

Relative to RME ADI-2 Pro’s, I would love it if they enabled automatic sample rate (ASRC) on all of the digital inputs, instead of only one input. (… or release a new Digiface USB with ASRC on all inputs.)

 

[KSTR]

I would love it if they enabled automatic sample rate (ASRC) on all of the digital inputs

There are only two digital inputs, SPDIF and AES, is ASRC manual switching between the two (perhaps using presets for convenience) too complicated?

 

[rcstevensonaz]

There are only two digital inputs, SPDIF and AES, is ASRC manual switching between the two (perhaps using presets for convenience) too complicated?

Too complicated? No. But my preference is all devices active at all times. I control by starting / stoping audio on whichever device, without having to switch (which then mutes everything else until I switch to new source).

My current solution is attaching a DAC to every digital device and sending the audio into an 8-stereo channels analog audio mixer, which is then routed into the analog input of my ADA-2 Pro.

Originally hoped I could use the Digiface USB to eliminate 4 DACs and the analog mixer. But then I found out about the slave clocking issue.

 

[KSTR]

Too complicated? No. But my preference is all devices active at all times.

Understood. That would require an ASRC for each source except for the first and then digital mixing before playback, which is the real issue. This is way beyond of a reasonable target spec for a DAC device, I fear.
Seperate DACs and analog mixing looks like the most feasible approach to me.

 

[john61ct]

I want all of my devices mixed (not switched) so they automatically play and mix with my PC audio. I don’t want only a single source active.

The underlying issue is that consumer devices can’t be slaved to the Digiface for clocking.

Relative to RME ADI-2 Pro’s, I would love it if they enabled automatic sample rate (ASRC) on all of the digital inputs, instead of only one input. (… or release a new Digiface USB with ASRC on all inputs.)

Yah, no mixing here, DSP RPi to only be used for crossovers, phase / timing issues, maybe playback node use but only occasionally, most sources through Wiim Ultra as preamp.

Only clocking I need is between the RME interface and the connected ADAT expansion breakout boxen.

I can't visualize clocking needed from any sources?

and ASRC is a new concept to me

I plan to stick to 44/48 only whenever possible.

 

[john61ct]

Separate DACs and analog mixing looks like the most feasible approach to me.

I got a mixer just to add mic preamps to an ADC converter (ADAT breakout) for measurement purposes, the primary interface handling clocking as Master.

Does that seem a logical approach?

 

[rcstevensonaz]

Understood. That would require an ASRC for each source except for the first and then digital mixing before playback, which is the real issue. This is way beyond of a reasonable target spec for a DAC device,

Strong disagree.

I am only asking for ASRC on all digital inputs. Not that hard to do with modern compute power. They already do it on either one of the digital inputs; so just enable on both with the newer model.

The multiplication channels would still route out of the ADI-2 Pro via USB port (send/receive in multi-channel mode) for off-board mixing. Such as on the Digiface USB or any PC or rPi.

 

[KSTR]

I can't visualize clocking needed from any sources?

and ASRC is a new concept to me

In the digital domain, there can only be one clock master in a system.
AES3/SPDIF embed the clock in their streams and thus a DAC has to sync to it.
Several sources at the same time cannot be used, so the solution is that one source remains the clock master and the other sources undergo a resampling to that master clock. Then sources can be switched gap-less or even mixed together.