Recording - December 2012 - 20

Sensitivity or Channel Pressure) as if they were ordinary Control Changes, which is a nice simplification. Positioned as a songwriter’s tool, the Keystation Mini 32 comes with Avid Sibelius First, an entry-level notation program, and is sized to go anywhere yet be decently playable. This one is very much a “try before you buy” product; the keyboard feel will have a lot of fans but detractors as well, so you’ll want to see how it responds to your fingers. If it feels right, then the under-thehood feature set will not disappoint.—MM

The EIE Pro requires a special low-latency audio driver before your PC or Mac will see it, but then talks to any DAW as a 4-in/4-out audio source plus MIDI. The hub will handle the most power-hungry USB peripherals, and lets you hang (say) a number of controllers off the EIE Pro without eating another USB port on your laptop. While the EIE Pro works as advertised, our one caveat is with the input channels themselves. On the mic side, they provide a maximum gain of +51.5 dB and get pretty noisy if you crank them way up, so this interface isn’t your best choice if you have mics that require a lot of clean gain and don’t have their own preamps already. Guitarists who worry about Hi-Z jacks on interfaces should listen carefully before buying as well, as the EIE Pro’s 102-

Akai EIE Pro
$249; www.akaipro.com

Akai’s new EIE (Electromusic Interface Expander) and EIE Pro attempt to provide a musician with pretty much everything he’d need to hang off a USB port in order to make music—a 4in/4-out audio interface, a MIDI interface, a zerolatency monitoring setup, metering, and even a USB hub for extra peripherals—all in a layout that is compact yet easy to access. The result is a funkylooking tabletop box with a lot going on both inside and out. We tested the EIE Pro, an AC-powered USB 2.0 interface with four simultaneous inputs and outputs at up to 24-bit/96 kHz. We didn’t test the EIE, a bus-powered USB 1.1 version that only provides two ins and two outs at a time at 16-bit/44.1 kHz but is otherwise identical. The EIE Pro’s box-shaped case presents all controls clearly on the front and has lots of room for cabling on the back. The front panel is dominated by four inputs with XLR/TRS combination jacks, individual gain pots, and individual switches for mic/line level input or Hi-Z guitar input. Phantom power is switchable by channel pair. When monitoring in stereo, the odd/even channels are hardpanned left/right. The rear panel has four 1/4" TRS balanced audio outputs, four 1/4" TRS send/return inserts for the inputs, MIDI In/Out, a jack and switch for the wallwart power supply, a computer USB connection, and a 3-port powered USB hub. The VU meters, an unusual but not completely unheard-of addition to a mid-level interface, can be used to monitor input or output level on either channels 1/2 or 3/4, and their white backlights flash bright red when clipping. The Master 1/2 level has its own pot and can be monitored in mono or stereo. A 1/4" headphone jack has its own volume pot, and a separate pot lets you blend the output of the DAW with what you’re hearing on the inputs. The EIE Pro offers flexible headphone monitoring. A switch lets you listen to software channel outputs from your DAW (either 1/2 or all four in a stereo mix) blended with your inputs, or solely to outputs 3/4 with no input blend. This latter setting is useful to DJs who require a separate cue mix without interrupting what they’re feeding the main outputs.
20
RECORDING December 2012

kilohm input impedance is way less than the 1 Megohm found on some other interfaces, and the difference in loading can have an audible effect on your tone, as it did in a couple of my tests. The EIE Pro combines a lot of features that laptop musicians find themselves needing; it’s worth a look and listen if you think it will work well with the gear you’ll be attaching to it.—MM

Zoom MS-50G MultiStomp Guitar Pedal
$99.99 street; www.zoomfx.com

Last but not least in this year’s Gift Guide, here’s a quick look at a brandnew multieffects pedal from Zoom that arrived just as we were preparing this issue. The MS-50G is the first of Zoom’s MultiStomp pedals, entire multieffects chains packed into a case the size of a standard stomp box; it’s a startling combination of tiny size and heavy-duty digital muscle.

http://www.akaipro.com http://www.zoomfx.com

Recording - December 2012

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recording - December 2012