M2 : A great entry level audio interface

A friend had bought me this interface as a birthday gift. I didn't own any sound card much better than PC motherboard integrated one. For me this one is a league apart -- headphones amp crystal clear, capable of driving 250 Ohm headphones -- no more background noise, no idle hiss in my ears.

Also tried it with 2 different microphones, a dynamic Rode Podmic and a large diaphragm condenser Audio Technica AT2035: this interface's pre-amp had enough "juice" to boost Podmic's signal to a comfortable level without becoming very noisy, had to crank the gain to about 90%, AT2035 fares much easier gain-wise: 50% level is loud and clear and crisp. Visual eq meters are quite useful to understand whether I'm about to make the mic clip.

Can't say anything about MIDI I/O or balanced output quality as I don't own any hardware to test it.

But all in all it's a great interface worth every penny of its price. If it has any cons, I didn't find any just yet.