Audiobus: Use your music apps together.
What is Audiobus? — Audiobus is an award-winning music app for iPhone and iPad which lets you use your other music apps together. Chain effects on your favourite synth, run the output of apps or Audio Units into an app like GarageBand or Loopy, or select a different audio interface output for each app. Route MIDI between apps — drive a synth from a MIDI sequencer, or add an arpeggiator to your MIDI keyboard — or sync with your external MIDI gear. And control your entire setup from a MIDI controller.
Download on the App StoreAudiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.
Recommend portable interface/dac for usb-c. No dongles and power pass-through.
Hi,
Believe me I’ve searched in many threads about small audio interface for iPad. But I can’t find the exact case.
I already own a “big” Zedi10 and a Zoom H4. But I want a portable and dongle-less setup. Now I have to plug in a usb dongle, then the zoom. It’s not ideal for daily casual use.
My usb dongle (Satechi) has headphone output but the quality sucks.
It needs to:
- have power pass-through for usb c. So that I can plug the interface directly, without need for dongles, into the usb-c port. The interface should have a power input so you can connect it to the current and it passes through the power to the iPad.
- Ideally some inputs, monitoring and so on to use as an audio interface (not just a dac)
- Good sound quality.
Here’s a few that look like they have power delivery pass-through:
Sharkoon dac - link. no inputs, but nice and small. Could serve for daily usage. If I need inputs I’ll use the zoom h4 or bigger Zedi. It was recommended by someone in this forum, I can’t recall who. Thanks 🙏
TC helicon Go Twin (link)
It has a power input separate from the USB port so I’m hoping it can charge the iPad while connected. Has anyone tried this?.
It seems obvious that the Sharkoon DAC will do power delivery. I’m not sure about the others.
What do you need to power an iPad from a usb-c port?. I’m guessing a standard usb-b to c cable won’t have power pass-through. How can I tell if an interface will power the iPad?. I’m fed up of dongles!.
Thanks in advance, you are wonderful .
Comments
@tahiche Be very careful with this. If it doesn't explicitly say "USC-C Power Delivery" it probably doesn't have it. And be aware that higher wattage chargers (over 12.5 W) deliver that power by increasing the voltage, not the current. Passing that through to the iPad requires some "smart" negotiation between the iPad and the charger. That's why the hubs/docks with PD have a separate power-only USB-C port. And certainly a cable with a conventional USB-A or -B connector will not connect the USB-C pins dedicated to PD.
Edit: Notice that the Sharkoon description explicitly includes USB-C PD, as I mentioned above, so that's a good one.
The TC Helicon Go Twin is just Lightning and conventional USB, not USB-C at all, so definitely no.
USB-C is much more sophisticated than Lightning or conventional USB. Check the description. That's why mixing it with older components will only have limited success.
I recommended the Sharkoon. As you say, it does the job if you just want a headphone jack with good audio quality and power your iPad at the same time. It’s small and sits firmly on the iPad, no hassle with dangling cables.
When I want to connect USB-A devices and be mobile then I use a good USB-C to USB-A hub with a USB-C PD port. Then I use one of the USB-A ports to connect a Sharkoon USB-A DAC for my headphones. At home I use my big audio interface of course.
So basically I own three audio interfaces now, where two of them I need only to connect my headphones. I can’t deny that this is kind of ridiculous
A really wireless setup would be any compact class compliant USB interface that has just enough space left inside for a small power bank and a Pi Zero running a custom compiled version of Sonobus. It would open a WiFi hotspot you can connect your iPad to and record/transfer audio over WiFi.
Completely wireless except the microphone/instrument cables.
Latency would be pretty high and subject to occasional dropouts with Sonobus. Sonobus is pretty cool but even with a wired connection I run into these issues.
If you're dongle-averse, but don't mind a brick, check out the USB-C hubs branded uniAccessories. They connect using a USB-C-to-USB-C cable and support PD. You can buy cables of various lengths. That way, you're not limited by a short dongle lead, or a hardwired cable of fixed length.
Hi. Sorry but I don’t understand. From what I see on the uniAccesories website these are precisely dongles!.
