MBOX Studio bundle—is it for me?

[Modrob]

Very nice salesman turned me onto the MBOX Studio bundle, and after hearing my history as an older user with an even older MP9 system, as well as my need for just “basics”, he suggested this option. (I have been thinking of going the Artist level route, and wanted his idea for an interface.) With this bundle I could have a good interface and the PT with Perpetual license for a good price. I’m digging deeper I have a couple of concerns; how is the build quality of the interface—I’ve read several reviews of failings out-of-the-box or soon after. And this Perpetual license thing—I have just seen a post that said after one year if not “renewed” it would turn into an Intro level? In my talk with the salesperson I understood what I thought was “since my ways of using PT are very basic, I wouldn’t need to change anything for several years or so, the same way I’ve used my MP9 software for at least 5 to 6 years or more…”
And is this Studio bundle version a lesser version of the normal Studio version?
Many thanks.

[albee1952]

I think your sales person is the best to answer this. But, consider how much you can spend and how much the Mbox package is going to cost(not sure what the current pricing is), as well as how many ins and outs you need(its easy to add inputs via the lightpipe input, but outputs don't work quite the same, so 16 in(plus Bluetooth) and 8 out(plus Bluetooth) and 2 headphone outs is a more accurate description(vs the advertised IO). Having said that, its a solid unit and sounds good. It allowed me to dump the monitor switcher(for 2 sets of speakers) and the Loopback feature allows you to record audio from the computer/internet directly into a session(very handy for learning cover tunes)

[Darryl Ramm]

Nobody can tell if this is for you. We have no idea really what you are doing or what interface you are using now, or what OS or computer you are intending to use with this for what use.

Through to the end of this calendar year there is a promotion where you get Pro Tools Studio Perpetual with the MBox Studio and that includes the first years annual support/update program. After that first year you will have to pay that fee yourself, currently $199 annually. If you don't pay that fee you still have the license to Pro Tools Perpetual, meaning you can run up to the latest version of Pro Tools Studio released before that plan expiry.

But it's more complex/worse than just that, some of the plugins included are core plugins that are built into Pro Tools and keep working as long as Pro Tools itself does, but many of the plugins you get with this are part of the somewhat misnamed "Avid Complete Plugin Bundle" although I guess that name is being deprecated. They are provided as an annual subscription bundled with the Pro Tools perpetual update/renewal plan. When that plan expires those plugins stop working. You also lose the ability to contact support, and access to some other content etc.

All this is only an issue if paying ~$199/year for the support/update plan bothers you at all and you would want every update, and maybe you can start by looking at what Avid plugins you use now/would want to use and what ones are in the complete plugin bundle. My spreadsheet here may help differentiate core plugins from bundle and other plugins, https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

And you asked about reverting to Intro Level. That's what would happen if the current promotion did not apply. The Mbox Studio would come with a one year subscription for Pro Tools Studio. When that expires you can just use the free version aka Pro Tools Intro or you could renew the subscription for $299/year are current pricing. Pro Tools Intro is very limited compared to Pro Tools Studio, see the differences here: https://www.avid.com/pro-tools/comparison

And now for the MBox itself, I know there are folks here who like their unit but personally this thing just annoys the heck out of me. Lets start with the misleading/deceptive advertising. Much of the promotion of this box leads with all the I/O it has, except that I/O is connected to the internal hardware mixer, which only has 8 DAW returns (as Dave mentions), so you can only ever at most use 8 outputs from Pro Tools. Some folks have been burnt by that surprise. Avid has had lots of time to make this more clear and have done nothing.

Then to me the thing just looks fugly. Large blob on a desk, not what I'd want, nowhere to put it. And yes as you noticed there are reports of quality issues out there.

Now I if you pop up a level and look at Avid and how poor their support for consumer oriented products have been you might want to avoid them, I would, but you need to make up your own mind based on what you want to do and how long you expect the product to be supported etc. If you look at the cost and features it is a compelling box, but you have to make that tradeoff.

