Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 - REVIEW

[Moon]

Hi,

It's been a long time that I got new audiogear in my studio. But here it is, the Scarlett 2i4.
Since my new laptop didn't had a firewire port, it was time for me to look for a descent soundcard. I did had an Alesis iO2Express which sounds realy OK, but it had one large drawback: it can't share the ASIO4all driver between different programs which is a nuance. My first option was to go for the lovely RME babyface... but this one costs over the 500 euro's. As you might have noticed, there's a economic resession going on, so more than 500 euro's for a soundcard to take on the move with a laptop... hmmmm.... yes... if I could explain this to the my budget keeper...  

So let's look for something that goes below the 200 euro, gives a real good sound quality and offers stable drivers with a low latency.

I allready owned a Sapphire 40Pro which is really great, so Focusrite was my first stop. The Scarlet 2i4 has very good specs. So yesterday, I ordered one at Thomann and today it allready arrived.

So, first impressions:

The device looks realy great. Build quality is oustanding: a metal solid casing, solid knobs, nice red looks... yes... hardware wise this looks like a good product. Totaly different than the Alesis Express which has a plastic casing. Don't get me wrong here: since the Alesis Express is half the price of the Scarlet, this can hardly be regarded as a critism on the Alesis. On the other hand, there are plenty of interfaces out there at 200 euro which don't have the build-feeling of this Scarlet. Good points for Focusrite!

Installation: registering the product you are directed to the download url of the drivers. I installed the USB driver and noticed that the setup panel is realy basic: you just specify the desired latency and that's it. The knob goes well low... all the way to 1ms.

Sound quality: the technical specs promised a lot. I can only confirm that this device is giving you outstanding sound quality. No small artifacts whatsoever, not the slightest giss... just perfect. I haven't tested the sound quality of the inputs yet but I expect that they will be close to the quality level of the Sapphire 40Pro.

Driver: Ok, let's enter the critical zone: starting up ABleton live, putting the latency at 96 and hit the test on a 80% cpu usage: perfect sound, not a single drop out. Pushing the card to it's limits and put it at 1 ms latency... not a glitch. Promising indeed ! I returned the setting to 2 ms of latency which works with a buffer setting of about 96 which is really OK. The driver looks good. Ok, time will tell but in any case this looks very promising. Note though, I'm working on a recent i7-363QM laptop which is also a determining factor for reaching this low latency setting.

Shared driver? Yes ! It works: while keeping the sample rate at 44.1 Khz, I can now switch between my browser and Ableton or another sound application. Sond keep playing  

Conclusion:

First impression is very positive. This sound interface meets fully my expectations.
If you're looking for an usb-sound interface in the sub 200 euro area, than this one should be definetly on your short list.
I don't have the habit of braging with my gear but this one can be recommended without hesitations.

Moon

[folderol]

Thanks for the review. It certainly looks a solid, no nonsense piece of kit.

[Marc JX8P]

Good review! Did you only test it on 44.1? I myself am partial to working in 48 kHz (though for all intents and purposes, 44.1 should be enough for mobile and live applications). In any case, Focusrite has a good name and I also like the design of their products. Back when I was looking for a new studio audio interface, Focusrite and RME were both strong contenders and I finally chose RME purely because of some great reports about their drivers (which is not to say that the FR had bad reports).

For my mobile and live needs I still use the M-Audio Fast Track Pro because it's stable and runs bus-powered but I may be moving towards using the built-in interface of my small Alan & Heath mixing desk.

In any case, it's very interesting how mobile recording is going as there are several multi-channel audio sequencers already for the iPad which support external audio interfaces and allow recording of mulptiple tracks simultaneously, run plug-ins and even virtual instruments in some cases.

[Moon]

Hi Marc,
I also tested it at 48khz. With the same result: rock stable and fantastic sound.
The headphone-output is higher than that of the Alesis Express and by ear it sound better than the Alesis Express. I'm still running at a buffer setting of 96 without any glitches.

I think RME is a noth higher in quality, and as an owner of 2 HDSP cards of RME I can only recommended RME.

I equally recomend this scarlet because of it's high quality/price ratio. Also, this is a great soundcard for live usage with a laptop.
For this area, Focusrite will defintely sell many units.

I'll try to come back on the recarding capablitities of the thing.

Moon

[elwoodblues1969]

I've always fancied Focusrite...but somehow,my Presonus AudioBox 44VSL won me over...but I may very well end up with a Focusrite in the future.