ThisIsValid
New Member
Hello,
I occasionally work on bits of vintage hifi gear, and sometimes need to perform some basic measurements; frequency response, impedance, wow/flutter, etc. But I also live an itinerant lifestyle, spending a large portion of my time on the road. All that matters is what I carry with me, not what fancy gear I have in my home laboratory. I'm currently trying to restore a Luxman K-15 tape deck, and find myself in urgent need of a portable ADC with at least 24-bit/96kHz capture - of which there are many, and cheap ones too (been eyeing the Swissonic Audio 2, for example), but being a curious b*****d I couldn't help thinking there must be something smaller around, if you don't need the all those knobs and buttons (I don't mind controlling gain etc from software, for a portable device). Sure enough, I eventually found the E1DA Cosmos ADC, which is not only very pocket friendly but has some truly mind-blowing specs, and which in turn led me to this very forum. My question is, between the compartively chunky €60 Swissonic and the diminutive €300 Cosmos, is there perhaps a happy medium? TBH I wouldn't mind a USB "thumb" with one or two 3.5mm jacks as long as it would capture at sufficient quality, bitdepth and bitrate - but while there are dozens of DACs meeting these requirements (due to to headphone mania), hours of trawling the web have failed to turn up an ADC equivalent. Any suggestions, anyone?
The ideal device ticks as many of these as possible (roughly in order of importance):
I occasionally work on bits of vintage hifi gear, and sometimes need to perform some basic measurements; frequency response, impedance, wow/flutter, etc. But I also live an itinerant lifestyle, spending a large portion of my time on the road. All that matters is what I carry with me, not what fancy gear I have in my home laboratory. I'm currently trying to restore a Luxman K-15 tape deck, and find myself in urgent need of a portable ADC with at least 24-bit/96kHz capture - of which there are many, and cheap ones too (been eyeing the Swissonic Audio 2, for example), but being a curious b*****d I couldn't help thinking there must be something smaller around, if you don't need the all those knobs and buttons (I don't mind controlling gain etc from software, for a portable device). Sure enough, I eventually found the E1DA Cosmos ADC, which is not only very pocket friendly but has some truly mind-blowing specs, and which in turn led me to this very forum. My question is, between the compartively chunky €60 Swissonic and the diminutive €300 Cosmos, is there perhaps a happy medium? TBH I wouldn't mind a USB "thumb" with one or two 3.5mm jacks as long as it would capture at sufficient quality, bitdepth and bitrate - but while there are dozens of DACs meeting these requirements (due to to headphone mania), hours of trawling the web have failed to turn up an ADC equivalent. Any suggestions, anyone?
The ideal device ticks as many of these as possible (roughly in order of importance):
- Small, even tiny
- >=24-bit depth
- >=96kHz sample rate
- Two mic preamps
- Balanced inputs
- >100 dB s/n
- Phantom power
- Linux compatible
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