The brain dump on those higher level negatives are...

Avid seems to have struggled for decades with what to do with the low-end audio interfaces, they purchased M-Audio, that failed and they dumped M-Audio, abandoning many users. They have done previous MBox products, some quite nice like the Mbox 3 Pro, but notable by lack of long-term support compared to some other vendors, and they screwed up reselling interfaces from Apogee, with some badly burnt customers dumped without ongoing support. It seemed like every few years Avid was hiring new weak management that would screw up trying to chase the low end of the market again. (I personally think they should not have bothered and only focused on partnering with interface vendors).

Avid no longer develops their own high-end interface products, they currently resell the very nice MTRX product that is badged from DAD/NTP and the MTRX Studio which was a custom made variant of other DAD/NTP products. And then there is the Avid Carbon, more developed by Avid, an interesting and strange box. It really looks like UAD were annoying Avid with their very successful Apollo interfaces and Avid tried to copy and improve on those with Carbon but chose bizarrely to make it a AVB interface, with no support on Windows, and currently problems/bugs on macOS Sonoma and we'll see if Sequoia fixes them. Just a bizarre choice to use AVB, completely incompatible with the Dante focus in MTRX products, and a proprietary/modified version of AVB as well. Who knows what the long term future of Carbon looks like.

And amongst all this Avid was acquired by STG, a software focused investment firm. Who knows what long term commitment there is to any of this. Given all this I'd personally just avoid any Avid interface product, except MTRX or MTRX Studio, for high end users since DAD/NTP is really behind those, has a well earned reputation for support and product quality.

Yes Avid has jammed lots of features and software bundles into this box, that is how they operate at the low-end. How they have done bundles in the past, and then they'll turn around and abandon those products (like the widely loved Eleven Rack). And often that abandonment effectively happens before any supposed end of life support date. Only you can weigh the tradeoffs here for you.

There are many interfaces available from many decent vendors I'd be looking at... UAD (esp. if you want UAD style Console/hardware monitoring and access to UAD plugins, but they get expensive fast), Motu (underappreciated company, makes nice capable stuff), Focusrite (wide range of products) and especially RME (great quality and technical and customer support but you pay more for that).

[Modrob]

Wow! Lots of deep info—thanks you guys! But, it’s still a bit overwhelming to me. You see, I’m almost 65, and my brain power has been steadily shrinking—a lot of that is getting married 4 years ago and adjusting from single life to married life…😉 I moved to her place in the country, and she has lots of STUFF, like I had and brought, and we’ve gotten more stuff! 😆 Machines, big house mods/repairs/maintenance—soo much to keep up with. It has cut in to a lot of the time I used to spend with recording setup. And, I started out in a Nashville studio for several years up until 96 and went to work riding trains. 🤪 I then got a Fostex VF16 and that worked great for several years, and then went haywire. I fought it, but gave in on the advice of my old studio boss, and got into ProTools. But…a beginner effort with the MP9 version…and it’s STILL working. But the old computer is maxed at 4GB RAM (yep! LOL) and WIN7 (or maybe it’s still Vista?&#128559 So I bought a used desktop with an I7, SSD, and 16gb RAM. I made another post a few days ago about that situation…My iLOK account and AVID both have “lost” me, so I thought maybe I’ll venture into updating somewhat. Keep in mind the MP9 version and it’s proprietary Fast Track interface have worked just fine for me all these years…I’m just pretty basic in my efforts of playing all my instruments and just capturing them. Honestly about all I’ve ever used to supplement them is the BF76 compressor, and DVerb mostly. Not a heavy user.😉
I’ve only used the two inputs—my drums have always been electronic and I’ve always used a stereo out. (I did recently buy EZDrummer software but my laptop has bailed on me) So haven’t needed to try and separate outputs on drums. And yep I might at some point venture towards it. I have two monitors to view, and I’ve been using a Presonus Faderport module as a controller mostly. Oh, the only reason I need to change is I’m tired of the frequent freeze ups because of not enough processing and memory.
Oh one more thing—I have sent a email to the sales tech asking too.
Thanks for listening, and your help. 😊

[tope d]

Originally Posted by Modrob

—I’ve read several reviews of failings out-of-the-box or soon after.


