[fallward]

Originally Posted by MBTC

I'm hesitant to get into recommending specific audio interface models, kind of getting beyond Cubase and Virus related mixer issues with that one. One thing to remember is that my Snow doesn't even have the capabilities you're embarking on using here, so you're going to be a bit of a pioneer in your research. Others on the forum here might be able to answer targeted questions about audio interface selection. You might look into the availability and quality of tech support with any interface you buy, even to the point of seeing if they will answer your questions pre-sale. Do you live in a big enough city to have a major music store? If so it might be a good opportunity to visit and ask questions, the sales guys get this sort of question all day long and if you have limited hands on exposure to hardware it might be nice to walk around, see some of the stuff in person. If it were me and the first time I were buying an audio interface, I would start with the forum of the vendor to see how helpful the community is, because they will be where most of your questions will need to go.

The model I have is Focusrite Saffire Pro 24 and I can tell you I already wish I had more physical ports on it, may want to upgrade one day. Its connected to a dedicated Firewire card that I installed. If I were buying another one today I'd probably get a Saffire Pro 40 or maybe something else but that's not to say Firewire is for everyone.

To put that all into context, the Focusrite stuff has its own software that goes on the PC that you could think of as a mixer console that sits between the interface and the DAW, so if the interface you buy is the same way in that regard, you'll probably need some way of seeking answers to how to troubleshoot that as well. Sometimes you may be going "ok why is there no sound coming out of this" and there will be some simple setting you overlooked on the middleware or whatever. The Focusrite software can be fiddly and honestly I doubt I could help much with it, because I just tweaked it until it worked and left it there, lol.. I didn't really retain how I got there in memory I just tweak things as needed as I go. I have no idea if the Native Instruments interfaces are simpler in that regard or not.

Anyway hopefully that last paragraph underscores what I mean by you'll want to be sure you have helpful vendor tech support and or a good community of users for that audio interface, only because it's your first one.

You might start over on the Cubase forums and ask Cubase users which one they use. Steinberg does make audio interfaces but I don't know how common they are. I will say the Cubase DAW controllers I have from them are very high quality Yamaha-made gear, love them and recommend them.

Personally more pre-amp gain knobs on the front the better, they are damn handy. Just remember when you see XLR mic inputs, those are always mono to the best of my knowledge. If you're doing Output1, 2 and 3 from the Virus, you will most likely want to take advantage of independent stereo channels L+R. You can route them to a mono input and then split it in software but of course that's not the same. So more input options = better.

Awesome, thanks again for all the help. I do appreciate it!