Had it with my Focusrite Forte interface - alternatives? RESOLVED

[Mornats]

I've had my Forte for a few years now and whilst I love the quality of the sound I've had various driver issues, not so great latency and general all-round flakiness. They discontinued it a few months after I paid full retail price for it (£330) and have a crappy beta driver that you can only find by googling it. I think I spent 2-3 weeks getting that to work after the official one refused to work with Windows 10.

So today I tried playing around in Reaper and there's no sound coming from the Forte. If I set Windows' default sound to be the Forte and play Spotify then I get sound. It's just no joy in Reaper and there's no change in settings. I've checked everything, reset the Forte to its default settings (something I have to do on a fortnightly basis to get the damn thing to work) and I've had it completely with the damn thing. It's buggy and has been abandoned by Focusrite almost as soon as I bought it.

So, are there any alternatives? I want super low latency in virtual instruments and good clear sound output. I'm not actually recording a great into it at the moment so high-quality preamps aren't a big consideration although they have to be good. Rock solid stability is a must and the ability to control the volume from the PC would be nice (it's very handy on the Forte as my interface is a distance from my desk).

Budget has to be £200-250 tops as I wasn't planning on changing my interface so that rules out any recommendations of RME and their envious stability. I'm on a PC too so it's USB 2 or 3 so I can't go for a Thunderbolt interface.

My first consideration would have been the Scarlett 2nd gen as I hear good things about the latency but I'm loathe to trust Focusrite's support of these after being burned by the Forte. I don't think they will be lax in driver updates and the like as it's their most popular range but still. I wish I'd bought an RME Babyface back when they were only £100 more than the Forte...

Edited May 6, 2017 by Mornats

[Mornats]

I've been playing with this for a bit.

The Forte will play back in Reaper if I select anything other than ASIO as the driver. With ASIO selected, I get no sound output and the song in Reaper will play back around 1.5x faster than it should (can't hear it but I can see it moving too quickly). I can't change the sample rate on the Forte from 44.1khz. If I unplug the Forte and reinstall, Windows doesn't recognise the device the first few times. Once it does eventually pick it up, it attempts a firmware upgrade which fails.

I dug out my old Native Instruments Guitar Rig Session - their old, cheap entry point model. No Win 10 drivers, no new drivers since 2013 but I installed the Win 8 drivers. It worked. But also, the latency is way better than the Forte's. Same sample rates and where the Forte is around 8.9ms the Guitar Rig is showing 6.9ms. I can also play back without pops and crackles at a lower sample rate on the Guitar Rig than I can on the Forte (in case you're wondering, one track that I have wouldn't play back in real time without pops and crackles last week at less than 256 samples. I can do it on 48 samples with the GR). WTH?

I was looking at the Audient ID14 but for now, the Guitar Rig is killing the (pretty much dead) Forte.

[lowdown]

Steinberg UR22 Mk2 is well worth a look.
Reviews are good and performs excellently.
Built like a tank as well.

I suppose with all these things, take your time with reviews and gather as much info as you can regarding
your DAW and PC spec set up. Of course, nip on over to VI Control, without doubt one of the best forums for all
Midi and Composing needs.
But you already know that.

[Mornats]

Ha yeah, I finished up posting something similar to the above on Vi-control

At least I'm in a lucky position that my old Guitar Rig Session is holding up very well so I can take my time with finding a new one.

[Sibob]

Hey bud,

Just wondered if you've talked to Focusrite's Tech Support about it?

Si // Focusrite Media Relations

[ambient]

I had one of these. One of the members on here is part of their technical support team. He was brilliant at helping me to get it sorted out.

[Mornats]

[quote name='Sibob' timestamp='1494023857' post='3292766']
Hey bud,

Just wondered if you've talked to Focusrite's Tech Support about it?

Si // Focusrite Media Relations
[/quote]

Hey Si, I'm just drafting a tech support ticket for them this morning. I'm trying to describe what's been happening in a more useful way than "it just stopped working and I don't know why" which is kinda what happened but not useful for a support tech! I'll go over all the symptoms I mentioned above and see what they come back with. I'll update this thread with the results (most likely mid next week hopefully as they won't pick anything up until Monday at the earliest).

