Customer Reviews

Emu 0202 USB 2.0 Audio Interface

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

If you use iTunes to listen to your music at home, you owe it to yourself to try this wonderful digital to analog converter.

Got emu 0202 digital to analog converter several months ago. Originally hooked it to an xp machine, now with a new vista system. What an amazing upgrade to the integrated soundcard.

When I initially used iTunes, it was to simply load music to my ipod. once i had the database of music, though, i realized that the pc made a much easier interface to access songs than did the ipod. so began my quest...

using the speaker out from the pc soundcard left me with sound inferior to listening to the ipod from the dock hooked to my stereo. which was inferior to listening to a cd on my onkyo cd player. I knew i needed better but did not have the ability to drop $700-$1200 for a high end digital to analog converter (which i assumed i would hook up to the toslink digital out on an apple airport express - another $100). When i stumbled across the emu 0202 on audiophile discussion boards, then found it on amazon for around $100, i knew i had to give it a try.

I have the emu 0202 output to a pair of 20' RCA cables to my living room system (parasound hp-850 preamp, adcom GFA-545 amplifier, castle durham 3 loudspeakers). The sound is remarkable! Listening to my favorite music, i have heard nuances that i never heard before. Great base, detailed midrange, lovely highs.

Almost immediately, i removed the cd player to the basement, and our ipods have been relegated to walkmen duty (travel and working out).

One caveat: the vista machine is a little quirky in its relationship with the emu. it is worth a little trial and error to plug the usb connector in upstream of slower usb devices (like keyboards and mice), otherwise the pc does not always allow you to use the highest sampling rates. also, when vista goes to sleep, it resets the sampling rate to the lowest quality.

I bought this device to complement my very nice HD595 headphones but like one of the previous reviewers mentioned I received a whole lot of crackles and pops. I did some research and concluded that it was my Dell Laptops high DPC latency that was really responsible for the poor output and as a result I am now using it with my desktop.

With my desktop I get clear highs, a punchy bass and a crispness that has brought a big smile to my face :).

I originally bought this because I wanted to use my Dell XPS laptop (running vista) as a DAW, and the dell came with such a lousy soundcard that I bought this in hopes that it would suffice. Sadly, after a bunch of effort, I finally concluded that I just couldn't make it work.

I updated the firmware, got the latest drivers, installed and re-installed them, tried using this with different software packages, nothing worked well. The main problem is that I'd always get a lot of "crackle" no matter what I set the buffer to, and there were a lot of machine-lockups that were associated with this interface.

Anyhow, I've since connected it to my desktop machine (running XP) and it has worked pretty well in that capacity.

One easily overlooked aspect of this device though is the notable software that comes bundled with it. "Light" versions of Cubase, Ableton, Melodyne, and a few others. This might be reason enough to buy this interface for some people. Say for example that you are planning to buy Cubase and Melodyne. By installing those "light" versions, and doing an "upgrade" from those will save you $100 on *each* program. That more than pays for the cost of this interface right there... something to keep in mind.

Don't bother with this piece of junk if you're using Windows 7. The hardware may be great for playback but, for recording, the crappy drivers keep resetting the sampling rate to 44khz under Windows 7. Emu has not put out any new drivers since early 2008. If you're doing vinyl rips, like I wanted to, you might want to look at the Edirol UA-1EX or the Xitel INport Deluxe instead and save yourself a bunch of money and a big headache.

This unit has excellent audio quality. I am an audiophile and the quality of sound is very important to me. For the price, I'm amazed at the output quality. I have had no problems with audio delay as some other reviewers have had. The only negative I have for this product is that the headphone output volume is a little lower than I would like. Otherwise, an excellent product for the price.

I use this only for listening to music while at work. I bought the EMU to replace an M-audio external USB audio card. I was forced to replace because I upgraded my work machine to Win XP 64 bit and M-audio has NOTHING for drivers for Win XP 64. The EMU drivers work without problem. I hear no background noise from the unit and have had no latency problems. Audio quality is pretty good (I use Sennheiser HD600 headphones). The volume can't get as loud as the M-audio, but that worked off AC power while this is only the USB line voltage. For my application, I can't think of any complaints.

You see the EMU 0202 listed on many sites as coming bundled with the EMU production tools software CD - lots of editing programmes (worth more than the EMU 0202 is). In fact EMU stopped bundling this software with the EMU 0202 6 months ago. When you do buy it now, you just get one programme - MS mixcraft (LE). EMU know this is happening and when I told them didn't seem bothered but just blamed the 3rd party website (even though the manual that ships with the EMU 0202 says this software is included). If this happens to you you can get your money back and try the Alesi i02 - which is newer, cheaper and has more functionality (eg recording 2 channels at once). If my experience is anything to go by, it is also more likely to have what it says it will have in the box.

Like others, I primarily bought this box to use for amateur radio purposes, that is to run a panadapter program with my Orion II radio. It performs as expected for a low end (price wise) unit. I made the mistake of trying to upload the newer drivers. This caused the unit to crash and cease to operate. My negative view is not with the unit, but the seller (through Amazon). CompSource charged shipping and handling initally as expected. When I called to return the defective unit, they refused to pay for the return postage. It took almost three weeks and two phone calls to get a refund (less all shipping and handling fees)! I had to buy the second unit in advance in order to have one in a reasonable period of time. I was of course charged shipping and handling again. When I called and asked to be credited for the initial shipping plus what it cost me to ship the defective unit back, they flat refused. DO NOT BUY FROM COMPSOURCE IF YOU WANT FAIR SERVICE!! I am afraid now to attempt to upload the new drivers as it may crash this unit as well and I will be out another $20.00!

I bought a brandnew Laptop (Acer Aspire)and wanted to use this interface for some homerecording. I could not get it to work with Windows 7. There are no drivers available. I finally had to return it. Instead I bought Presonus Audiobox. Drivers are offered on the supprt page Windows 7 64 bit. It works fine. I had no trouble at all!

I've had this unit for over a year. On my Windows Professional box, I had repeated dropped connections, shutdown and startup freezes that would only resolve when I unplugged the usb connection to the 0202, then having to plug and unplug several times upon restart to get the computer to recognise the unit. I moved it to my Mac iBook using OS 10.4, and it just froze up the computer completely each time I tried to use it. I'm having ethical issues with even considering reselling it on ebay, it's been such a problem for me.