Presonus Sucks Potpourri

Here is the consensus at Vguitar Forums.

Presonus AudioBox Interfaces- NOT Recommended

« on: April 04, 2013, 09:05:20 AM »

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Just a heads up, earlier in the Fishman TriplePlay  thread I recommended a Presonus AudioBox 1818VSL.

These work well for low latency MIDI Softsynth playback, but bulk of owners have contacted presonus regarding a solution to occasional random "popping" during recording.

Presonus issued a statement, and are seeking a solution - but this interface is a turkey and NOT recommended for serious audio recording.
http://forums.presonus.com/posts/list/32657.page
Here is a statement by the Presonus Management on this issue.

Quote

To AudioBox VSL Customers,

We have been made aware of several issues regarding noise and pops and clicks when using the AudioBox VSL with Mac and PC systems. We are actively investigating these reports to confirm the reported failures and look for possible solutions. As we are investigating this, we do not have an estimated time for solutions, we ask that you be patient knowing that we have made this a top priority with our development team.

As more information becomes available we will post responses here.

Thanks,

PAE Management

Its one of those interfaces that looks great on paper, but really sucks for live real time Guitar Plugins (Guitar Rig, Amplitube), or recording.

I get a "pop", crackling" sound at random - sounds just like a bad guitar cord, or static discharge.

This is with the latest drivers on a iMac 27" I7 3.4GHz, 32GB RAM, OSX 10.7.5 - any DAW app, N.I. GuitarRig 5, or IK Multimedia Amplitube CS

I purchased the 1818VSL assuming Presonus had their act together, but this is a repeat of the old Presonus FirePOD days.

Just google "1818VSL pops" :
http://forums.acoustica.com/bbs/viewtopic.php?p=39292

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/newbie-audio-engineering-production-question-zone-trial-beta-forum/746701-cracks-pops-presonus-1818vsl.html

http://forums.presonus.com/posts/list/32260.page

Last time I had an interface this bad was my Echo Audio Layla24 Firewire that refused to work with an HP ZD7000 laptop.

Presonus apparently subcontracts the USB driver creation to a third party, and the Presonus  tech support is no help at all.

Just issuing a warning so others do not fall into the same trap I have with this $500 doorstop. 

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I had the original Layla. Worked great for many years.

I have the presonus firepod/fp10. It sucks. Has issues locking to spdif, and also alot of crackle and pops when recording, even at extremely high latency values.

I have a tascam fw1082. Ok converters. No snap crackles or pops. Have had issues in win 7 64 bit with losing sync. Love the automated control surface and flying faders integrated with sonar.

I mainly use a delta 1010, which has very good converters, but its a bit old in the tooth and I think some of the connectors are getting spotty. Its PCI. No problems with snaps or pops.

I also have a Tascam us1800 for tracking my whole band live (16 inputs). Its cheap. No weird noises, but the converters are mediocre. This replaced my firepod.

Im seriously considering buying the Focusrite Forte to get something with better quality converters/preamps. Also considering the Focusrite with the Liquid pre's.

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I had a Presonus AudioBox 44VSL.  The key word in that sentence is "had". 

As a standalone unit, it is an incredible piece of equipment.  There wasn't a single problem in that capacity and would recommend it to anyone who would use it without connecting to the internet.  But, connecting it to the PC was a nightmare.  I fought with that thing from day one of plugging it into the PC. 

The drivers are horrible and the software is very intrusive.  I couldn't get that thing down to a usable latency without popping all over the place.  The drivers are crap.  The first thing customer service asked was what kind of system I had, which was a complete monster machine.  But they tried to blame it on the machine, even though it beat the minimum specs by 2 or 3 generations of chips and beat the requirements by over 24 gigs of ram.  That was the last straw, I disconnected it and packed it up.  It was going back asap.

It also did some crazy stuff to my regular sound system.  Even after uninstalling everything, it took me a couple of days to get my regular sound back to his previous state.

I wouldn't (or couldn't) recommend this unit to anyone who plans to use it as a means of connecting to the computer.

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I tried using the Audiobox VSL "Beta" driver  USB 2.0 port and USB 3.0 on my Lenovo W520 with Win7 64 pro - no luck

http://www.presonus.com/support/downloads/AudioBox-1818VSL

Same with the latest AudioBox 1818VSL v1.2.1 - PC USB driver =  random pops and clicks every few seconds

Same with my 2011 iMac 27" OSX 10.8.5  with a USB 2.0 port
AudioBox 1818VSL v1.2.2 - Mac USB driver  = random pops and clicks every few seconds

When I contact Presonus support they say  "Sorry we do not develop the USB drivers for our products - review the forums for latest updates"

More stories of pain here:
http://forums.presonus.com/forums/show/46.page

One problem may be all my computers use Sandy Bridge or Ivy Bridge Intel CPU's
http://forums.presonus.com/posts/list/39513.page


I do like StudioOne DAW app  -  but their hardware support is sub par.
http://www.presonus.com/products/studio-one