[quote name='ambient' timestamp='1494027046' post='3292788']
I had one of these. One of the members on here is part of their technical support team. He was brilliant at helping me to get it sorted out.
[/quote]

That will be SiBob Great to hear yours got sorted - that gives me some hope for mine. Although I do still have concerns that there will never be any driver updates or optimisations for it.

[ambient]

[quote name='Mornats' timestamp='1494068038' post='3292976']
Hey Si, I'm just drafting a tech support ticket for them this morning. I'm trying to describe what's been happening in a more useful way than "it just stopped working and I don't know why" which is kinda what happened but not useful for a support tech! I'll go over all the symptoms I mentioned above and see what they come back with. I'll update this thread with the results (most likely mid next week hopefully as they won't pick anything up until Monday at the earliest).



That will be SiBob Great to hear yours got sorted - that gives me some hope for mine. Although I do still have concerns that there will never be any driver updates or optimisations for it.
[/quote]

I got it sorted, but did end up selling it. It was very fussy, it liked to be plugged in after launching Logic Pro. I ended up buying an Apogee One, which sounds just as good, and works seamlessly.

[Mornats]

Mine's plugged in constantly so it could be that too.

I've just been going round Focusrite's support site and found this article: https://support.focusrite.com/hc/en-gb/articles/115003109265-1st-Gen-Scarlett-interfaces-No-playback-or-metering-from-ASIO-applications- so even though it's a different interface, I'm currently installing a trial of NOD32 to replace my Avast antivirus to see if that's the cause. I've been meaning to jump from the free AV software for a while due to the nagging they give you to upgrade. More updates as I get them

[Mornats]

Righto, another update. got rid of AVAST and installed a demo of ESET Nod32 antivirus and the ASIO issue has been resolved. What's more, I'm playing a track back in recording mode at 64 samples without any issues at all (6.7ms latency). I've updated the title of this post to say it's been resolved

Tried playing the track at 32 samples and Kontakt crashed. Tried it again and it ran through the track with a few pops and crackles when the choir kicked it (which has always been one of the most demanding VSTs to be fair). Playing this track back at 64 samples is far better than the 256 that seemed to be the limit earlier. Free antivirus eh? Not worth it! I'll buy a licence for Nod32 when my trial expires.

So I'm happy now. SiBob - any ideas if Focusrite will put out any driver updates or optimisations for the Forte? I do periodically run into problems like this and I've lost work in the past so anything that can be done to help with stability would be fantastic.

[Sibob]

Hi,

So glad that it's been resolved!
Yes I was in the Tech support team, although have moved to another part of the business around 6months ago. As such I've kinda fallen away from the little things that can cause problems (Windows 10 updates (eugh), free virus protection updates (double-eugh)).
That said, I obviously like to still represent on here as best I can, and can always pass details onto Tech support to contact back asap.

With regards to Forte, as you mentioned, it is now discontinued, and whilst we will always help as best we can with ANY of our products through the years, as you can imagine, we can only commit to bug-fixing for a certain period past discontinuation, which is 2 years.
And this is, of course, if the bug can be fixed in the context of an operating system that the discontinued product may not have even been tested on initially.

Certainly report the issue to Tech Support anyway, they'll be glad to hear of that fix working and may be able to asvise of any further beta versions of the driver available for Forte. I'm not aware of any, but as I said, I'm not in the thick of that part of the business anymore

Cheers
Si // Focusrite Media Relations

[Mornats]

Thanks again Si, I'll drop the support team a note to mention the huge improvements moving from Avast gave me. Maybe they should give a Nod32 licence away as part of their monthly plugin deals I've got a lot more confidence in Focusrite now so I may look into the Scarlett 2i4 a bit more (key thing for me on that is the RCA out connectors which means I can go through the same interface and test the mix on my Yamaha HS7s and my Tannoy E11 / Rotel RA930AX amp hi-fi setup.

Any idea if there are any comparisons of the latency improvements between the Forte and the Scarlett 2nd gen?

