Steinberg has "rounded-out" its range of audio interfaces with the announcement of the UR242, a 4-in/2-out device that offers 24-bit/192kHz performance, MIDI I/O and class-compliant support for the iPad.
Sporting a similar design to the company's other UR interfaces, the UR242 features a pair of front-mounted combo connectors that come with Class-A D-PRE microphone preamps with +48 V phantom power, peak LEDs, gain controls and dedicated pad buttons for signal attenuation.
Input 1 also has a high-impedance option for instrument-level signals, and the front panel is completed by a headphones jack with its own volume control and a master volume knob.
The rest of the connectivity is round the back and comprises two TRS line inputs, two analogue TRS line outputs, MIDI I/O, a USB 2.0 port and a power supply socket.
DSP
The UR242 also has a selection of DSP-powered, latency-free effects: the REV-X reverb, the Sweet Spot Morphing Channel Strip and the Guitar Amp Classics. These can be used in Cubase or any other DAW or on the iPad via the included dspMixFx application. VST 3 versions of these effects are also supplied.
"We realized that there was a clear demand for a four-channel interface with DSP-powered, latency-free effects, CC mode and MIDI," said Steinberg's product marketing manager for hardware, Stefan Schreiber. "And the UR242 clearly bridges this gap in our extensive range of premium-built, premium-sounding, premium-pretty-much-everything UR series of audio interfaces."
The UR242 will be available soon priced at £161/€219. You can find out more on the Steinberg website.
Steinberg UR242 features
- 24-bit/192 kHz USB 2.0 audio interface
- 2 Class-A D-PRE mic preamps supporting +48 V phantom power
- 2 combo inputs with PAD (Hi-Z switch on input 1), 2 TRS line inputs, 2 TRS line outputs and headphones jack with independent level control
- Latency-free DSP powered monitoring with REV-X reverb, Channel Strip and Guitar Amp Classics (VST 3 plug-in version also included)
- dspMixFx editor application for Windows, OS X and iPad
- MIDI input and output
- Rugged full-metal housing
- Loopback function for streaming performances live to the Internet
- Includes Cubase AI DAW software download version
- Cross-platform compatibility for Windows, OS X and iPad (with Apple iPad Camera Connection Kit/ Lightening to USB Camera Adapter)
