Audio interface shootout reveal: UA vs PreSonus vs Focusrite

This is the reveal video for the blind test shootout between the Focusrite 4i4, PreSonus Quantum, UA Apollo, and PreSonus Studio 68c.

[treeproduction]

To be honest all 3 companies will do the job.. its not a night and day difference I know a lot of beat makers and engineers scream you need a universal audio to make great music just like you need protools the industry standard to make a good song.. and Im not knocking those companies they make great products.. this just shows that its more about the creative process.. good idea's..good mixing..good recording practices will make a good song...💪🏾

[jl]

Even though people picked favorites while listening blind, I'd be surprised if they could pick those out consistently. I used a match plugin to compare them, and other than the "air" one (which has essentially a tilt EQ on it), they are all pretty much identical, and practically null.
Thanks very much for the test.

[mvoproject]

Could you make the battle Zoom UAD-2 vs Motu M4 vs PreSonus Studio 68c ?

[RyanNoyes]

Thank you so much for doing this. It’s a bit freaky to admit this, but just watching this through YouTube which compresses everything horrendously, and THEN an iPhone through its own internal speakers—I could still hear major differences. My hunch was that C was a PreSonus. Far and above my favorite. Thanks again!

[gutenbird]

Had picked the E as the UA but also thought D was in the ballpark. It just was more robust on every recording. This was pretty helpful as I thought the first 2 were a bit thin.

[kingjmusic]

A and E sound very similar and those 2 are my favs

[longship]

Thanks for taking the time to do this comparison. Your work here was very helpful.

[mostyles]

The Apollo is the nicest colored sound, no surprise, but you really don't want that in an interface...You can always at that, but you can't take it away. I think UA interfaces are highly overacted. Good musicians = good music. The gear just doesn't matter anymore. Just need a few good preamps to bring you mic level up to good clean level and a little compression to even out the signal....Keep the rest in the box. Nice video!

[assshakerstudios]

E was my fav, C second. On the first 2 when you hear the cymbals(acoustic/real drums/are hardest to record so that's where you listen)they sound phasey like there's a slight flanger on them, or washy! That's intermodulation distortion which the cheaper interfaces are known for! It's a lot slimmer on D but it's slightly there as well. On C it's a lot harder to hear but it's there. It's less apparent on E, but there is some there, however out of them all it's the least IMO. I wonder if you could test that? I never was the tester, but was always in the room...lol! I suck ass with that stuff, but know it when I hear it! Also the pre's on the Twin or whatever where a little thin around 100ish hz?compared to the Quantum which I was not expecting! I wonder if that was an older Twin or a newer one? Don't they have 3 revisions of that one? It's hard to tell with how many different versions of the same interface there are! Also imagine you have 200 tracks all stacked up on top of each other, after a while....those little differences do ADD UP!! And they can limit how your track will turn out! Next time you do one of these Czar, can you put 10 stereo tracks of the drums(so 20 mono tracks) and write them to a 2 track so your stacking 10 stereo tracks on top of each other, and then do this same test? You'll just have to account for the gain staging of course, but that shouldn't be that big of a deal. I'm willing to be that the differences will be more apparent! You could also stack them the same way and combine them all to make a song, so 10 stereo tracks of drums, 10 stereo tracks of guitars, and 10 stereo tracks of vocals equaling 60 mono tracks combined into a stereo track per interface!

[lilsavdabest]

C sounded best overall, E sounded best when it got loud and when you could see the waves peaking hard, it seemed to have a certain smoothness when encountering clipping, instead of just accepting that the signal was clipping.

[metalfather]

not really enough range in a voice alone to test these through YouTube compression.

[TheDigitalMedia]

I guess then if hardware fidelity isn't the determining factor it would come down to software. I'm in the market for an interface so I'd love to hear which product has the best software and which has the best-designed UI.

[ancientalien]

I mixed up b and c. I own a quantum too...go figure.

[musick]

Well done shootout. I figured out A and had a good idea what C was. I think I liked the Apollo the least!

[axemanfishing]

Man o man, your a great guy to do this for us. Thank you! I listened on really crappy behringer ms16's on my main desktop computer, and "A" sounded nice on my crap system. Noticed no difference on any of the others on my pc set up. NOW, I need to do this again, using my recording PC and my near field monitors to really hear what is going on. I often worry about the new generation listening to stuff on phones and garbage systems, so, makes me wonder if I should invest more in quality pres and converters, but then think, why? I only know a handfull of folks like myself who still have audiophile high end amps and speakers to listen to music anymore. Seems to be a dying breed and this is sad, because the experience of listening to high end mixes by your favorite bands, is an experience that is exceptional in itself if you've never heard it. Folks are really missing out in my opinion.

[dub-a-youproductions]

If your going to use the higher end presonus interfaces why are you not using Focusrite's Clarett range in the shootout?

[crissbmajor]

all device sound Awesome No Product Can Be The Same Because is not coming from On Company
Mixing Is The Main Tag U can Own UAD Audio Device But Still Your Music Sound Bad If u Never Mix To Get Well Balances
It Will Be Like U Waste Money Out There I Like Presonus Sounds For The Price Range It Looks Professional
Pls Try Compare UAD Vrs Avid M Box pro

[CoolCat]

Thanks so much. I have been researching, watching videos... Aaaarrrggghhh. Your tests were the most useful I've seen.

[dat_chip]

Oh wow, I was pretty wrong.
Great test, and a good challenge too!

[okibaykal]

Great Video What Helps Me My FRIEND THNX...