Steinberg UR22 24/192 usb interface

Just bought one for my desktop interface and it should be here by wed. Needed something smaller at my computer than my Yamaha MG16/XU for listening to 24/192 files. Hoping it works well for its bargain price from Sweetwater.com My AT&T internet speed is so slow that DSD downloads are out of the question for now. 24/192 is pretty nice and I love 2496 I can burn to dvds. Even the Yamaha was a huge sonic improvement over my stock computer sound card.

 

For playback or recording?

For playing back double rate files, anything will do. Steinberg IS Yamaha, FWIW. So, I guess you traded up in their line.

For recording, I have SERIOUS issues with anything without actual line level inputs. These "universal input jacks"--that will sense impedance and take anything from a guitar DI to a condenser mic to a ribbon mic to a line level....all passing through a lousy cheap gain stage circuit....

The only concern for playback, though, is what you're plugging it into--it will have balanced +4 professional outputs. You can obviously just use tip/sleeve to RCA to connect it to a traditional stereo, BUT it will be far too hot....a lot of better interfaces give a software configuration to calibrate it to -10 (consumer unbalanced level)....so, a control panel check box to switch between +4 and -10 operation.

 

Mostly for me it will be to playback high-rez files. I do not do any computer recording any more as I will not chance any concert recording to a computer. Burned once and that is enough. You can obviously pay good money and get a great usb device (Ayre), but I don't live in the Hamptons, so I must work the other side of the tracks. All my recording now is done on SDHC flash recorders and I've never made better recordings than the 2496 ones I do now.

I am also not not sure about the quality of phantom power being supplied by the 5V of the USB cable for the Steinberg, but for playback it should be a nice device. It also didn't make sense to use the big, bulky Yamaha MC16/XU for just listening to files. I still have issues with latency and that will have to corrected, and that maybe only with a new computer.

 

-------------------------
Thanks for the reminder of the +4 to -10 change, which I will do.

 

Steinberg UR-22 showed up today and I am mightily impressed with this device for all of $149. Does 24/192 and 24/96 with no dropouts in any of the files I've played, and they sound so good, way better than the stock card in my computer and better than I thought. Very smooth and detailed. Hopefully this will be one of my best buys for 2015. I am surprised that I had dropouts with the Yamaha MG mixer USB I/O and not this UR-22 since it is the same driver, so something else is holding back the Yamaha piece. More investigations to come.

The UR-22 comes highly recommended as a high rez usb audio device. 24/192 files are good enough for me. I am listening to Barry Diament's last project: Work of Art in 2496 as I downloaded his DVD of wav files into my computer. I can listen to them here, and I have burned 2 DVD-R's as DVD-Vs for my disc spinners. Audio life is good today.

Bought mine from Sweetwater Sound and my guy there is Ben Porter. Great service.

 

Jim it's a few months later - still like the Steinberg? I'm looking to retire my venerable E-Mu 1212m card due to apparent incompatibility with Windows 10 and I need a new interface. The E-Mu has been a great performer for MANY years, but all good things come to an end and there's only so long I can expect a PCI interface from the mid-2000s to continue to work. Did you consider the M-Audio M-Track Plus MKII (or did you disqualify it for only doing 96KHz)? Honestly I think the M-Audio M-Track MKII (non "Plus") may be all I need since I only ever do needle drops at 24/41.

 

FWIW, in my experience, the sub-$500 ADCs do not do 192kHz well. In many cases, 96kHz sounds objectively better on those units. And there seems to be a trend in pro-sumer audio gear where 192kHz capability in the sub-$500 market segment is vanishing (noting that is does indeed exist on the $150 UR22).

I currently own an Apogee Duet that does do 192kHz reasonably well, but it's going for around $650 these days.

 

I am probably going to add the Schitt Wyrd and see if it makes an improvement. Kind of crazy to by a $99 add-on to a $150 device, but I am liking it.

 

----------------------------------
I really like it and the fact that it does 24/192 was a plus, but for $150 I'm sure there is better out there. At 68 it certainly does all I need it to do. I would love to have done the Benchmark, and the new $1100 Rega DAC had a great review in Phile. There came a point to me where I had to set a limit as too how much to spend as I don't listen on the computer much, except for my recordings and some downloads. I generally burn the 2496 ones to DVD-Rs anyway.

I know the math is that 24/192 is better, but my old ears have a hard time discerning it. I doubt it is the DAC. There is no reason for anyone at $150 to not do the Steinberg or a Focusrite unit, or something else from the Pro world.

 

It looks as if re-installing the drivers again on my Windows 10 machine made my 1212m work again! Yahoo! I really like this card for needledrops, though I've never figured out how to make it playback 96/24 WAV files. The software is bewildering to say the least.

 

-----------------------------------
This has been my fear of even considering Win 10 because of all my Sony software and Cirlinca for burning DVDs. I really don't want to regret doing it when there isn't really a reason to use Win 10 right now.

 

Phil I have a 1212M as well and have also run into issues with Windows 10. Even after reinstalling the drivers, non-ASIO playback only works at 48kHz. However, ASIO still works fine at all sample rates since it bypasses Windows sound. I found a workaround for mine by connecting the optical S/PDIF out from my motherboard to the optical input in the 1212M. I use the motherboard Realtek HD audio at 96kHz for Windows sound and apps without ASIO output and then the E-MU ASIO driver for apps with ASIO output. It all works perfectly and sounds great.

