Some equipment advice/recommendations

Im about to buy my first audio interface and some monitors but kinda having trouble deciding on which I want or need. Im making mostly sampled based music and I want to be able to sample from vinyl, I already have my pdx2000 turntables and a shitty mixer from years ago when I used to dj. Right now Im using maschine mk3 and some headphones. I dont really need to be able to record vocals or anything.

I hear a lot of good things about the focusrite scarlett 2i2 so im leaning in that direction.Will this be able to hook up to the monitors and my TT/Mixer ok? If you have any recommendations for an interface roughly the same price range that would be great.

Id also like to pick up something like a zoom sampletrak or sp303/404/505 eventually not sure if that will make a difference on what I should get now or not.

Studio monitors seem to be a bit trickier for me to decide. Theres not really a way for me to listen to these to test them, although these being my first I can imagine id probably be happy with any. My room is about 13x11 ft and Im getting pretty confused as to which sized speakers to purchase. My room is also not treated. Reading many conflicting things : (

These are the choices Ive narrowed down from research I have done

Adam t7v - Seem to be pretty new but havent really heard a bad word about them.
Adam t5v - Smaller version of the t7v (i think)
Yamaha hs7 - Not too sure about these, seems to have mixed reviews.
JBL 308 - Again seem to have found some mixed reviews for these but mostly positive I think.

Again any recommendations on others is very much welcome.

The Yamaha hs8 might be slightly out of my price range theyre roughly £100 more expensive than the Adam t7v from what Ive found, and the t7v will set me back about £340 for the pair. Not sure if I can swing for the Yamahas but possibly if they really are worth it.

Sorry for the long post. Any advice is appreciated.

Thanks guys!
 
Last edited:

Fade

The Beat Strangler
Administrator
illest o.g.
Ok well for an audio interface, the Scarlett is super popular so you can't go wrong. There's others now that are multitrack mixers and an audio interface all in one. So maybe that's something you would want?

You could hook up your turntable -> mixer -> interface. Do you have a multitrack mixer or just the DJ mixer?

The Sampletrack is good and so are the SP line from Roland. The 404 is popular (I would like to get one myself) but there's the earlier versions like the 303 that are good too but more limited. What I like about the 404 is the effects and what you can get out of it.

For studio monitors, yeah I've always heard mixed reviews from the Yamaha's so I don't know. Have you looked at the Mackie monitors? I have the MR-5 and they're great. I have the older model but I think this is the latest one: https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/MR524--mackie-mr524-5-inch-powered-studio-monitor

I really like the flat response from it, not bassy.
 
Thanks for the reply.

Its just an old dj mixer it was my backup one somehow Ive seemed to have lost the plug to my actual dj mixer lol I can just pick up another one of those I guess. And yea I was looking to do something like the turntable - mixer - interface thing. Is there better ways? And will the scarlett 2i2 be enough for it plus whatever I get in the future? Sampletrak/sp or whatever.. I really want that dirty gritty sound!

I havent looked in to mackies that much (so much choice) it was mostly the adams cos ppl were raving about them, yamahas,JBLs and some focal ones. Ill def take a look at the mackies tonight and they seem to be much cheaper too which is a plus. Do you know anything about the room size thing I mentioned? That kinda threw me off when I researched and saw ppl mention it. Dont wanna pick up the bigger t7v for example if the t5v would be better suited to my room.

Thanks for the reply mate!
 
You sound like you have everything already to go. the focusrite scarlett 2i2 is a great choice I have one myself and it has never fail me and it bring a great clean sound. It should connect to everything that you have. I also have the yahama hs8 and they are prefect for highs and bass heavy which you can control the frequency in the back of the monitors. They're a little high in price but well worth it to me
 
@K-waz Thanks for the reply.

Sounds good I think I'm definitely settling on the 2i2 then thanks. Heard a lot of good things about the hs8, but yea they are a little pricey.
 

Fade

The Beat Strangler
Administrator
illest o.g.
Well for the mixer, I would say get something that can accommodate everything. It seems like you want to have hardware so if you want an SP plus other stuff, it's good to have something to plug everything into, then the output of the multitrack mixer could go into the Scarlett, for example.

What's your room size? I have my Mackies in a regular sized room and they're fine, I don't think that should be an issue for you.
 
My room is roughly 13x11ft so kind of a medium sized room here I guess.

Ill be sure to check out some of those multitrack mixers too.

Thanks for all your help.
 

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