Sonoma Wire Works have published this chart as a comparison of the different guitar interfaces available. Makes for interesting reading.
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Sonoma Publish Interface Chart
Sonoma Wire Works have published this chart as a comparison of the different guitar interfaces available. Makes for interesting reading.
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13 comments:
200 bucks? price point seems off to me. It's going to be hard to convince more than a handful of hobbyists to spend as much on an accessory than on the device itself.
The iRig looks like the best out of all the iPad compatible ones.
those sonoma wireworks boys are profit hogs
200 dollars for something that won't work on an iPad (and perhaps not on an iphone4 either)?
Yeah, we didn't make a cheap adapter. We're a small company and GuitarJack is our first hardware product. We're making small runs in the US, not China, so the price point reflects the higher cost of making it this way. With the percentage for the dealer and distributor, there isn't much left over. Probably less than other units on this chart!
If you compare GuitarJack with the iRig, realize that iRig is a plastic case with a single layer board with only 11 analog components on it. You can build one yourself from parts at RadioShack.
GuitarJack is in a machined aluminum case with a 4 layer board with over 100 analog and digital components to switch inputs, set levels and communicate to the software.
Of course we plan to make one compatible with the iPad and iPhone 4. The specs to do that weren't released until the week after the iPhone 4 launched. We are working on it as fast as we can.
cheers,
dug
Douglas Wright, President
Sonoma Wire Works
Kudos to Sonoma for engaging with the community.
While I think the price point makes it a tough sell, the name calling is uncalled for. If these guys were profit hogs, they wouldn't be makikng boutique music gear/software. I appreciate the effort to make something quality, but perhaps this is a bit overengineered for this market?
One problem is that ipod touches and iphones are made to be disposable consumer products. The build quality and the software licensing scheme (low price points but limited "ownership") are all about frequent hardware replacement.
If I had a music platform in this form factor but was designed to last me for 7-10 years, then yes, I'd consider a 200$ audio interface for it. But as is, it's hard to justify 200$ when I will likely have to replace my ipod touch with an incompatable model in 1-3 years.
I can't speak for others here, but I'd say I'm in the top minority in terms of my willingness to spend money on ipod-touch related music stuff - I've spent about 150$ on apps (nanostudio, nanoloop, mixtikl, bleepbox, dopplerpad, thumbjam, xenon, etc). I've been thinking about hardware, and I don't want total crap, but given the above considerations, my price range is probably more 40-120$.
Personally and as a developer, I'm very happy that someone made this move on the high quality range of the spectrum.
Everyone has to remind that the fourth pole jack mono-input of the iPhone (used by iRig, GuitarBud and Ampkit LiNK) was designed for the small electret mics that are found in the headsets. That means it's fed with a DC offset (can't be heard, but can lead to distortion and is bad for DSP), that it only manages low amplitude signals (leading to distortion for high level input or feedback from the headphone cable) and that it's not suited for high impedance devices (deteriorated tones on guitars). So you have to correct all this with some electronic before even thinking of having a just OK tone.
Based on what I've read here and there the existing jack devices are in this order of quality (please correct me if you know anything better than me) :
- Lowest is GuitarBud, it seems to not have any electronic to correct the above problems. That's why some people experience sucked tone and/or random software interruption by the iPod app being launched.
- Mid is iRig, it does have the impedance matching thing and probably a DC offset filter. But it doesn't solve the problem for high level signals and headphone cable feedback.
- High is Ampkit LiNK, it seems to have impedance matching + DC offset filter and has a way to solve the headphone cable feedback by amplifying the headphone signal at the end of the cable so you can lower it on the iPhone. But it requires a battery to do so. Not too sure about the handling of high level signals however.
As you can see that's lots of work-around and unwanted electronics on the signal path. But that leads to cheaper devices than the dock connected ones. Especially the GuitarBud which is a basically the same thing as this : http://www.amazon.com/6FT-Camcorder-Video-Cable-Sony/dp/B000I1D0BW/ref=pd_sim_e_2 with jacks instead of RCAs.
