This is a review and detailed measurements of the Focusrite Scarlett 18i8 Version 2 Audio Interface (analog to digital converter). It is on kind loan from a member. The current version seems to have moved to version 3. Assuming its cost has not changed, it goes for US $297 with free shipping on Amazon.
Matching the name of the unit, this is one bright box:
Power is provided through an external power supply. There are a lot of inputs and outputs. I limited my testing to line inputs you see in the back:
Let me tell you that I have been to hell and back on this device. I have had it for a few months trying every which way to get it working on my Windows 10 desktop. On my old system, I tried every trick in the book: multiple install/uninstall of the drivers. Different drivers. Booting, rebooting, installing, rebooting, etc. I literally spent days trying to get it work given the popularity of the brand and its low cost. I finally gave up.
Fast forward to today when I realized that it might work on my brand new Windows 10 system. I installed the drivers, plugged the unit it and to my pleasant surprise, its control panel popped up saying it detected it!
I ran my dashboard measurement and all was well. Then I noticed as I was documenting the output in photoshop that it was showing garbage data being captured. It was a sequence of sqarewaves at 750 Hz. I took a snapshot of it, put it in photoshop and then unplugged the input from it but it made no difference at all. I then hit the soft reset button in the Asio interface and bam! I was greeted with the good old blue screen of death:
Wdf01000.sys is the windows driver frame work. I looked at the unit with anger and it was as red as it could be, proving that the 18i8 was the culprit!
Using every ounce of self control I had, I hard reset the machine and booted. Sigh. Back to square one with neither Windows nor Focusrite control panel able to see the hardware. Same problem I had before. Multiple power cycles, reboot, USB input change, etc., nothing has fixed it. It has become totally non-functional as it was on my old PC.
Went through the troubleshooting page Focusrite has and everything is fine as far as services and such.
So, the measurements you see, is all the measurements I can produce.
ADC Audio Measurements
At first I started testing using the microphone input. There, even with zero gain, max input was 1.9 volt without clipping. The rear line inputs allow 4 volt input but that did not generate 0 dBFS as it should. Anything higher would make it clip so I had to go with what I could get:
We have a jungle of noise and spikes everywhere in the FFT spectrum. Distortion is low however at -105 dB or so. SINAD (signal over noise and distortion) is much lower at 93 dB due to high noise floor. Here is where the 18i8 ranks among consumer and professional interfaces we have tested so far:
DAC Measurements (Edit)
With my old PC I managed to make a couple of DAC measurements before it stopped working then.
I don't have it in the spreadsheet but it would fall just below second tier of all DACs tested.
Conclusions
I don't care what performance a device has if it crashes your system or flat out doesn't work. If I were charging even minimum wage I would not want to take jobs from clients with this type of reliability. I hear their interfaces work better on Mac and the owner says he is OK with it. But come on. I have tested countless pieces of hardware on my two machines with almost no trouble. Certainly never having blue-screens even on a brand new Dell computer and fresh Windows 10.
Besides the software issue, we have the self-oscillation or whatever it was that caused the unit to spin its wheels capturing garbage. Imagine monitoring that and having it go to your speaker at high volume. Not good. Not good at all.
Even putting all of that aside, the SINAD tells us it can't clear good old 16 bit audio. The consumer card EVGA Nu Audio runs circles around it.
Instead of making three versions of this interface, make one that works please.
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As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
After any of these negative reviews, I need to do something to feel better. In this case, I am thinking about getting some expensive ice cream but can't afford it. Please donate some money so I don't stay depressed for long using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
Matching the name of the unit, this is one bright box:
Power is provided through an external power supply. There are a lot of inputs and outputs. I limited my testing to line inputs you see in the back:
Fast forward to today when I realized that it might work on my brand new Windows 10 system. I installed the drivers, plugged the unit it and to my pleasant surprise, its control panel popped up saying it detected it!
I ran my dashboard measurement and all was well. Then I noticed as I was documenting the output in photoshop that it was showing garbage data being captured. It was a sequence of sqarewaves at 750 Hz. I took a snapshot of it, put it in photoshop and then unplugged the input from it but it made no difference at all. I then hit the soft reset button in the Asio interface and bam! I was greeted with the good old blue screen of death:
Wdf01000.sys is the windows driver frame work. I looked at the unit with anger and it was as red as it could be, proving that the 18i8 was the culprit!
Using every ounce of self control I had, I hard reset the machine and booted. Sigh. Back to square one with neither Windows nor Focusrite control panel able to see the hardware. Same problem I had before. Multiple power cycles, reboot, USB input change, etc., nothing has fixed it. It has become totally non-functional as it was on my old PC.
Went through the troubleshooting page Focusrite has and everything is fine as far as services and such.
So, the measurements you see, is all the measurements I can produce.
ADC Audio Measurements
At first I started testing using the microphone input. There, even with zero gain, max input was 1.9 volt without clipping. The rear line inputs allow 4 volt input but that did not generate 0 dBFS as it should. Anything higher would make it clip so I had to go with what I could get:
We have a jungle of noise and spikes everywhere in the FFT spectrum. Distortion is low however at -105 dB or so. SINAD (signal over noise and distortion) is much lower at 93 dB due to high noise floor. Here is where the 18i8 ranks among consumer and professional interfaces we have tested so far:
DAC Measurements (Edit)
With my old PC I managed to make a couple of DAC measurements before it stopped working then.
I don't have it in the spreadsheet but it would fall just below second tier of all DACs tested.
Conclusions
I don't care what performance a device has if it crashes your system or flat out doesn't work. If I were charging even minimum wage I would not want to take jobs from clients with this type of reliability. I hear their interfaces work better on Mac and the owner says he is OK with it. But come on. I have tested countless pieces of hardware on my two machines with almost no trouble. Certainly never having blue-screens even on a brand new Dell computer and fresh Windows 10.
Besides the software issue, we have the self-oscillation or whatever it was that caused the unit to spin its wheels capturing garbage. Imagine monitoring that and having it go to your speaker at high volume. Not good. Not good at all.
Even putting all of that aside, the SINAD tells us it can't clear good old 16 bit audio. The consumer card EVGA Nu Audio runs circles around it.
Instead of making three versions of this interface, make one that works please.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
After any of these negative reviews, I need to do something to feel better. In this case, I am thinking about getting some expensive ice cream but can't afford it. Please donate some money so I don't stay depressed for long using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
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