MOTU M4 5-stars Reviews

Early days but performing well.

I spent a lot of time looking for a good affordable USB interface. Most of the reviews I read on other popular brands all mentioned issues with problematic drivers, USB noise and glitches etc. This MOTU M4 hasn't crashed or dropped out on me yet, the drivers went straight in and work with Reaper and Omnisphere. The sound quality is excellent and the drivers are fast and stable giving me low latency for my soft synths without using a lot of processor power. I have a moderate mobile setup using a Microsoft Surface Pro 6 running Windows 10 Pro. This only has one USB socket on it so I've connected the MOTU M4 on it and I've used the MOTU M4 MIDI din sockets to connect my other mobile gear. I suppose I could use a USB hub but I am concerned this migh cause problems. I like the way I have it but I might try a USB hub one day to see what happens. The loopback feature I will be trying next as I like the idea of doing some studio live streams on youtube or facebook and the M4 loopback feature makes it easy to stream the audio to both the internet and M4 outputs at the same time. I highly recommend this interface.

The latency is amazingly low

I wanted an interface that I would use to record but also play along with backing tracks and practicing guitar.

The driver never crashed on me once on any windows 10 update whatsoever.

I get insanely low latency which means I can easily play the guitar with loaded fx, amps and IR's without any hustle.

The recording part is very good and exceeds my needs.

Nothing to complain here, only some (2) knobs feel a bit stiff to the touch when I move them clock or counter clockwise.

Perfect

Edit After 5 Months: Extremely happy, very well choice. Strongly recommend...

I got the unit today. I have Mac and it works perfectly; flawless. Everything works as you wish to expect.

Amazing!

This little black box has it all:

- amazing sound

- very “quiet” almost no noise microphone preamplifiers

- incredibly natural sounding preamps for instruments (all kind of guitars)

- very clever combination of inputs and outputs

- phantom power individually switchable for each channel

- great sturdy build (I dropped it just when unpacking, was moment of terror, but the interface works perfectly) :)

- unbelievable short latency time

I bought it for my home studio to replace constantly problematic Focusrite Scarlett 4i4 3gen (which replaced TC Impact Twin).

Using and abusing it for 3 weeks now, and it just works. Works perfectly well with:

- Windows 10

- MacOS

- iPadOS

I am using it with USB-C cable, but this device works without problems connected to USB-A port (USB 3 and USB2) - tested on my laptops.

If you’re looking for quality interface for your home studio, this one is wort to try.

I am very happy. In the last two years I changed/checked dozens of USB audio interfaces. Always was some problems - either noisy preamplifiers, or non-working drivers, or devices not working after OS update.

This MOTU M4 seems to “just work” :-) I am happy.

Pros:

A fantastic audio interface! Cheap and a lots of features...In it, is a chip like the high prices versions of motu use.... you can plug in studio monitors and analog speakers at same time.

To use the Loopback function you have to use a seperate free software (google for it) .

Con:

- the delivered usb cable got to much latence just replace it with a usb- c to usb-c cable then it workes much better

- software is like all other software from audio interfaces or sound cards... you have to restart the software if the sound is randomly shut off

Great clarity and sound for this price

I'm using this in my home studio setup, connecting two pairs of monitors, headphones and some mics and guitar.

The build quality is great, metal chasis and pots, beautiful LCD display with meters, and rubber bottom pads so it doesn't slip around.

The headphone amp drives my 250 ohm DT990 without a problem. I keep it at about 60-65% while mixing and at about 50% for mastered material and it is loud enough for me, with a lot more gain if you need it.

Sound is crystal clear, which is expected as it has professional converters.

The only thing that bugs me is that there is no volume control for output 3/4, at least no practical and fast way to do it. So switching to my secondary monitors to check the sound is a bit of a hassle.

Pros:

Sturdy build, clean converters, great LCD, two pairs of outputs, good headphone amp.

Cons:

No volume control for output 3/4

Really good quality!

Such a high quality audio interface. Very beautiful looking on the outside and very good sound quality in the inside. I would recommend this interface to everyone.