Depends on what you like and what your needs are. Personally I think the Daking Mic pre one looks better than a brick, but thats just me.

http://vintageking.com/Daking-Mic-Pre-One?sc=13&category=42661

Ummmmm........what does the Daking have to do with anything Presonus?

To the OP:
There doesn't seem to be much difference on the surface. The obvious difference is the metering on the one. The FS Project seems to be a newer version but I don't know that for sure.

Ya know, Presonus has all these different products, if your interested in them.

IMO an original FireStudio is the only one of them worth its weight because you can expand it, heck it even comes with inserts for channels one and two which come in handy for an analog compressor/limiter. It has digital spdif in and out, they come in very handy. The Digimax FS is made to use with the FireStudio, four toslink cables (2in,2out) to run 16 tracks at 96k or run two separate DigimaxFS at 48k for 24tracks+spdif.

If you want the FS tube it has only two channels of tube and 6 standard xmax plus eight line inputs. I dont think it has a spdif input/output either.
Channels one and two have a built in analog limiter too. I think that this product is interesting, just not sure how well the analog components are.

FireStudio Project and FP10 are basically the same thing.
10x10 96k 24bit.

Project has bundled plugins, FP does not. As far as I can tell thats it.

So, thats all I know.

Your idea of running a brick with a FP10 sounds good to me. I'm sure the brick is more versatile than the FireStudio Tube is. Although the only real way is to try them and see for yourself.

ThirdBird, can you tell us what computer platform+OS you intend on running your PreSonus on? Perhaps we can help you decide if your computer is up to the task.

I used my friends Firepod for my first few projects.
Then I got my Project.

I can tell you the converters in the FSP are a step above. How much? Can't really say until I use a Lynx/Apogee/anything more than $500
But definitely better.

The build quality is better also. No loose firewire ports.

I am happy with it, but you can probably do better than $500 if you shop around. I got a free FaderPort with mine, so that helped too.

Drivers are pretty much the only problem I have with Presonus (so double check).

Granted this is Presonus propaganda but I think it is true.
"While the FP10/Firepod is a great product, the Firestudio Project was designed to kick it's *you know what* in every way we could thing of. We took all of the comments from customers and tried to address all of the things they wished their Firepods had.

So here are the things that the FS Project gives you that the FP10 does not:

1. Better analog to digital conversion (the Firepod had 106dB of dynamic range; the FS Project has 114dB)
2. Better fit and finish - no wiggly pots, no firewire jacks sticking out
3. Power button on the front panel (can somebody give me an Amen!)
4. Better metering (the Firepod had only a clip indicator; the FS Project has a 3 segment LED to let you know sooner that you are approaching clipping)
5. More phantom power switches (the Firepod had only 2; the FS project has four)
6. Better software (we constantly try to get better at this with every new product)
7. A DSP Mixer that allows you to send multiple stereo monitor mixes to different musicians (the Firepod only had one mono no latency mix that everybody has to share)

If you are on a budget and want to get something that outperforms everything at $399, you'll love the FP10. However, the Firestudio Project is definitely worth the extra $100 in my opinion." Rick Naqvi Presonus Marketing
For me the headphone mix situation, and the LED meters made life a lot easier. The fact that you can daisy chain the studio or the project means you can get 16 or 24 channels fairly easily. Not sure what the advantages of the digimax set up are never used one.
I did own an FP10 then switched to the Project (I have two) and while subjective I think the recordings are better. I like their hardware and while I have had no problems with computer compatibility or driver issues, I think that they are not doing a great job in this area from some of the complaints I have read.

ThirdBird, can you tell us what computer platform+OS you intend on running your PreSonus on? Perhaps we can help you decide if your computer is up to the task.

It is nothing special... but here it goes.

- Dell Inspiron E310
- just upgraded to 2 RAM
- I am at my work computer right now so I think it is a Pentium 4 2.8 maybe?

- I need to buy a PCIe to Firewire card

- 2 160G SATA hard drives, upgrading them soon to 500s

Anything else I need to know, I am confused if I need a better soundcard?

If you are going Firewire from the Presonus units your soundcard is not part of the recording chain. In some software platforms you need to disable the soundcard altogether, not most of the better modern ones. Hopefully your playback chain does not involve your sound card either but rather powered or amplified monitors coming directly out of the interface. If you are running Vista your RAM is probably a little low, and 160G hard drives are fine depending on how much free space you have. I think that their speed is more important rather than total volume if you have free space.

I have Sonar 7 on Windows XP, I didn't think I needed a specific soundcard, just wanted to make sure.

How do I run the monitors out of the fire products?

There are two 1/4" balanced outputs (more are assignable) for monitors controlled by a knob on the face. These need to be either powered monitors or an amplifier powering passive monitors.