And this Perpetual license thing—I have just seen a post that said after one year if not “renewed” it would turn into an Intro level?

In my talk with the salesperson I understood what I thought was “since my ways of using PT are very basic, I wouldn’t need to change anything for several years or so, the same way I’ve used my MP9 software for at least 5 to 6 years or more…”
And is this Studio bundle version a lesser version of the normal Studio version?
Many thanks.

Hi there!

I've been using the Mbox Studio since it came out and have minimal to zero issues. Only issue I've encountered is the USB-C cable being faulty. I had to replace it with a new generic one and has been working solid ever since.


The Perpetual License for Pro Tools Studio includes 1 year of Support and Updates. After a year when the support and updates plan ends, you will still be able to use all the versions of Pro Tools you already have prior to the updates and support plan ending.


I'm still using Pro Tools 8 LE with DIGI 003 besides the M-Box Studio and Pro Tools 2024.6 Im currently using at home and the only thing I personally don't like with older versions is that they don't have Offline Bounce. Everything is the same with the latest versions, plus more features previously not available.

Hope this helps.
Please feel free to let us know if you have further inquiries and we'll be here to help!

[Modrob]

Ah…cool! Thanks for that info. Makes me feel better about it. 😊

[James67]

Build Quality: From my experience and what I’ve gathered from other users, the build quality of the MBOX Studio is generally solid, but like with any product, there can be the occasional dud. Some of the early issues with failings out-of-the-box or shortly after purchase might have been isolated cases, but it’s always a good idea to check if the retailer or manufacturer offers a decent return or warranty policy. That way, you’re covered in case something does go wrong.

Perpetual License: Regarding the Perpetual license, the confusion comes from how Avid handles updates. The Perpetual license itself doesn’t expire, so you’ll always have access to the version of Pro Tools you purchased. However, if you don’t renew the support and upgrade plan after one year, you won’t get any updates. Some posts mention the software reverting to the Intro level, but that only happens if you switch to a subscription and let it expire. In your case, with a Perpetual license, you’ll be able to keep using Pro Tools indefinitely without updates, similar to how you’ve used your MP9 for years.

Studio Bundle vs. Normal Studio Version: The version of Pro Tools that comes with the MBOX Studio bundle should be the same as the standard Pro Tools Studio version, with no feature cuts. The main difference is that you’re getting the MBOX interface bundled with it at a discounted price, rather than buying the software and interface separately.

It sounds like the bundle could work well for you, especially if your needs are similar to how you’ve been using your older system. Just make sure to double-check all the details with your salesperson, especially about warranties and any future upgrade options.

Hope this helps

[Modrob]

Ahh…very good info. And thanks to you to for helping. I believe this is a good fit for me now…😊

[basslik]

Originally Posted by tope d

Hi there!

I've been using the Mbox Studio since it came out and have minimal to zero issues. Only issue I've encountered is the USB-C cable being faulty. I had to replace it with a new generic one and has been working solid ever since.


The Perpetual License for Pro Tools Studio includes 1 year of Support and Updates. After a year when the support and updates plan ends, you will still be able to use all the versions of Pro Tools you already have prior to the updates and support plan ending.


I'm still using Pro Tools 8 LE with DIGI 003 besides the M-Box Studio and Pro Tools 2024.6 Im currently using at home and the only thing I personally don't like with older versions is that they don't have Offline Bounce. Everything is the same with the latest versions, plus more features previously not available.

Hope this helps.
Please feel free to let us know if you have further inquiries and we'll be here to help!

Good to hear peeps still rocking the 003, nice tope d

[Bender]

What Darryl and Albee said. They have been around a while!