RME ADI-2 Pro as a Monitor Controller
Having previously owned the original ADI-2 Pro, I found it to be a great centre-piece for a small home studio. The ADC section became my primary recording input channels, and the DSP allowed me to setup the DAC section as a terrific monitor controller. The following is a slightly edited copy of a thread I started a couple of years ago in the RME User Forum, I'm hoping it might help show some of the flexibility and the capabilities of this amazing unit to those that are new to it or have been thinking about using it in a small studio:
I've setup my ADI-2 Pro as a monitor controller. It can provide one-button selection of USB or DAC mode, selecting between two sets of speakers (one balanced, the other unbalanced), mono L+R, mono L-R, and use of headphone or speakers. These are functions that are commonly used when tracking, mixing, or mastering.
In my case, I'm using it to alternate between using my primary speakers (Focal Shape 50's) full-range, or using them with subs (SVS SB-2000's) with appropriate high-pass and low-pass filters. I'll describe my setup, but you could do something similar for two sets of full-range speakers, as long as you don't mind running one of them unbalanced.
One aspect of the ADI-2 PRO that is not given the credit it deserves is that the four push-buttons on the front can be programmed to change configuration items and to call up a preset. What makes this incredibly powerful is that each of the 9 presets can have the four buttons programmed independently.
I have 8 presets programmed using the ADI-2 PRO's eq, mono, phase reverse, and mute capabilities to give me:
1) Focal's connected balanced (XLR jacks on back) with an ADI-2 PRO high-pass filter, 80 Hz at 12 dB/octave and the sub's connected unbalanced (3/4 TRS jack on front) with an ADI-2 PRO low-pass filter, 80 Hz at 12 dB/octave.
2) Focal's balanced (XLR jacks on back) full-range, with sub's muted.
3) Focal's balanced full-range, mono, with sub's muted.
4) Focal's balanced full-range, mono, right channel reversed phase, with sub's muted
The above presets are used with the ADI-2 Pro fed digitally from my multi-channel interface. Presets 5, 6, 7, and 8 duplicate the same presets but fed from the ADI-2 PRO USB, sometimes I like to use the ADI-2 PRO as my interface.
Then I set up the push-buttons so that encoder 1 (VOL) alternates between preset 1 and 5 (DAC and USB modes), encoder 2 (I/0) alternates between preset 2 and 6, etc. In each Preset, the push-buttons are set up so that pressing the same button alternates between DAC and USB mode, but pressing a different button selects the relevant preset in the same mode as currently set.
By the way, I use Sennheiser 600's plugged into the front HP 1/2 jack and can switch back and forth between any of the speaker config's and full-range headphones by just pressing the Volume knob for half a second.
It might sound complicated, but using it is really, really simple and it's amazingly versatile! In my case, the ADI-2 Pro does everything I need in a monitor controller, without the extra expense and signal degradation of a separate controller. An additional monitor controller with the same functions and with equivalent signal quality would be very expensive, comparable in cost to the ADI-2 Pro itself, so for this use the ADI-2 Pro is a real bargain!
I'm really looking forward to a similar setup with the PRO FS R BE that I just ordered! The remote may make some of these things even easier, I'll soon see. A big difference this time will be my primary interface, the RME AIO Pro that I also just ordered. This will give me an extra two channels of high-quality (hopefully) input-output, plus about the lowest latency that's currently available. I can hardly wait!