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Hi!

I have a simple question: I already have an M-Audio Fast Track Pro, and it has (as you may already know) S/PDIF in/outs. Would it be a good idea or not if I want to record like live drums, dj set, mics etc to get a Behringer ADA8000, and as it has optical in/outs I would have to get an M-Audio cO2 optical/coax converter...Would that make sense?

This way for less than 250$ (if I buy both the cO2 and ADA8000 over eBay) would I really get another 8 ins/outs? And, if I buy it, when I'll all plug it, will it be easy to configure in my audio appz (Live, Cubase mainly)? Like will I see the 8 ins/outs as all the other one with the fast track or will I have to wire everything virtually with the another software?

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rockstardave Wed, 05/23/2007 - 06:34

you know, thats sort of a 2-part question. the first part is what you're asking about ; "can you expand the fasttrack?"

but what i would be concerned over is the 2nd lingering part ; "what kind of quality will you end up with if you stream 8 independant tracks through USB?"

most multi-track interfaces (8pre, firebox, onyx mixers, even the multimix) are FIREWIRE.

so .. i do not have an answer about expanding the FastTrack, but if it does work, you'll want to watch out for the quality thing. or, if it does work, i cant imagine that overdubbing would be possible without plenty of latency (yuck!!!)

good luck,

Boswell Wed, 05/23/2007 - 08:06

patton686 wrote: I have a simple question: I already have an M-Audio Fast Track Pro, and it has (as you may already know) spdif in/outs. Would it be a good idea or not if I want to record like live drums, dj set, mics etc to get a Behringer ADA8000, and as it has optical in/outs I would have to get an M-Audio cO2 optical/coax converter...Would that make sense?

No. The ADA8000 output is ADAT lightpipe format. The Fast Track Pro has only S/PDIF for its digital inputs and outputs. The two formats are not compatible. If you got an optical-coax converter, that would give you an S/PDIF optical input, commonly called TOSLINK. You would be able to connect that to devices that have S/PDIF optical outputs, such as some CD players and minidisc decks.

patton686 wrote: This way for less than 250$ (if I buy both the cO2 and ADA8000 over eBay) would I really get another 8 ins/outs? And, if I buy it, when I'll all plug it, will it be easy to configure in my audio appz (Live, Cubase mainly)? Like will I see the 8 ins/outs as all the other one with the fast track or will I have to wire everything virtually with the another software?

Sorry, as explained, this will not work. The best way forward is to get a FireWire interface for your PC, and then you have a choice of high-quality multi-channel interfaces, most of which are expandable via ADAT (unlike the Fast Track Pro). The software that drives whichever interface you go for will probably handle the extra ADAT tracks.