If you’re in the world of music and music production, we here at Team Mex Music Productions know how excited you are when you’re thinking about your next audio interface purchase. We know you have a dream list of guitars and microphones. The list is never-ending, right? The research is also never-ending, right?
Well, we’d like to help, keep reading for our full review of the Universal Audio Apollo Twin X.
What makes the Universal Audio Apollo Twin X so good?
We are big fans of Universal Audio, but before we talk technical, let’s take a brief look at the historical value and contribution UA have made to audio engineering.
The company was founded by the late Bill Putnam Sr in 1958, the golden age of recording. He had an extensive career within the industry before creating UA, in fact, he was Frank Sinatra’s preferred engineer (wow).
Not only was he a sought out engineer he’s deemed ‘the father of modern recording’. Throughout his lifetime he invented the modern recording console, the multi-band audio equalizer, the vocal booth and so much more.
In 1999 the company was relaunched by the sons of Bill Putnam, James and Bill Jr. At this time they focused on creating products for computer-based sound recording and led UA into the empire it is today.
For us here at Mex Music Productions, we are lovers of both the analogue and digital worlds of audio engineering. We love the ease and accessibility of digital products but nothing beats the richness of analogue sound.
This is why use a hybrid style when it comes to recording and mixing music. And this is why we love UA products.
A company with this kind of history, you know you’re buying quality.
This is directly from Universal Audio about the Apollo Twin X.
Apollo Twin X allows musicians and producers to easily track, overdub, and mix with elite-class A/D and D/A conversion, two Unison-enabled preamps, and available DUO or QUAD Core realtime UAD plug-in processing — all in a desktop Thunderbolt 3 audio interface for Mac and Windows.
Right now we are working with an Apollo Twin X Quad (pictured above), but there’s also the Duo version. The difference is the number of DSP processing cores the products have, Quad has 4, Duo has 2.
Pros
- It’s compact, takes up little space. It’s perfect for travelling, whether that be from studio to home studio, or when on the road.
- Although a small piece of equipment, there is 1 headphone output, 4 line outs and 2 mic preamps. Boom.
- You can add on Twin X upgrades to match that of Apollo X rackmount interfaces. It’s gear that can grow with you.
- DSP (digital signal processing) is built-in, faster processing.
- Recording in real-time with zero latency.
- Comes with Universal Audio plugins, like preamps, EQs, compressors and reverb.
- Connects to MacBook Pros with Thunderbolt 3 or USB-C style connectors. Fewer adaptors and plugs!
Cons
- UA does not provide the Thunderbolt cable.
- Depending on your budget, quite expensive.
Overall, the Apollo Twin X Quad is a great piece of audio engineering equipment for the home-studio or moving studio. Although UA may be expensive, you are definitely buying a high-quality piece of gear.
If you have any questions about recording with us or you just want to chat about audio gear, feel free to reach out.
Ciao
Team Mex