With dock devices however this is a little different. Until the iPhone 4, iPhones and iPod touches had line level input hidden in the dock. That means A/D converters and electronic similar to what can be find in a (probably cheap ^^) PC/mac sound card. So a pretty standard thing. Add a preamp with high enough impedance and you can face pretty much all the various signals that you can find on your beloved music gears. The Alesis ProTrack - that I own and which is sold for around 149 $ now, not 399 $ anymore - does this quite well for example. But it won't work with your iPhone 4 or iPad either, for the same reason as the GuitarJack.
Basically Apple removed the line-in on the iPhone 4 / iPad but added a compatibility for generic class 1 USB sound cards through the camera connection kit. My guess is that Sonoma will build a full USB class 1 sound card that fits in the GuitarJack case for iPhone 4 and iPad compatibility, which is quite a bit of work since you have the USB communication and the A/D converter to add ! If you can share anything with us regarding this issue, I would be delighted Douglas :).
If I'm right, it would be great to provide a dock to USB cable so we can connect it to our PC and Mac to use it as an USB sound card too. It would help to accept the big 199$ price point if it could be a real cross-platforms thing (In addition to be just awesome ^^ !).
What about the guarantee also ? At this price, I would expect a guarantee of at least 2 years and it would help to emphasize the build quality.
Anyway, I would like to once again stress that it's great that someone care about high quality audio input on the iPhone, it's great to have choice.
Damn, it's a long post, but audio I/O on the iPhone is my cup of tea ^^. Kudos if you are still reading this !
Personally and as a developer, I'm very happy that someone made this move on the high quality range of the spectrum.
Everyone has to remind that the fourth pole jack mono-input of the iPhone (used by iRig, GuitarBud and Ampkit LiNK) was designed for the small electret mics that are found in the headsets. That means it's fed with a DC offset (can't be heard, but can lead to distortion and is bad for DSP), that it only manages low amplitude signals (leading to distortion for high level input or feedback from the headphone cable) and that it's not suited for high impedance devices (deteriorated tones on guitars). So you have to correct all this with some electronic before even thinking of having a just OK tone.
Based on what I've read here and there the existing jack devices are in this order of quality (please correct me if you know anything better than me) :
- Lowest is GuitarBud, it seems to not have any electronic to correct the above problems. That's why some people experience sucked tone and/or random software interruption by the iPod app being launched.
- Mid is iRig, it does have the impedance matching thing and probably a DC offset filter. But it doesn't solve the problem for high level signals and headphone cable feedback.
- High is Ampkit LiNK, it seems to have impedance matching + DC offset filter and has a way to solve the headphone cable feedback by amplifying the headphone signal at the end of the cable so you can lower it on the iPhone. But it requires a battery to do so. Not too sure about the handling of high level signals however.
As you can see that's lots of work-around and unwanted electronics on the signal path. But that leads to cheaper devices than the dock connected ones. Especially the GuitarBud which is a basically the same thing as this : http://www.amazon.com/6FT-Camcorder-Video-Cable-Sony/dp/B000I1D0BW/ref=pd_sim_e_2 with jacks instead of RCAs.
With dock devices however this is a little different. Until the iPhone 4, iPhones and iPod touches had line level input hidden in the dock. That means A/D converters and electronic similar to what can be find in a (probably cheap ^^) PC/mac sound card. So a pretty standard thing. Add a preamp with high enough impedance and you can face pretty much all the various signals that you can find on your beloved music gears. The Alesis ProTrack - that I own and which is sold for around 149 $ now, not 399 $ anymore - does this quite well for example. But it won't work with your iPhone 4 or iPad either, for the same reason as the GuitarJack.
Basically Apple removed the line-in on the iPhone 4 / iPad but added a compatibility for generic class 1 USB sound cards through the camera connection kit. My guess is that Sonoma will build a full USB class 1 sound card that fits in the GuitarJack case for iPhone 4 and iPad compatibility, which is quite a bit of work since you have the USB communication and the A/D converter to add ! If you can share anything with us regarding this issue, I would be delighted Douglas :).
If I'm right, it would be great to provide a dock to USB cable so we can connect it to our PC and Mac to use it as an USB sound card too. It would help to accept the big 199$ price point if it could be a real cross-platforms thing (In addition to be just awesome ^^ !).
