Roland Ua 55 Series Roland Announced

In fact the ring of LEDS around the preamp gain knob will actively display the gain level as it is being set.

Until September of last year Roland had always marketed their audio interfaces under the Edirol brand but the introduction of the Octa-Capture changed all that.

The Octa-Capture introduced some unique and genuinely useful features such as its Auto-Sens feature but with 8 preamps and no option for bus powering it may prove overkill and unsuitable for many portable users.

Roland Ua 55 Series Roland Announced

Filling the gap between their fully featured Octa-Capture and the intro line Tri and Duo-Capture series Roland announced the Quad-Capture in April of last year.

Whats In a Name You have to give Roland credit for what must be one of the most straight forward product naming strategies I have yet encountered on an audio interface.

As you may have guessed, the Quad-Capture is a 4 in, 4 out audio interface housed in a very attractive and sturdy rounded aluminum case and comes complete with a DSP powered zero latency mixer and even digital compression on each of the analogue inputs It comes equipped with two mic line preamps derived from the highly regarded Cakewalk VS-700 series audio interface, two balanced line outputs on quarter inch TRS sockets, full sized Midi IO and SPDIF IO at up to 96 kHz on RCA sockets.

The first of the preamps is equipped with a HI-Z input for use with guitars and bass, the preamp isnt auto sensing in this regard so you will have to engage the HI-Z mode from a switch on the rear of the unit, more of which later.

Unlike my Edirol FA-66 the Quad Capture is made in China whereas the FA-66 is made in Japan.

However there is an average difference of 100 on most online retailers so Roland had to make savings somewhere to meet this devices lower price point.

The unit is USB bus powered and the Roland marketing machine is very quick to promote their low noise wide ranging power supply.

Being equipped with full size Midi IO means almost all the checklist boxes for live use have been ticked.

The only feature that may be missed are unbalanced RCA inputs for the connection of DJ equipment.

The unit can operate at up to 192 kHz but at sampling rates above 96 kHz you will loose the SPDIF io.

Aside from the connections listed above the rear panel is equipped with its USB port and 3 switches for ground lift, phantom power and the already mentioned HI-Z switch for Input 1.

I am pleased to see that much of the Quad-Captures settings are controlled from the drivers control panel.

Even the preamps gain setting can be controlled from the driver, a feature you would not expect to find at this price point, very neat One thing missing is a power switch but with a modest draw of only 480ma the Quad-Capture has good green credentials.

Overall build quality is impressive for a unit in this price range with small allen bolts retaining the XLR sockets and a solid feel to the rear switches.

The front panel knobs all have a smooth feel to them and as the preamps are digitally controlled you need never worry about scratchy pots or gain bunching towards the end of a pots travel.

It might also be worth pointing out at this stage that the Quad-Capture does not support 88.2 176.4 kHz sample rates.

Alternatives There are many alternatives in this price bracket but the obvious competitors are Focusrites Saffire Pro 14 firewire interface and the Focusrite Scarlet 8I6 USB interface.

Both are slightly more expensive on the high street than the Quad Capture and neither of them features Auto-Sense, on board DSP powered effect or digitally controlled preamps.

Sens.ational A key feature of the Quad-Capture is its Auto-Sens function.

Simply put Auto-Sens sets the preamp gain to the optimum level while auditioning your playing.

You plug in your guitar or microphone, press the Auto-Sens button on the front panel, play or sing your loudest part and the preamp gain will be set automatically.