The Avid MTRX is James Richmond’s’ Hardware Product Of 2020, he explains why.

My hardware Product of the Year, although not released in 2020, is a total no-brainer- it has to be the Avid MTRX Audio interface.

I’ve had the Avid MTRX for around 6 months now and it has been an extremely productive few months indeed.

I overhauled the studio in the middle of the year as I needed more Dante channels than the Focusrite Red 16 Line would allow. It was a big change in workflow, the Red 16 Line is a great device that had a really excellent software interface, I wouldn’t have been looking for an upgrade unless I really need the extra channels, which I did.

The MTRX allows for many more channels than I could ever possibly use and I currently have it configured with 24 channels of input and 8 channels of output on the device itself. I have also expanded from 64 channels of Dante, adding another 128 channels for a total of 192 channels. I’m not using all those channels at the moment- getting the additional 128 channel card wasn’t done because I had run out of channels but the advantage of the second Dante card is it can run at a different sample rate to the rest of the device. Given I have several other interfaces and computers running in the studio at once this is very helpful indeed.

For instance, I usually keep the MTRX running at 48kHz or 96kHz and the Red 16 Line, my native interface, is switching between 44.1kHz and 48kHz depending on the project, connected to the 128 channel Dante card on the MTRX. It might sound a bit niche but having independent SRC on a per card basis has made the studio much more flexible to work with. It is a really clever system.

Beyond these technical considerations what I have really enjoyed about the MTRX and ability to expand my studio in this way is how well thought out the DADman control software is. Any of the input sources can be sent to the monitors or headphone mixes, and can be controlled in a variety of way- by mouse and keyboard, by using the Avid Dock/Avid Control combination or by using the MOM controller by Digital Audio Denmark. I am also using a combination of Soundflow (software) and an Elgato Stream Deck (hardware) to manage some functionality within DADman. It is true that the DADman software doesn’t feel as slick as some other control software that I have used but that is because it is capable of so much more than any other product- there is a utilitarian feel to it that, as an engineer, I appreciate. No fancy graphics, just the data you need to make decisions.

I look forward this is being the backbone of my studio for many years to come.