What about the guarantee also ? At this price, I would expect a guarantee of at least 2 years and it would help to emphasize the build quality.
Anyway, I would like to once again stress that it's great that someone care about high quality audio input on the iPhone, it's great to have choice.
Damn, it's a long post, but audio I/O on the iPhone is my cup of tea ^^. Kudos if you are still reading this !
FIST PART (sorry about the order)
Personally and as a developer, I'm very happy that someone made this move on the high quality range of the spectrum.
Everyone has to remind that the fourth pole jack mono-input of the iPhone (used by iRig, GuitarBud and Ampkit LiNK) was designed for the small electret mics that are found in the headsets. That means it's fed with a DC offset (can't be heard, but can lead to distortion and is bad for DSP), that it only manages low amplitude signals (leading to distortion for high level input or feedback from the headphone cable) and that it's not suited for high impedance devices (deteriorated tones on guitars). So you have to correct all this with some electronic before even thinking of having a just OK tone.
Based on what I've read here and there the existing jack devices are in this order of quality (please correct me if you know anything better than me) :
- Lowest is GuitarBud, it seems to not have any electronic to correct the above problems. That's why some people experience sucked tone and/or random software interruption by the iPod app being launched.
- Mid is iRig, it does have the impedance matching thing and probably a DC offset filter. But it doesn't solve the problem for high level signals and headphone cable feedback.
- High is Ampkit LiNK, it seems to have impedance matching + DC offset filter and has a way to solve the headphone cable feedback by amplifying the headphone signal at the end of the cable so you can lower it on the iPhone. But it requires a battery to do so. Not too sure about the handling of high level signals however.
As you can see that's lots of work-around and unwanted electronics on the signal path. But that leads to cheaper devices than the dock connected ones. Especially the GuitarBud which is a basically the same thing as this : http://www.amazon.com/6FT-Camcorder-Video-Cable-Sony/dp/B000I1D0BW/ref=pd_sim_e_2 with jacks instead of RCAs.
FIRST PART (sorry about the order)
Personally and as a developer, I'm very happy that someone made this move on the high quality range of the spectrum.
Everyone has to remind that the fourth pole jack mono-input of the iPhone (used by iRig, GuitarBud and Ampkit LiNK) was designed for the small electret mics that are found in the headsets. That means it's fed with a DC offset (can't be heard, but can lead to distortion and is bad for DSP), that it only manages low amplitude signals (leading to distortion for high level input or feedback from the headphone cable) and that it's not suited for high impedance devices (deteriorated tones on guitars). So you have to correct all this with some electronic before even thinking of having a just OK tone.
SECOND PART
Based on what I've read here and there the existing jack devices are in this order of quality (please correct me if you know anything better than me) :
- Lowest is GuitarBud, it seems to not have any electronic to correct the above problems. That's why some people experience sucked tone and/or random software interruption by the iPod app being launched.
- Mid is iRig, it does have the impedance matching thing and probably a DC offset filter. But it doesn't solve the problem for high level signals and headphone cable feedback.
- High is Ampkit LiNK, it seems to have impedance matching + DC offset filter and has a way to solve the headphone cable feedback by amplifying the headphone signal at the end of the cable so you can lower it on the iPhone. But it requires a battery to do so. Not too sure about the handling of high level signals however.
As you can see that's lots of work-around and unwanted electronics on the signal path. But that leads to cheaper devices than the dock connected ones. Especially the GuitarBud which is a basically the same thing as this : http://www.amazon.com/6FT-Camcorder-Video-Cable-Sony/dp/B000I1D0BW/ref=pd_sim_e_2 with jacks instead of RCAs.
I hope Sonoma also include a 30-pin iPod input jack on the iphone4/iPad Guitar Jack that supports the older stereo analog inputs. Then you could plug the existing iPhone mics like the Blue Mikey into the Guitar Jack. This would help justify the price of the Guitar Jack - which is likely to go up in order to support the A-to-D converters and USB communications hardware. Plus it will have to have a battery as Apple is likely to restrict USB devices connected to the iPhone4 to those that don't have a significant battery drain. This is probably the reason the USB devices are currently only supported on the iPad.
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