Hey Gearspace Fam!

I recently bought quite a few analog synths & outboard gear. Of course I quickly ran out of I/Os on my Element 88 as well… Duh??‍♂️

Here’s the thing; I’m an Apogee guy. With the recent price increase, the Symphony I/O is out of the question…

So it would be either buying another (used) Element 88 or go to the dark side AudioFuse 16Rig? Pros: I/O count is perfect, it has midi, usb hub, routing matrix… Cons; Sound quality doesn’t seems to be on par with my 6/7 older Element, USB2 (in 2024wtf) and the annoying limitation that doesn’t allow to control the headphone volume via software! The last one might be a deal breaker as I’m likely to rack the audio interface a bit far from the mix position…

Anyways, my biggest concern is sound quality. Will the difference be noticeable for recording (line level) synths and full mixes processed with the Fusion/Bus+ back to my DAW?

As an alternative, the new MOTU 828es seems much better in term of specs but lacks a bit of I/O (but I could make it work I guess). Another option is to go for a used Apollo 16X. This last option would not be my preferred route as it’s significantly more expensive b)would need to buy a separate high quality (and expensive) headphone amps as well as pricey db25 cables… So the difference would need to be pretty stark to justify the massive price difference. Or would be wiser to just wait for NAMM?

To give you more context, I make electronic music-only. Melodic house & techno specifically. No real instruments or microphone recordings. Just a bunch of synths, drum machines and the 2bus processed two my analog outboard back to my daw.

Any advice/thoughts/idea is greatly appreciated?

If you like the Element sound and it's primarily about i/o, what about the Ensemble Thunderbolt? I believe it's the same sound quality, but with significantly more outputs. Might even be possible to use in tandem with the Element, but I'm not sure on that.

I was kind of looking for an upgrade to be honest. The Element’s sound quality is good, but I was hoping that in 2024 I would find a modern midrange interface that would blow an almost 8 year interface out of the water…