 

Yeah I'm jealous to this day of your ability to write 96/24 DVDs. I've never been able to get my 1212m to work right playing back high res files. The interface is bewildering. It works great for needle drops however. My DVD Architect Studio 5.0 does the same error now than it did before when I try to create 96/24 audio compilation discs. You're using the full version of DVD Architct, correct? Some day I may be able to listen to all these Paul McCartney box set high res tracks but not today.

 

----------------------------
I unloaded DVD Architect when I could not get it to work after some Windows updates. Sony was great trying to help me with it, but they could not figure it out either, and that was after removal and a clean install. Windows did something to render DVD Architect unusable.

I now use Cirlinca ($39) and I have had no issues and it will burn DVD-As and DVD-Vs. My Sony DVD/SACD players take the DVD-Vs at 2496, but for my Yamaha S-1800 it needs DVD-As. Cirlinca works great for me.

Sony's CD Architect works great and has made me some great first generation redbook cds that sound excellent. Most of my commercial cds don't sound as good as my first generation recording. I highly recommend CD Architect.

Cirlinca is pretty intuitive but you must be careful to choose which format you want in the upper right hand corner. There are circles you check for DVD-A and DVD-V, and checking one does not uncheck the other which it should. I am careful of that from now on.

 

I'll check Cirlinca out. I'd love to be able to write 96/24 DVDs just to have a nice clean way to play the Paul McCartney box sets (I have 5 of them). I've used CD Architect for my needle drops since I first got a copy with Sound Forge 9 (full version). When I was a student I took advantage of Sony's very generous educational pricing. Sound Forge 9 came with CD Architect and I've been using it ever since. Absolutely GREAT redbook CD authoring.

Edit: I wonder if Cirlinca is out of business. Their web presence is dead.

My 1212m came with Minnetonka discWelder Bronze I don't think I've ever been able to get it to install or work. Maybe I should try again.

 

I can't believe they are gone. I wish I knew what had happens as it was the only affordable DVD burning software out there. Have to put on my Sherlock hat.

 

It appears that Discwelder Bronze was only a DVD-A authoring package so I would not buy it if it did not create DVD-V at 2496 which it appears not to do.

There was another affordable program calls Audio DVD Creator you might try. http://audio-dvd-creator.software.informer.com/

This is not a good change of events. Much of the other is Mac only such as Roxio Toast.

 

I used Audio DVD Creator many years ago with a little success. It was not supported. I think I was one of the last people ever to purchase it and I lost my login information.

Discwelder Bronze does not install. I don't think I've been able to install it since I was using my old Windows XP machine.

 

There used to be a freeware program over on Sourceforge that allowed for making audio DVDs. I'll look around when I have time and see if I can find it. IIRC, it wasn't very fancy, maybe even command line, but I once used it to burn a hires needledrop to DVD and it worked fine.

 

I am really bumed out that Cirlinca has just vanished.

 

Yeah, strange. They contacted me several years ago to ask if they could package a freeware VST plugin I created called V.I with their software. I agreed and then heard from a guy there who asked if he could buy the source code from me. Later when I tried to contact him, he never replied. I've since contacted the company and asked if the guy still worked there, but never got any replies.

 

You can try these free, open-source programs:

For audio-only DVDs: http://audioplex.sourceforge.net/
For DVD-Audio: http://dvd-audio.sourceforge.net/

 

So with my new receiver and office setup I can send the analog output from the "regular" sound card in my computer to my receiver. The system built in to the desktop is based on a Realtek chipset and is capable of 96/24 and I'm listening to "RAM" in high res right now. Sounds great. I know built-in sound cards are wildly variable in quality, and that they're much better now than they were 10 years ago. We'll see. At least I can play back the stuff High-rez.

My old PC:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2365877,00.asp?tab=Specs


Edit: There's a thunderstorm coming through my neighborhood and it just thundered mightily outside at the same time as the thunder in "Dear Boy". One of the coolest musical synchronicities I've ever experienced.

 

If it sounds great to you, that's all that really matters. I'm sure there are some around here who will tell you built-in motherboard audio sucks, etc., and yes, if you start looking at noise level measurements, etc., it's not as great in theory as lots of external devices, but it can sound fine when properly implemented, which is the case with most modern PCs.

 

Jim, and company...

Cirlinca.com seems to be going through its annual, several days long, repurchasing of that particular domain name. As I recall, at this time last year the same thing happened--that was when I was trying to look into them as a functioning alternative to Sony DVD Architect. If history serves as a guide, I expect Cirlinca.com will be back online in a few days.

However, as turned out to be the case last year, http://www.cirlinca.org/ and http://www.cirlinca.net/ seem to be exact mirrors of Cirlinca.com, and it looks like they are both completely functioning at this time.

But there is something else to note about Cirlinca products. Effective January 1 of this year, they completely dropped the particular DVD-A/DVD-V authoring software you and I purchased, but kept their other two products while putting them through a name change. They have even dropped all references to "DVD-Audio" from their site (I noted this back at the start of 2015) even though it used to be a part of product names.

That brings us to this point in time. Currently, the only Cirlinca product that will author DVD-V or DVD-A discs is "HD-Audio Solo Ultra", with a price of $68.98. While the site does not list DVD-A authoring for this product (only DVD-V authoring), the current product user's guide does mention DVD-A is still supported. The user's guide can be accessed from this page: http://www.cirlinca.org/products.htm

To all, if there are any doubts about the product make use of the free trial.