MOTU UltraLite mk5

Nicely compact with a pleasing aesthetic, sleeker in person than the pictures would have you believe. Build quality is excellent, surpassed my expectations. The unit gets slightly warm during use, nothing out of the ordinary for electronic equipment.

I use it in a Win10 home studio setup, drivers install along with CueMix 5 in a single installer, firmware update via CueMix took 30 secs, was up an running on my system within about 15 mins from opening the box. CueMix 5 is well laid out, easy to use, responsive and functional.

The OLED is a nice addition and is quite useful for quick metering and there are some settings you can change directly on the device without having to open CM5 such as sample rate and factory reset. Latency performance is good, nice and stable at low buffer sizes. Loads of I/O, the two pre-amps sound great, transparent, with lots of gain. DC coupled outputs are a useful bonus. MIDI I/O essential, ADAT expansion great to have.

One con: the Volume knob is small and right above the headphone output so can be harder to turn when you have a set plugged in. The knob is high precision but that also means it takes a few seconds to turn all the way down. As far as I can tell, there is no way of quickly muting either the headphones output or the main output directly on the device.

Overall very pleased with this purchase, does everything I need and more at a very high standard of quality across the board.

735€ und 1 bit oled display einzubauen ist das allerletzte auf der Welt. Unfassbar. Digital-analog Wandlung ist o.k.a.y. Sehr störend auf das Gesamtbild des Klanges und insgesamt Gerätes wirken die harsche Höhen und Jitter aus. Wahrscheinlich 125db,115db noise floor und viele ins und outs konnten nur mit obengenannten Klangproblemen erreicht werden (typisch Motu). Im Vergleich beim Apollo Twin X gibt das nicht. Da klingt alles sehr gut, eingebaute preamps um Welten besser.
Vielleicht mit external clock verbessert sich beim Ultralite5 alldas wie das z.B. bei Apollo x16 der Fall ist (x16 mit guten external clock wird auf ein mal eine höhere Wandlerklasse, nur wenige wissen dass apollo für einen externen Clock ausgelegt ist). Von daher die Wandlung und internal clock ist nur mit O.K. zu bewerten.

Motu ist verbesserungsfähig und sollte dies korrigieren z.B. 1000-2000€ aber dann bitte menschlichen Sound, guten Clock, gerne Doppelhöhe bzw. 19'' zoll rackfähig, externes Netzteil weiterhin und klever konfiguriert - Ultralite5 ist zurückgeblieben und nicht überlegen, ich habe es gekauft, wegen 125db und 10 Ausgängen.

Der Preis 735€ für 10 simmetrische Ausgänge und 8 simmetrische Eingänge (2 davon Preamps) ist trotzdem viel zu hoch.

Die Software und Treiber auf Windows 11 liefern schnell zuverlässige und intuitive Ergebnisse - hier beste Note. Wird leicht warm das Gerät, es wackelt nichts, gutes Gewicht, Gummifüße, gute stabile Buchsen, auch hier beste Note.

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Empfehlung mindestens Apollo X8

The DACs in this interface are far above it's price range (both Main and HP outs). The connectivity it's plenty, the interface itself it's extremely light and portable and using it (both software and hardware) is extremely easy.

I had motu audio interfaces for over a decade, their products are robust and reliable (never had ANY issues). This was my last motu before expanding my studio and switching to an Antelope Orion Studio SC. But I still use the motu for portable recordings, connectint two SSL Pure drive Octo's on it, one whith DB25 and one with adat, for a total of 16 tracks, and works like a charm! Super easy to move around allong with all the other heavy equipement and extremely reliable!

Since I began using the MOTU Ultralite mk5 in January 2023, it has exceeded my expectations in every way. The sound quality is incredible, making my recordings and live sessions professional and pristine. Its flexibility with inputs and outputs is a game-changer, allowing seamless integration with my guitar pedals and other hardware. However, one drawback is the new CueMix app, which lacks the handy tools like a tuner, oscilloscope, and other visualization tools for phase and frequency analysis that were present in previous versions. Despite this, the Ultralite mk5 remains a standout choice for anyone serious about their audio setup.

I’ve been a convert to all things MOTU since owning an UltraLite MK4 as part of a small mobile audio “all in one” package, from live mixing, home studio recording and DJing/PA events.
The mk5 improves on the already high standard of the mk4 as MOTU continue to improve and innovate with its product line. Gone is the browser access interface, replaced by its own app which is much easier to use. I haven’t begin the use the mk5 utilising the full suite of features on offer but to date.Ive used it for monitoring and recording in a home studio and mixing several sound sources for DJing radio and live events. You can throw almost any Audio environment at it and it will handle it with no issues.

Oh, they’ve finally made it easier to integrate into a rack mount setup. The mk4 assumed (if memory serves) you had another MOTU device otherwise the unit had to be used “table top”.

Overall, I’m very happy with my mk5. MOTU will be my preferred manufacturer for the foreseeable.