How would you use an apogee rosetta within 001?

[cane]

Hi.
I know what an apogee rosetta does but how would you use it with the 001.
I keep hearing it mentioned in post's & was just curious to how it would benefit a 001 setup.
Im thinking you would stick your recording source into the apogee first to take advantage of the good quality a/d's then go into the 001's spdif or optical inputs thus bypassing the 001's a/d converters?
is this right?

thanks.

[lwilliam]

In a word, yes.

I just happen to think the Rosetta is way overpriced. I have an RME/Nuendo 8 i/o which I think sounds just about as good, but I get 8 analog ins/outs for about $200 more than a Rosetta. It works flawlessly.

The converters in the 001 are decent, but not spectacular (whadya want for $800). I'm just finishing up my first project done completely with the RME, and the difference is VERY noticeable. It's ALMOST as much difference as going from 16 bits to 24 bits.

[ThomCat]

Back to the question at hand, I plan to do exactly what you are talking about. I plan to use the Rosetta for two main tasks...tracking and mixdown/dithering.

The way I see it working is that instead of using the analog inputs of the 001 I would track directly into the Rosetta and then lightpipe its output into the 001. In such a setup the Rosetta would do the A/D work (and hopefully a much better job of that than the 001), and the 001 would act simply as an interface to the DAW. I would continue to use the D/A section of the 001 for monitoring. When down-converting 24 bit to 16 bit, such as when creating a submaster for CD, I would use the Rosetta for that as well, due to its high-quality UV22 bit-reduction/dithering algorithms.

But I'm open to suggestions, if this doesn't sound like a good plan to some.

[crowdog]

Thomcat,
Are you still going to use the Digi001 preamps?? If you are, your money might be better spent on some higher quality preamps. I bought 2 channels of Vintech 1272 & API 312 which made quite a big difference right off the bat, before I got a Rosetta.

The Rosetta's most noticable benefit was when I accumulated lots of tracks thru it - it seemed to allow for more depth and separation in my mixes, I'm sure it's better quality clock had alot to do with this also.

In my experience the biggest improvements were made with microphone upgrades, then preamps, then convertors. YMMV

BTW - Is it possible to use the Digi's preamps thru external convertors?? I don't think so.

If you're already using better preamps the I apologize for this tangent.
Peace
Tony

[lwilliam]

Using the Rosetta will definitely improve the a/d (I've a/b'ed it with the 001 converters), but remember that it has no d/a converter. The Rosetta is analog-to-digital only. For both a/d and d/a you would need the Apogee PSX-100 which retails somewhere in the $2500-3000 range; or any number of other ada converters (Lucid, RME, Prism, Mytek, etc).

You could use UV22 on the Rosetta if you first converted your 24-bit files to analog before running them into the Rosetta for reduction to 16-bits: they would go in at 24-bits and could come out digital as UV22-dithered 16-bit. I can't see that an extra d/a/d conversion would help the sound.

However, clocking the 001 to the Rosetta made an audible difference even through the 001 d/a converters.

[ September 05, 2001: Message edited by: lwilliam ]

[ThomCat]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:<HR>Originally posted by lwilliam:
...For both a/d and d/a you would need the Apogee PSX-100...You could use UV22 on the Rosetta if you first converted your 24-bit files to analog before running them into the Rosetta for reduction to 16-bits: they would go in at 24-bits and could come out digital as UV22-dithered 16-bit. I can't see that an extra d/a/d conversion would help the sound.

However, clocking the 001 to the Rosetta made an audible difference even through the 001 d/a converters.

[ September 05, 2001: Message edited by: lwilliam ]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, the PSX-100 is what I really want, but can't quite afford.

After thinking things through last night, I realized that my desire to use the UV22 in the manner I spoke of would not be possible (unless I did go to the PSX), just as you have said. Luckilly I can achieve much the same result using the Waves +L1/IDR dither instead.

Your comment about clocking is in line with what I have read. One Rosetta review said things sounded pretty mushy until ancillary equipment was clocked to the Rosetta (as opposed to clocking the Rosetta to other equipment), and then things got orders-of-magnitude better...better than anything the reviewer had heard previously. I'm still stuck pretty much in an analog world, equipment-wise (other than a SRV3000D). How would one clock the 001 to a Rosetta, seeing as how it only has wordclock in? Could the 001 be set to clock automatically to its digital input if the Rosetta's clock was the master? Would extra equipment be needed?

