Focusrite iTrack Dock Studio Pack

I was a television broadcast sound engineer, and used to the Focusrite top notch rack units. used in our national broadcasters flagship studio.

I have many small projects I recorded over the years on various media, from good ol 1/2 inch tape, to ADAT (Remember that?) DAT, and more recently DAW.

I wanted to go back through these and complete them adding and polishing off tracks, my biggest problem was how? with such an array of old tech & new tech material.

in the end, I opted for the Focus Rite ITrack Dock Studio Pack. & Purchased the excellent Cubase App from the Itunes Store.

The Itrack Dock sadly lacks any Daw software or apps,
other than a simple record / playback one called "Tape".
I began learning the Cubase App while awaiting my Gimme Gimme iTrack dock.

I virtually dragged the delivery guy through the letterbox when it arrived.

Okay,
Opening the box inside a box, which slid out with a rude noise.... resulting in brief childish laughter.
I found the product to be well packaged.
everything had its slot in the box.
minimal waste here, just a couple of small plastic bags around the sensitive units inside.

It comes with a good quality Microphone with Cable and stand mounting clip.

The Registration card, which allows you download the "Tape app.

a red rubber mat for Ipad Air use.
some circular pad stickers for same.

A nifty set of good quality headphones.

Power supply

and a free pack of Silica Gel Woo Hoo

In use:
--------
The Unit itself is lightweight black plastic.
there are 4 knobs of good quality, obviously High Quality
Potentiometers were used in the build.

One "Direct Monitor" momentary button (Rubber with led)
on the back are the inputs. 2 mic (Phantom powered 48v) & 2 line and one "Instrument"

the headphone socket is to the right.
lastly there is the rocker power switch & Usb Midi socket.

The Product is let down by the skimpy "Quick Start" 7 page guide, somewhat eased by the ability to download another user guide.

I would have liked a more enthusiastic Manual in the box.

The device seems to have been originally designed with the ipad mini in mind, you slide a lightening connector up to fit the ipad air / ipad. the red rubber mat comes into play here as it raises the ipad to the correct height.
Ipad Air hangs over the edge a bit.

I thought it would be akward, but no... the weight of the ipad
balanced out the lightweight itrack plastic and the whole thing felt solid and doesnt slip or move.

I hooked everything up, Powered up, and
was pleasantly surprised. its what you dont hear that struck me first, very little Hiss.

I loaded up the Cubase app
And even before connecting monitor speakers, The sound played out of the ipad speakers.

once connected to the big boys sound monitors and amp,
the Quality showed, perfect... no colouring of the sound
I recorded a short snippet using the supplied cm25 condenser mic, excellent quality, clear and again little hiss.
I also found the supplied mic cable gave little or no rumbling if moved.

Cubase worked well, no lag even with multiple tracks playing back.

I then transfered my archived recordings onto the ipad using the iTrack, (Line input) these transfered over easily,
from Dat, Cassette tape, Cd & of course other Daw Tracks which I played using Soundforge on the Pc.

The only thing that truly lets this wonderful device down,
is the very poor, cheap and awful power supply.
its something you would get with a cheap mobile phone.
I used the itrack just 5 Times then WHUMP!!!
it blew. I contacted Thomann who were most helpful.
And promised to send a replacement powersupply.
I waited quite some time, before being informed The whole Itrack had to go back, Focusrite wouldn't send a power supply.

The Good People at Thomann were good to their word and a new replacement Itrack arrived within days.

They still use the same awful power supply.
one word of advice I could give is to always plug this in to a seperate surge protected socket.

You do have to use the supplied powersupply as it has a noise filtering ferrite collar on it.

apart from the awful power supply, I love this little device.
the Headphone are really good & comfortable,
I would like to use the midi input on it but the quickstart booklet is very scant on how?

You really can start out of the box.
its very versatile, with its range of input options.
the mic supplied is great.

Come on Focusrite, give a better power supply, better introductory manual, and I would be proud to give you 100% 5 star rating, You make top notch equipment, you generally pay attention to detail, a silly plug is all it takes.

Focusrite, gets 4 Michelin stars this time