The EM Poll

M-AUDIO Ozone

Dec 1, 2003 12:00 PM, By David Battino

           

With the Ozone ($399.95), M-Audio has added an audio interface to its popular Oxygen 8 MIDI controller, delivering both audio and MIDI I/O with a single USB connection. That makes the Ozone the first keyboard controller of its kind.

View from the Top

The Ozone offers the same unweighted, 25-key, Velocity-sensitive keyboard and handy MIDI features as the Oxygen 8, including dual MIDI Outs (one for the computer and one for the keyboard), an assignable slider, and eight great-feeling knobs. The slider can send Aftertouch, although the keyboard can't. You can program any knob to transmit any Control Change on any MIDI channel and store 40 knob assignments, which ought to be more than enough for most users. I found programming the controllers to be awkward; you have to switch the keyboard into Data mode then play a series of keys with misaligned labels. However, the bright display shows each value as you enter it as well as the current value of the controllers in Performance mode.

The remaining five knobs control audio functions: mic and line monitor level, mic and line gain, and headphone level. I wish the audio knobs were farther from the MIDI knobs, because I constantly grabbed the wrong one. A knob for the main output level would have been useful, too.

Two LEDs show signal strength. A Monitor/Record button mixes the aux input and the computer's output to the Ozone's outputs or routes the aux input to the computer for recording. Because the inputs are connected to the outputs in hardware, there's no monitoring latency. As with other USB audio interfaces, when both inputs and outputs are enabled, the Ozone's sampling rate is capped at 48 kHz (to accommodate USB's bandwidth limitation). Disabling either the inputs or the outputs lets you raise the rate to 96 kHz. ASIO and DX drivers are included.

Behind the Scenes

On the Ozone's back panel are jacks for power, USB, MIDI Out, sustain pedal, headphones, left and right audio output, stereo aux input, mono line input (all unbalanced), and XLR mic input. The jacks are labeled in nearly unreadable silver on silver, which I'd like to see changed. Thanks to its preamp, the line input can accept a guitar or high-impedance mic signal. You even get switchable phantom power, an unexpected feature for a low-cost unit. The phantom-power switch is tiny, but I doubt most users need to switch phantom on and off repeatedly during a session.

Unlike the Oxygen 8, which can run on batteries or USB power, the Ozone must be powered by a wall-wart adapter. According to M-Audio, using an AC adapter allowed the company to incorporate higher-quality audio converters than would otherwise be possible, so the company sacrificed portability in return for superior sound quality. It would be great if M-Audio found a way to offer a battery-powered version with good sonic quality for users who want true portability.

Holes in the Ozone

Using the Ozone, I got great sound on a G4 PowerBook under both OS 9 and OS X. Audio programs occasionally had trouble finding the Ozone under the older operating system, but I have experienced that with other interfaces, too. The sonic improvement on a Pentium III laptop running Windows 2000 was dramatic. Normally, that PC sounds pinched and hissy, and it clicks when I move the cursor, but with the Ozone, the music was clear and full, and the headphone output provided plenty of volume. However, whenever I set the latency value to Very Low and played audio, the computer blue-screened. (I had no crashes with higher latency settings.)

A friend and I also used the Ozone on a 1.5 GHz Athlon laptop running Windows XP. After disabling the computer's power-management software (which was causing some crackling), we successfully recorded several backing tracks in Sonic Foundry Vegas. During a subsequent series of seminars on computer-music production, however, Windows repeatedly refused to recognize the Ozone and cut off the sound. According to several USB audio experts I consulted, Windows XP — incredibly — often fails to recognize USB devices when they're connected to a different port than the one on which they were installed. An M-Audio tech recommends installing the software for each port. This is clearly an ongoing issue with Windows XP and not M-Audio's fault, but I wish M-Audio had mentioned it in the manual.

Back in my studio, I noticed an intermittent hiss in the Ozone's left output. The first unit I received didn't work at all, so both Ozones I received from the company were defective, which was frustrating.

Out of Thin Air

The Ozone blazes a new trail in the perilous frontier of USB audio. Duplicating all of the Ozone's features with separate devices would be awkward and expensive, and it includes nice touches such as auxiliary inputs and phantom power. But clearly, M-Audio needs to improve its reliability and documentation. I'd also like to see some of the ergonomic problems (especially the hard-to-read labels and poorly spaced knobs) addressed. These are significant drawbacks that mar an otherwise promising product.

That said, the price is excellent, and the audio quality is impressive. Although its portability is limited by its dependence on AC power, the Ozone is nevertheless an efficient space-saver. The Ozone certainly isn't a home run for M-Audio, but if it makes the aforementioned improvements, it could have a solid hit.

M-Audio
tel. (800) 969-6434 or (626) 445-2842
e-mail info@m-audio.com
Web www.m-audio.com