Crowdog...your point is well taken, but my little project studio is a module/keyboard only rig...no analog/mic recording takes place, so I guess upgrading preamps wouldn't really apply to me (yet).

[lwilliam]

It's very simple to get a Rosetta working with the 001. I borrowed a friend's for about a week to compare and test various parameters. I was up and running in about 10-15 minutes - it would have been less, but I read some of the manual first.


You take the s/pdif output of the Rosetta to the s/pdif of the 001. I used coax, but there's an optical port, also. Set your "sync source" or "clock source" (I forget the exact name) in PTLE to external and s/pdif. That's it. Run your preamp's line level output to one of the Rosetta inputs (balanced or unbalanced) and select that input from PT.

You don't need separate word clock for this setup (it's embedded in the s/pdif signal). I believe it has w/c output only, so it can't be clocked from a Nanosync (or other clocking device), but it can clock other devices. You would need to use the w/c if you go out the TDIF port to a DA-88, for instance. There are also some configuration parameters with level-setting (many having to do with softlimit) that can be done with the Rosetta. I didn't optimize them myself (I didn't want to mess with my friend's settings). I turned softlimit off for all my tests.


I recorded three tracks of vocals and three tracks of acoustic guitar. Track 1 of each was pure 001 a/d and clock; track 2 was Rosetta clock and 001 a/d; track 3 was Rosetta clock and Rosetta a/d. Each incremental step was audible, but not overwhelming. I would compare the difference to moving from 16 bits, to 20 bits, and then to 24 bits in the overall sound improvement.
For instance, the acoustic guitar, when using the 001, sounded like a very clean recording of an acoustic guitar - no problem. However, when I used the Rosetta's converters and clock, all of a sudden it sounded much less like a "recording" of an acoustic guitar and more like a live guitar playing. It's depth and realism increased noticeably.


It was more subtle on the vocal tracks, but it definitely improved the sound. I've since then upgraded my own converters to an RME ADI-8Pro (the Nuendo version, actually), and have noticed similar subtle differences. The big difference, however, is that as you accumulate tracks, the separation of the instruments and the 3D imaging is much clearer. I would imagine the Rosetta would perform the same trick with it's low-jitter clock.


I also couldn't afford a PSX-100 and so I started checking the pro audio groups for opinions on converters and decided to get the RME instead. 8 a/d/a to lightpipe; it cost about $1200 or so. I just think (IMHO) that $1000 for an analog-to-digital (only) converter just seems a bit pricey for a 3-year-old design. The softlimit is a nice feature and useful, but I couldn't see a practical need for UV22 since I would never be going in analog and then dither to 16-bits to an existing session. All my sessions are 24-bits. But it would be useful if you want to use it as a front end to a DAT or other 16-bit machine, for instance.


There's no question that Apogee makes very good converters. Are they the best even now? That seems to be debatable according to the many posts I reviewed on various converters. Three years ago, they were the only affordable converters worth buying (considered "pro"). But they are not the best bang for the buck any more - no one seemed to debate that. Lucid and RME seem to hold the bang-for-the-buck title.


I hope some of this little diatribe was helpful...

[ September 06, 2001: Message edited by: lwilliam ]

[ThomCat]

Certainly very helpful to me...thanks LW.

Your point about bang for the buck is well taken. In my case 2 inputs is likely the max this little studio will ever need, or I would seriously consider the RME.

Your comments about adding clarity to dense mixes as a main benefit of Apogee/RME quality converters is heartening, (as that is something my mixes seriously need). That's not a unique perspective that you have...others have said the same thing about Rosetta converters, and I believe low jitter was also the reason given for this.

Also it was good to hear that you had positive results even without SoftLimit (which you should). I plan to use that feature extensively for tracking, however, and it is one of the main reasons I am leaning towards Apogee. What I've researched on that seems to compare it favorably to the limiter in the Waves +L1, which everyone seems to rave about (and with good reason...I won't do a mix without it). Of course the L1 is of no help to analog signals, so for tracking in my studio a Rosetta with SoftLimit engaged seems to be just what the doctor ordered.

[ September 07, 2001: Message edited by: ThomCat ]