Three things:

1: Are your ears trained enough to be able to tell the difference? Have you listened to and are you dissatisfied with what you hear from the Digimax?

2: The True is a decent pre but it doesn't have digital output afaik. It does have DB25 connectors but I'm pretty sure those are analog. That's great if you already have a dedicated A/D converter.

3: What are you putting this into?

ira wrote: i've got a new presonus digimax fs 8 channel preamp. been told the pre's are alright but that the a/d converters are not good.

Who told you that?

I think there fine, its more about the performance anyway. A preamp can very in color. A to D converters are much more transparent anyway. Well, FWIW I use the firestudio and am pleased with the sound. The fs 8 is exactly the same A to D.

Whoever told you that the a/d is not good does not know what there talking about or is very picky.

Musicians are not bankers, why should we have such high standards for recording?

Work with what you got, its a good piece of gear.

I'm scratching my head here a bit...
First, Presonus A/D converters are actually pretty decent. They're far better than most mid level gear's converters! Also, while I think the True is more than a "decent" pre, running it into your box without going through an external converter will only do harm to a substantial investment.

If you're really not satisfied with the A/D (very unlikely...if someone is using a Presonus product, no offense, but it's because they can't afford much better - that means that the room, the mics, the pres and all other factors are far more likely a problem than the minute difference a different AD would make), then by all means, drop the cash on a new AD.

My advice - if you really do want to go this route -
Drop some hard earned cash on a versatile pre with an AD built in. To me, there is no more versatile a pre with AD than the ISA 428. It's got 4 excellent preamps built in and with the optional A/D card, you've got room for 4 more pres of any flavor. The A/D in the 428 is as good as any I've heard in nearly any price range.

Cheers-
Jeremy