Should I upgrade to Apogee Ensemble?

I'm currently running a PreSonus Fire Studio Tube and I'm considering upgrading to The Apogee Ensemble. I have the Apogee Duet that I use for when I'm traveling.

 

I would appreciate any input anyone may have as the the benefits I might realize by going with the Ensemble. Will it be noticeable etc..

 

Thanks in advance.

 

Cheers,

 

Ken

Here's a discussion/thread that may give you some insight. It starts out sounding unrelated but read thru it. It may help you make your decision.

 

http://www.logicprohelp.com/viewtopic.php?t=49311

 

Scott

my writing partner uses an ensemble, and it is a complete piece of garbage. he could have a lemon, but it always crashes, has caused all sorts of issues, and the supposed marriage of apogee and apple never really has seemed to work out. their support has been bad. i know it can sound good as a converter, but seriously, in my experience, i would avoid it.

Apogee Ensemble here. Upgraded from a BLA modded 828 mkI. TOTALLY in LOVE WITH APOGEE!!!! I had a couple set up issues that were fixed by Apogee tech support. They talked me through my problems like they actually CARED! There may be other good companies and interfaces, but I am sold...

fwiw

my writing partner uses an ensemble, and it is a complete piece of garbage. he could have a lemon, but it always crashes, has caused all sorts of issues, and the supposed marriage of apogee and apple never really has seemed to work out. their support has been bad. i know it can sound good as a converter, but seriously, in my experience, i would avoid it.

 

My guess is your writing partner has a lemon, and seriously needs to be in contact with Apogee.

 

I have a friend who bought an Ensemble from sweetwater, had a problem with an input, called Apogee - they sent him a new unit and had him return the defective one after the new unit arrived. Nothing but excellent support.

 

I've never heard of anyone having any trouble whatsoever with Apple + Apogee. The integration is seamless.... unless your friend, again, has a defective unit. Their tech support would sort that out in a few moments if he were to contact them.

 

I hope I'm not coming across as an Apogee 'fanboy', but I know quite a few users - duets, ensembles, symphonies - and never heard anything but praise of their products and integration.

 

REGARDING THE OP: There would definitely be a difference in the sound of the Presonus FireStudio Tube and The Ensemble -- but it could be a difference that you like. The tube preamp in the Presonus is something that I quite like - but it's not for everybody. The Ensemble has the same "guts" as your Duet - just more inputs etc. So, really, you have the ultimate A/B set up right now to tell the difference in the two units. Hope that helps.

Hi,

 

I started with the Firepod, moved up to a Firestudio and sold it a few months later, went back to the FP, didn't have the tube version yet. Back then the FS control center software was VERY shaky. Since it was basically the same converters and mic pres as the FP no real reason to deal with all the problems. Hopefully the CC software is more stable now.

 

Bought the Duet to track vocals and was amazed at the difference... I knew I needed to get the Ensemble to add more I/O's at that point.

 

Picked one up at Guitar Center on sale, but GC didn't have a new one in stock. GC gave me an open box demo not planning to worry about the difference. Apogee insisted that they send me a brand new one despite the nice discount, used the loaner until it came in... worked flawlessly since day one. The integration with Logic/Apple is really nice!

 

Yes, you should hear a significant difference! As slamthecrank said, A/B for yourself, record vocals, acoustic guitar, etc through both and see if you can hear a difference.

 

Good luck!

Of all the companies out there I do think the Apogee integration into MacOSX is absolutely in the top 3 tier.

I can see both sides here.

 

I have owned my Ensemble for almost a year. I bought it used off Craigslist. While I love the sound of it and the ease with which I can use it, it occasionally crashes or gets very nasty distortion happening. All I need to do is power down the unit, then power it back up and it's fine.

 

I have concluded that the reason this happens is because my computer needs more power, and not because the unit itself has issues. I'm running a 2.5 year old Macbook with 2 GB of ram, and when I have a big project with lots of plugins, that's when the unit crashes. Interestingly enough it doesn't always correlate with the CPU meter being maxed out.

 

Having said that, I love this thing. I have recorded incredible sounding drums and piano through it, and at $1400 used, it's a worthy investment.

Thanks a lot for everyone's input. I'm going to A/B the Duet and the Fire Studio Tube and let you know.

Thanks a lot for everyone's input. I'm going to A/B the Duet and the Fire Studio Tube and let you know.

well i guess since everyone else posting here has had good results with it my partner got a lemon.... I certainly don't mean to come off as an apogee disser.... the funny thing was, is that we actually got the unit from apogee themselves as an endorsement/payback thing, and if i remember correctly, he has had them send him more then one unit with the problem persisting even through 3 cpu changes.... so not sure. Again, the convertors sound great, just have major stability issues....

The only apogee induced niggle I had was installing the firmware update. I had to run it twice. I ran the driver update twice, as well. Maybe that would solve your partners issues. Just a thought.

If anyone has an Ensemble/Duet and a more modest interface, plus a low-noise, transparent sounding analog mixer, I think many of us would really appreciate it if they could do something like this:

 

- Run a nice microphone into the mixer

- Send that channel to two mixer outputs, level-matched closely

- Route one of the outputs to the Apogee device, and the other to the PreSonus/whatever modest device

- Using a test tone into the mixer, level-match the two devices within 0.1dB or less

- Record a short take of an instrument or vocal using both devices simultaneously, each on its own track

- Post the two files as AIFFs, not specifying which is from which device.

 

Then we could use the files in ABX tests or other blind auditioning, and be sure that we're hearing the sound and not our expectations.

 

I will do this if I can borrow a high end interface from work. I have a PreSonus Firebox at home and would be very curious to hear the difference, and be SURE I'm hearing it and not imagining it.