Actually this one is identical to my Satechi. The audio is not great on the Satechi, I don’t know about this one but I wouldn’t bet it’s too good as it’s not it’s primary purpose.
Yes you did!. Sorry I didn’t give you proper credit.
I’d rather have a proper audio interface with ins and outs, but as @uncledave warns I’m not plugging in just anything. @krassmann you probably remember my post where I burned 2 iPad Pros (bloody Tristar).
@uncledave
I searched in google but couldn’t find any audio interfaces that explicitly mention Usb-c power delivery.
I feel like I’m always demanding stuff that doesn’t exist!. Is it just me that would like to skip the dongle?. Even with higher end interfaces like Motu M4 you need a dongle to plug the interface and power the iPad. If the interface had power delivery incorporated you could skip the dongle, just plug the interface into the power source. How come a tiny dac like the Sharkoon incorporates it but bigger interfaces don’t?.
Profit margins are tiny. A company like MOTU has done a cost benefit analysis and probably decided that the number of people for whom it is a critical feature doesn’t justify the additional engineering and manufacturing cost.
Some other company may decide that having that feature gives them a distinguishing characteristic that will help them stand out. It would not surprise me if power passthrough makes it trickier to keep the interface hum-free.
I apologize. My notes just said this was possible, neglecting the maker's full product range.
This is an example of the cable-connected units. There are several others. For good audio you probably need a separate high-quality USB DAC that you could plug into this, for example the Dragonfly series. There's a lot of comparative info on-line, for example this. You need to be sure it can handle your headphones (impedance, etc.).
Thanks!. Thing is I already have a usb dongle, 2 soundcards... I’m looking for a no-dongle very basic setup. Like the Sharkoon on the thread origin.
I have limited close to cero experience in building stuff. I once bought a theremin, it was cheap because it turned out to be disassembled. After 1 week of going blind with the tiny transistors and burning my fingers with a soldier thing I turned it on and didn’t get a sad bleep.
This setup you mention would be amazing. My birthday is soon, just saying... 😃
Have you seen this one?
I can't tell you anything about the quality but I love the concept.
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Hey!. I need USB-c not lightning. Plus I don’t really know what to do with that!. 😂
I just ordered the Sharkoon dac thingy, thanks for the recommendation, @krassmann . There were a few others by Belkin and such but this one has been tested by one of the prestigious forum members...
Since we were at it I also purchased an Anker powerbank. A good one and that specifically says it’s PD (power delivery). I don’t really know if it’s crucial, but seeing how I busted 2 iPads (tragedy link) and you guys also helped me out on that one I want to play it safe. If I bust another one I’m moving to windows...
I’ll let you know how it sounds. But I do wish there was an all-in-one interface with ins/outs and power delivery thingy. @rs2000 Maybe you can add that to the gadget !.
Tbh I've been searching for that as well and I'm just taking my H1n as-is. Good enough.
That magic ADC cable is also available for USB-C by the way.
The Sharkoon just arrived. Nice little unit, smaller than I expected.
@krassmann was it you that mentioned that the eq on the unit didn’t work on the iPad?. It works and the eq settings are rather nice.
I tested against the Apple usbc to jack thingy and the quality seems about the same, which is not bad for the Apple one sounds pretty good.
Happy with the purchase, recommended (so far). Thanks @krassmann .
@tahiche, great you are happy with the device. I did not find the EQ, so I thought they left it out on iOS. Where did you find the EQ?
You just press the button, there’s only one!.
It’s on page 10 of the manual. https://en.sharkoon.com/Download/Gaming/Head_Z/Mobile_DAC_PD/dmn_Mobile_DAC_PD_02.pdf
What might be confusing is that it uses the display of the sample rate. So I guess you can’t change sample rate with the button, just read it’s value.
Sorry to resurrect this thread but I'm a bit disappointed with the output from the official apple usb c headphones dongle, any of you guys with the sharkoon use higher impedance headphones with it? I've got some Dt 770 80ohm that I feel are a bit under driven and hoped maybe this would give the signal a bit of a bump..
Double post. 😅