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For this review I'll be talking about the Tascam US-2400. This hefty unit is 24 faders wide complete with pan knobs, transport control, surround sound joystick, scrub wheel, a master fader, mute/solo buttons and several other useful functions.
For those of you who are new to the control surface world, think of this unit as a big mouse. It allows you to do multiple tasks at once when trying to control parameters in the mix window. Say, for example, you'd like to write volume automation on two or three channels at the same time. With a typical mouse this is pretty much impossible, but with a control surface you can easily just place multiple fingers on multiple faders and move them however you'd like. It also gives that hands on feel that analog board users miss when switching over to a computer workstation.
The Tascam US-2400 works on both Mac OSX 10.2.8 or greater and Windows XP. It works with most all major recording programs including Pro Tools utilizing HUI emulation mode. The setup guide for the US-2400 seemed pretty simple. They explain the software configuration steps in the manual. The first time you use the control surface with a program you have to press a series of buttons on it so that when you turn it on it's ready to be used in that mode. If you change programs, you have to 'reset' the hardware to turn on in the new mode. The only problem I really had in setting it up was getting Windows XP to recognize the device. The control surface didn't seem to be working right out of the box like it said it should have been, so I tried updating the firmware to the latest version that is downloadable on their site. After finally getting Windows to recognize the device, I was able to update it and finally get it working with Pro Tools. Since then it's worked pretty flawless. If you are a Pro Tools user, note that if you ever go through the 'trashing preferences' procedure to help fix problems with Pro Tools this also clears out the connected peripherals in the menu, so you will have to reassign the MIDI ports each time.
Each channel strip contains a 100mm touch sensitive, motorized fader with 10-bit resolution. You can use the fader for volume, pan and aux send information. Above the fader are the typical mute, solo, and select toggle buttons. And above those is a continuous rotary control knob for typical panning usage. There is a ring of lights around the knob that tells you the current pan position and can also be switched over to Meter Mode to act as peak meters. The Meter Mode is more of a quick visual tool than a reference. I would never use it to set levels by since it's not very fine, but it makes a flashy display for clients who like seeing all those lights.
A downside to most control surfaces I've seen are they are only eight channels wide. Each of the US-2400's channel strips show up in three banks of eight giving you a total of 24 across. Although seeing 24 channels at once is at most times enough, the US-2400 also allows banking. Banking these channels allows you to switch between 192 channels by groups of eight or by one channel at a time.
The transport controls contain the typical Play, Stop, FF/REW and REC buttons. Holding down the shift button (or shift key on the keyboard) while pressing the FF/REW allows you to jump to the beginning or end of the timeline. The Master Fader on the US-2400 is not used in Pro Tools. Although it's something I wish would be available with this unit, it's probably more of a limitation with Pro Tools than with the controller. Pro Tools treats Master Fader tracks in the mix window as typical fader tracks and doesn't separate it off from audio or aux tracks. In fact, Pro Tools also allows you to have multiple Master Fader tracks in one session. This arrangement in Pro Tools probably just isn't compatible with the US-2400's master fader. However, you can still control the Master Fader in Pro Tools with one of the other 24 channel faders.
Another feature missing on this unit is a scribble strip. There is no way of knowing which fader is which just by looking at the control surface. The only way of doing so is by either checking the track number or selecting the tracks one by one in Pro Tools until you see them light up on the board. Tascam does have a small downloadable program that shows the track names across the bottom of your monitor. However, I found this program almost useless. The tracks names are still not numbered with corresponding channel faders, the text is very very tiny and graphically it just looks ridiculous. You?d be better off just looking at the mix or edit window to see which tracks you're selecting than wasting the extra small amount of memory taken up by this program.
Overall, I'd say if you're in the market for an affordable control surface, definitely take a look at the Tascam US-2400. Rumor has it Tascam is possibly releasing a newer control surface, which would explain the price decline as of recently. These units sell for an average of $800 a piece which, considering the $1600 price tag it came down from, is an absolute steal. The unit is much longer than the average control surface, so be sure you have room for it on your desk. But for the price and capabilities of it I'd definitely recommend it to someone looking for that hands on feel and look of a 24 fader mixer. Its presence just adds that little extra vibe to the room.
Questions or comments, please e-mail me.
-B
Tascam US-2400 Control Surface
