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[OneWorld]

I am considering buying one of the A&H QU series of mixers. The QU32 (and QU24 I think) offers 32io over USB.

Is 32io realistic over USB. I have a Win10/64 i7 32gig of RAM PC using Cubase 8.5

The most I would ever use id say 8in and 24out, but I am sure even that would not allow me to achieve the 32 sample latency I currently experience with my Focusrite Saffire 56 and I sometimes use an RME FF800, both of which use Firewire and are both rock solid

Is it realistic to expect similar latency figures using the QU mixer, the other mixer I am considering is one of the Behringer x32 mixers, anyone any experience of using these mixers as an interface?

[Sam Spoons]

I use my X32 Compact as the only interface in my home studio with an old Mac Pro running Reaper. I don't record many tracks TBH but have never even though about buffer sizes or latency, it just seems to work. When I had a PC based system (Win XP) with Cubase and a M-Audio 24/96 I spent countless hours trying to get the latency down and eventually went back to hardware for several years.

USB2 should be fine for 32x32 I/O though, apparently AI manufacturers have been very slow to adopt USB3 as USB2 has plenty of bandwidth for the job.

FWIW if you are using any digital desk (as opposed to an audio interface) for recording to a DAW you have the facilities to direct monitor while tracking (with multiple cue mixes) so latency will not be an issue (a digital desk will introduce it's own latency but with the X32 it is only 1ms so is really something you can ignore in normal circumstances).

[Humble Bee]

I think the QU latency is around 1ms as well.

Latency in and out of your computer will depend on how powerful it is.

Unless you are tracking VI's live in the box, latency is not a problem as you would monitor direct at the desk as Sam pointed out.

[OneWorld]

I think the QU latency is around 1ms as well.

Latency in and out of your computer will depend on how powerful it is.

Unless you are tracking VI's live in the box, latency is not a problem as you would monitor direct at the desk as Sam pointed out.

Actually, I keep forgetting that, mixing all the inputs to a mixing board, both those coming from the DAW and the 'live' inputs are all in 'realtime' so to speak. I used to do OutTheBox ages ago and latency was something that I never needed bother my little head about

[Hugh Robjohns]

Actually, I keep forgetting that, mixing all the inputs to a mixing board, both those coming from the DAW and the 'live' inputs are all in 'realtime' so to speak.

Not quite real-time when using a digital mixing console because of the inherent A-D and D-A latencies for external (analogue) sources and monitoring destinations. But at least you don't have to worry about the computer buffer latencies, and the converter delays are no more than about 1-1.5ms at base sample rates (less at double rates etc) which shouldn't cause a problem for most live performance monitoring situations.

[Humble Bee]

That's what I meant with the qu having about 1 ms of latency.
Zero latency is only available in the analog world.

[Hugh Robjohns]