Outstanding Piece of hardware

I got this to record local bands and I love it.
My setup is to bring my laptop and either get a set of feeds from the artists mix or use a couple of microphones in the room setup in an XY pattern.
The device has great zero latency monitoring and works with the software that I have tested with (Audacity and Sonar 5).
Compact and lightweight I keep the unit in my laptop bag all the time so that I can be ready to record at the drop of a hat.
The inclusive software (Live 4 upgradable to 5) was not the greatest thing for recording live but I was not buying this based on the included software.

This is one piece of audio gear well worth the price.

Great Interface with clean, hassle free audio for recording for only $150 !!

This is an awesome piece of equipment for $150. We use it to record our worship sessions by using an aux send from our mixer to send the whole thing to this little box, from there it goes to our Mac's GarageBand with one USB cable. The only drawback is not being able to break each mic/instrument into it's own feed for editing, but if your performers have their act together, and you get to know GarageBand, this is a pretty awesome recording setup. If you are looking into serious home recording, I'd recommend getting one with 8 XLR inputs so you can break down your mix better. Still a great way to get started without breaking the bank.

Works well, worth more than the price I paid.

I bought the MobilePre to work on my project, especially for school. I have had this interface for more than 5 months now. It works well, never had a problem. The preamp helps recording my singing from non-condensor mic. It's worth starting with this when you're on a budget.

MobilePre USB

I have owned this product for at least a year now. In my opinion, it's good for its portability, program compatability, and ease of setup, however; The preamps at best are okay, and given the fact there's no MIDI I/O this interface is quite limited. Don't get me wrong, it's an awesome piece of gear to own if you're going to be doing small time production with a couple of tracks at a time. Don't expect pristine audio quality though. For the price, it's worth it. You can take this thing anywhere with a laptop and set up in seconds. I wouldn't say it has zero latency monitering, but surprisingly it's not bad. Nowhere near professional quality, but what did you expect out of a $150 piece of gear? 3 out of 5 stars

You get what you pay for…but great for beginners.

I have used this thing for 3 years now; we have two of these at my “studio” where I produce voiceovers. One is hooked up to an Oktava MK-319, and the other to an MD-421. The preamps are extremely noisy for VO, especially on the MD-421 (since its a dynamic). I’ve also had to turn the latency up after a few months because we randomly started to get clicks and glitches, both in the monitoring and the recording. I wish we could get a better audio interface/preamp, but what can I say? The company I work for is extremely cheap. These definitely are not professional studio quality. However I am sure they would be great for beginners since they are inexpensive and straight forward to use.

Works great... perfect.

This a great way of getting cheap, basic, portable phantom power and pre-amping to my condenser mics for mobile laptop recording. Install was effortless and worked perfectly following the quick start instructions. Cannot comment on the included software package as I'm not going to use it. FYI - The ASIO drivers were picked up by KRISTAL after re-installing KRISTAL software. No problems so far. I'm happy as a little girl. By the way some mobo chipsets will give you headaches with any audio apps or hardware, for those of you having "issues" with pops, dropout, etc. If you want studio quality, don't expect it for $150 =) I had no such expectations.

Not TOO bad for the price.

I recently bought the M-Audio Mobile Pre and have only been using it for a short while.

My primary use for it is vocal recordings and also some tape dubbing.

It's micrphone pre-amps are certainly not studio quality, as they have rather high noise. But this is not a concern if a high output microphone is used or the program material isn't something quiet, (like a crowd mic for example).

One particular problem with this audio device is it's somewhat unstable communication with the computer; under certain circumstances (OS, USB hardware, computer speed, applications running) it will produce random glitches during playback (I have not yet expirienced glitches during recording). CD-rom use usually aggrivates these glitches.
The best thing to do is turn the latency setting up all the way, although sometimes that will not solve the problem entirely.


The line inputs are balanced, which is useful, however they do not work very well with high level sources because the input gain adjustments must be turned down so far that they become "touchy". Unfortunately the outputs are not balanced, so ground loops can become a problem if you use exclusively unbalanced audio equipment.

Overall I would rate this a 6 out of ten, although under certain situations I would only give it a 4.
If you plan on doing professional audio recording then the Mobile Pre may turn out not to be the best solution for you.

However, if you are willing to mess around with the settings and cannot afford a more professional audio device (like Digidesign's Mbox) then the Mobile Pre can certainly be made to serve your basic recording needs.

M-Audio Mobile Pre-USB

The unit is powered by the included USB cable.

Then you need a mini plug 1/8" stereo plug to monitor in and out.

Nice Inputs Low & Hi Z.

This all hooked up very nicely and quickly.

But of course you need recording software.

This "demo" software package was where I started getting into problems. Not using Midi I didn't need the REASON...but for Multi-Tracking and Burning a CD-R mix the "demo" Delta Live was loaded.


This took some work, to the inexp. like myself.

Once recording was figured out, 10 track MAXIMUM was limit for the "demo" version. the full version is ~$300.


Now I had 10 tracks recorded and was monitoring/playback- cool


...but then I couldn't seem to be able to save the song-mix....and my CD-R didn't recognise the Delta "demo" .ext.


So no CD-R burning until you buy a full version of Delta is my understanding. $300apprx.


So unfortunately, I couldn't really test out anything to completion on this unit.