MOTU 2408mk3 (PCI 424) - 24 Input / 26 Output Hard Disc Recording System with PCI 424 Card for Mac and PC

The 2408 mk3 (PCI 424) from MOTU is a hard disc recording system that includes an interface featuring eight high quality, 24-bit/96kHz analog inputs and outputs, combined with twenty-four channels of ADAT and Tascam digital I/O. The single space rack-mountable interface provides seven banks of I/O (in multiples of eight) - one bank of analog on balanced 1/4" TRS connectors, three banks of 96kHz ADAT optical and three banks of 96kHz Tascam TDIF. Any three banks can be chosen to be active at one time. This means one can hook up three ADATs, three DA-88s, and eight analog devices all at the same time and access any three banks in any combination of formats, and freely switch formats at any time.

In addition to the eight dedicated analog outputs, the interface also features a stereo output with front panel volume control so one can plug powered monitors directly into the interface, while a separate headphone output with volume control is on the front panel. Also provided is S/PDIF digital I/O for exchanging digital audio with a wide variety of other devices. An extra S/PDIF stereo output of the main mix is available that could, for example, be left connected to a DAT machine. The 2408 mk3 interface provides Wordclock sync and on-board video and SMPTE time code synchronization features. These features allow one to slave the system to video, SMPTE time code or both, without a dedicated synchronizer.

The 2408 mk3 uses the second generation AudioWire protocol, a high-bandwidth digital audio format capable of carrying up to twenty-four channels of 96kHz digital audio in and out of the computer at the same time. The included PCI-424 card features a powerful DSP chip dedicated to creating a custom tailored monitor mix of up to ninety-six channels of 96kHz audio. Because the mixing takes place on the card itself, instead of making the round trip from the PCI bus to the host processor, the system provides near-zero latency performance. Up to four audio interfaces (which are hot swappable) can be connected to a PCI-424 in any combination. The system includes the PCI-424 card and Audiodesk workstation software.