Yamaha Steinberg UR12 USB Audio Interface, small

So, I've tried a couple of audio interfaces before and none have ever done it for me. Mostly, the delay of signal is what puts me off. Granted it had been a few years and I knew technology was getting better. So, I gave this a try after looking around at the Focusrite and others. I use Cubase as it is, so I figured if ANYTHING will work with it, this will. Setup: Do not use the CD to install the drivers. Search for the UR12 drivers on Steinbergs site. They're up to date and work. The ones on the CD are years old, so, just toss them. After the install (and possible restart) plug the device in and then line out into your studio monitors or plug your headphones in. This thing becomes the sound card basically and will override your existing sound card. Now when you go into your DAW, you just set the inputs and outputs accordingly and you're in business. It was the easiest setup I've done to date with one of these things. Best part? I could set the latency down to the 2-5ms range which is barely perceptible. In fact, you can switch between direct monitor and DAW and I can't tell them apart. As a guitar player, you want to hear that immediate response. Pair this with a DAW that has things like amp simulators and it's pretty awesome. I've always played with effects coming out of a floor pedal but the effects in Cubase are pretty nice. Also, my son has nabbed all my older floor gear but just as well, he plays a LOT more than I do these days. We'll both be utilizing this thing quite a bit. I haven't used a mic with this unit yet so I can't comment on that. As for instruments, it's quite nice. I'm just leaving it as my main sound in/out device. I recommend you give it a try if you're on the fence about some other devices. Especially if you're looking at Focusrite and run Windows. I've seen several people complain about the device having issues on that OS. Maybe they fixed it? Also, this one is cheaper and that's quite nice. Give it a whirl.

I feel like I cheated with this product because it was so easy to set up and just as affordable as the UM2 when on sale. I stream to twitch a fair amount and was forced to buy a new interface after I switched from Windows 7 to Windows 10 and my Behringer Uphoria UM2 stopped working. The drivers for the UM2 destroyed my audio for Windows 10 so badly that I had to system restore to get my audio back. This interface actually comes with a cd and drivers on the cd! You don't have to google around for random drivers like you do for the UM2. Blew my mind. You install the drivers, plug in the interface, and it works? I was so confused. It took me more time to unpack this product than it did to get it working. This thing works.... I've been using it for only 24 hours so if it breaks I'll be sure to update you guys. I did a lot of searching to find this product. It's also full metal compared to the cheap plastic UM2. Things a beast. I am so excited. I was so frustrated with the UM2. I tried so hard to get it working for Windows 10 spending time on forums, google, and reddit until I finally just bought this... Buy this. It's twice the price of the UM2 but it actually works. Buy cheap - Buy twice. That's exactly what happened to me. Don't let it happen to you. October 9th, 2021 update - This thing is still amazing. I tell everyone who is in the market for an interface to buy this. I even bought another one when I started to have small audio issues (which were actually related to my dynamic microphone - yes dynamic - for shoutcasting). This thing is a tank. I dropped it multiple times and it still works. Gotta give credit where credit is due. Steinberg is worth the price. Excellent product.

This good interface has all the basics and a few flaws to go with it. The quality of the Yamaha preamps are good. I don't use it to record, but if I did, it would be good for me or for someone on a budget. The knobs work well. They're a little stiff, but that also means that you can be precise with how small they are. It's USB 3.0 compatible, which is good because some recent interfaces haven't been. I think 4 stars is a good rating all things considered. I have 4 different interfaces, and this is probably the 2nd best one I have. Nice clean audio with a decent interface.

Amazing for the price. I bought this for some voice-over and foley work with pro tools 12. It's a wonderful upgrade from having to use ASIO4ALL drivers. The pre-amps are quiet, you start noticing the hiss at around 75-85% gain. The direct monitor functions works perfectly, there's a slight volume reduction from my computer when I turn it on but it's hardly noticeable. I only used the instrument input to see how it is, fiddled with my acoustic for a bit, seems to work fine but I don't record music. I do wish the headphone output was a little louder (using Sennheiser 598s), it sounds great but I have it at max most of the time so I hooked it up with my Magni 2 headphone amp. It's an all metal, sturdy box, everything is well built. It sounds great, it records great. Don't forget to read the instructions before plugging it in. I didn't have a CD drive so I just went on their website for the drivers. Took me 5-10 minutes for installing it because I figured I didn't need to read the instructions. Also, do not plug this into a usb hub, plug it directly to your computer.

I use this audio interface as a way to do voice recordings and karaoke. I use a Rode NT1 and the sound quality is fantastic. It has a guitar pickup if that is what you really need, but I don't use it for that. I also bought a separate power supply so that my computer isn't stressing by splitting all that power through the usb port. This hooks into USB and once you are done registering your product you can use the audio software that they provide for free. This is a very affordable model that gets the job done for a home user. I would recommend a different series if you are looking into studio recording due to the lack of ports and on device audio mixing.

This review goes out as a warning to all Windows users who are looking to buy this or any other Steinberg USB interface... Expect to have to do hours of debugging and research, along with some sacrifice, if you don't want annoying audio cutouts! The driver seems to semi-randomly cut power to the interface for a split second, "interrupting" it as indicated by the USB light, causing the audio to disappear and take a couple seconds to fade back in. Look on the Steinberg forums for the UR series audio interfaces and you will find that this is a problem that many people seem to have had for years. The "fixes" you will find are all related to disabling random and sometimes obscure features and settings in windows and in BIOS for decreased power consumption and are not guaranteed to work, with some people going as far as disabling dynamic frequency scaling on their CPUs. This specific issue doesn't happen to me on the default windows audio drivers (though audio distortions take its place), so until Steinberg bothers to patch up their drivers, this has the unfortunate position of being some pretty neat and quality hardware bogged down by geriatric drivers.

I bought this device to replace another interface I was having issues with on windows 10. Long story short.. I have had 0 issues on my windows 10 machine! It’s Been super stable! Focusrite, AT2035, & Windows 10 nightmare story! I experienced issues with the Focusrite Solo (2nd Gen) on my windows 10 machine. It was causing my voice to be robotic and super distorted, my friends would yell at me to fix my mic every 45 minutes. I would have to unplug and replug the device every 45 minutes to fix the issue. I tried the latest drivers and beta drivers, I also disabled a bunch of things through out windows that focusrite recomends with NO luck. Thankfully amazon has a killer return policy and took care of me. I’ve replaced it with a “Steinberg ur12” which is owned by Yamaha and have had 0 issues on Windows 10. Hope this can help someone who’s experiencing issues with there focusrite on windows 10 as it can be a huge headache.

As a pro audio interface this provides very basic functionality. While Steinberg's ASIO drivers are renowned, I could not get rid of the occasional low level ticks on my Win 10 machine. Just playing back some on line music and doing nothing else would reveal the occasional tick. Pretty decent dac converter, but spending a bit more for an audio dac can bring some benefit on the playback side. Did not use inputs other than USB in my setup. Well built and YMMV with respect to how it behaves with your computer OS. Worth a shot if on a strict budget. If not, perhaps Audient ID4 would be the next logical choice, their drivers and UI are very strong!