Originally Posted By: BlueAttitude
Originally Posted By: Mike Halloran

Focusrite's version is called 3rd Generation and those are the ones you want. Avoid the older ones.



I've got a 1st generation Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 here, no problems with it whatsoever. I use it for recording guitar tracks, no noticeable latency.
And there's nothing wrong with that but you have to set it up within an app to fake low latency. It's USB 1.1 and 1/10 the round trip speed of the new units.

I'm still using my MOTU 828mkII FireWire (through the Apple FW–TB converter into a TB 2 dock into a TB2–TB3 converter into the USB-C port on my iMac Pro — Yikes!) which is a little faster and I've set it up to work great. It's 13 years old, now, and better is out there for a lot less than I paid in 2007.

The new units are using a chip set that allows them a 2.7 ms RT right out of the box—actual USB 2 speeds. No need to compensate in the app. It just works through the blend control. Among other features are 24-bit/192kHz converters. It doesn't matter who the manufacturer is — they're all using the same core ICs and they're extremely good.

This now lets you shop features such as the actual mic pres, metering, I/Os, form factor and so on. I'm looking at the MOTU M4 ($219) but a Scarlett 4i4 ($229) would work fine for me. I like the M4's metering, however and the ability to have separate blend controls for R/L if I install the Mac drivers. I really don't think the .2 ms speed increase (with the drivers only) will make a difference.

The thread is about what to buy now. A Scarlett older than Gen 3 is obsolete and the new ones are so much better and quite inexpensive. It makes no sense to buy the old versions at any price.

I am not recommending that you toss yours just because it's old. Same as I'm not rushing to buy my daughter a new unit. Her 1st Gen Scarlett is doing quite well, too.

NAMM is still a month away. Waiting to see what else gets announced before I pull the trigger.

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