[lowdown]

[quote name='Mornats' timestamp='1494072688' post='3293020']
Righto, another update. got rid of AVAST and installed a demo of ESET Nod32 antivirus and the ASIO issue has been resolved. What's more, I'm playing a track back in recording mode at 64 samples without any issues at all (6.7ms latency). I've updated the title of this post to say it's been resolved

Tried playing the track at 32 samples and Kontakt crashed. Tried it again and it ran through the track with a few pops and crackles when the choir kicked it (which has always been one of the most demanding VSTs to be fair). Playing this track back at 64 samples is far better than the 256 that seemed to be the limit earlier. Free antivirus eh? Not worth it! I'll buy a licence for Nod32 when my trial expires.

So I'm happy now. SiBob - any ideas if Focusrite will put out any driver updates or optimisations for the Forte? I do periodically run into problems like this and I've lost work in the past so anything that can be done to help with stability would be fantastic.
[/quote]

I am sure you are aware of Vienna Ensemble Pro 6?
Loads all FX and Instruments outside of your DAW. You can use it on one or several Computors.
Even combinations of Mac & PC running together.
For me, best bit of software I have purchased, especially running large templates or numerous amounts of Midi tracks.

[Mornats]

I always thought that VE Pro was for running slave machines only. Do you get many benefits running it on a single machine?

[lowdown]

You can use it one machine as well, everything is hosted outside of the DAW.
Basically you are running your DAW on pretty much zero cpu.
I am not sure about the tech in and outs of it .
But yes, for me the RAM and CPU of running Cubase is not an issue anymore.
In fact, I can't remember the last time I had performances issues.

Check some of the videos out from VSL, plenty more on YouTube as well.
http://youtu.be/tNlaUVthzeM


https://www.vsl.co.at/en/Vienna_Software_Package/Vienna_Ensemble_PRO#!Video_Demos

[Sibob]

[quote name='Mornats' timestamp='1494074270' post='3293031']
Thanks again Si, I'll drop the support team a note to mention the huge improvements moving from Avast gave me. Maybe they should give a Nod32 licence away as part of their monthly plugin deals I've got a lot more confidence in Focusrite now so I may look into the Scarlett 2i4 a bit more (key thing for me on that is the RCA out connectors which means I can go through the same interface and test the mix on my Yamaha HS7s and my Tannoy E11 / Rotel RA930AX amp hi-fi setup.

Any idea if there are any comparisons of the latency improvements between the Forte and the Scarlett 2nd gen?
[/quote]

There were big steps forward in latency with ththe new 2nd Gen Scarlett's over the 1st gen driver (which the Forte shared), so you may well see an improvement (depending on a lot of variables) in a 2nd Gen 2i4.

Si // Focusrite Media Relations

[Mornats]

Thanks lowdown, I'll check it out. By the way, I did post on another thread explaining the performance I'm getting out of my PC at the moment (http://basschat.co.uk/topic/303671-can-you-recommend-a-pclaptop-for-music/page__view__findpost__p__3290429). CPU seem alright at the moment and purging samples in Kontakt is almost halving my RAM usage. I'll still check out VE Pro though. I noticed there's a free edition but haven't looked hard enough to see if that would give me any benefit.

Thanks again Si. By the way, I dropped a note to Focusrite support to say that the anti-virus swap worked a treat. I asked a little about any new driver updates for the Forte too to see what they say.

[DaveFry]

Here's an interesting video of a composer showing how he uses two slaves and VE :

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtBxZaUB8p8[/media]

[lowdown]

[quote name='DaveFry' timestamp='1494140723' post='3293498']
Here's an interesting video of a composer showing how he uses two slaves and VE :

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtBxZaUB8p8[/media]
[/quote]

Yes, his tutorial is excellent and for anyone new to VE6 Pro, definitely well worth a watch.

[lurksalot]

[quote name='Sibob' timestamp='1494102847' post='3293346']


There were big steps forward in latency with ththe new 2nd Gen Scarlett's over the 1st gen driver (which the Forte shared), so you may well see an improvement (depending on a lot of variables) in a 2nd Gen 2i4.

Si // Focusrite Media Relations
[/quote]
I understood that the gen 1 Scarlett runs on the Gen 2 drivers? I changed mine and it does seem to run with a lot less latency , though I will get a gen 2 fairly soon anyway 😊