 It's time Welcome to the Linux Focust review of Focustrite's Scarlett 2i2 third-generation USB audio interface I'm Anfa. I'm an electronic music producer and sound designer and I work exclusively with open-source software and Linux And this video will take a look at this device and See how does it perform with Linux? But first let's see what's in the box The box is very small, and I think that's good because there's no wasted packaging material and Right away we have access to the interface Just packaged in a nice thick plastic wrap But I think is doing a good job at protecting the chassis. What else is there? not much we have a Anfa doesn't line with Sebastian and carries on a USB cable type C to USB type a cable USB 2.0 and we have Safety instructions, so that's like, you know mandatory stuff nothing more What is there as well is some instructions in the packaging as you can see the front is Protected with some film And so is the back panel By the way, there is some slight chassis damage But I assure you this is not my doing one negative out of the box is that the supplied cable is very short This is nothing. I simply had to use an extension for this But because that's a 2.0 cable. I wasn't a problem and no it didn't affect the stability. Also, there is no ferrite cores on this so I've seen reports of interfaces having issues with cables including a ferrite core So maybe that's not a downside when you connect your scarlet to the computer for the first time It will be detected both as an audio interface and as a USB mass storage device This is because the manufacturer wants you to click some links register the device and download some proprietary software I doubt anybody really wants this. I think a QR code would be sufficient However, since it's there Let's hack this thing so we can boot Linux above its internal storage There is no information on how to disable this on the box It's in the manual online because the expect you to run Windows or Mac and Disable that via software and we could do this via software in Linux as I'll show you in a bit But for now, let me show you how to disable this in hardware You need to press and hold the 48 volts button for five seconds And then the mass storage device mode should be off Nobody's gonna talk about this so Hell I'm gonna if you're coming from a free software or Linux background You probably don't need me to explain why I don't like this practice but Many people don't focus right is keeping hostage Part of the functionality of the device I've already purchased. I've given them my money But now they want my name email address The serial number of the device maybe that's additional profit for them because personal information is Money they're limiting the performance of this device and also Putting a nagging icon on my desktop and of course if you dig deep and find the manual Maybe you learn that you can work around this Maybe you won't and you will just install their software and tell them everything they want to know So they let you use your device. I hate this back to the review all of the focus right scarlett 2i 2 3rd generation software controls are available and working on Linux However, the standard USB audio Linux driver Requires an extra parameter to be given to it to do this open a terminal Type sudo su and give your password to gain a root user privileges Now execute this command you can find it in the video description by the way This will create a file Snd usb audio that conf inside the ETC mod probe the system directory The file will contain a line specifying what options the USB audio driver needs to be loaded with Snd usb audio is the name of the driver vid means vendor id Pid is product id These two numbers make sure that the device setup parameter will only be applied to a focus right scarlett 2i 2 3rd gen device If you happen to have a different device from the scarlett family check this page at the link is in the video description as well The different models have different Pid numbers Also, not all devices from the second generation are supported So before you buy a used unit check if it will work with software controls on the legs if you need that Once the file is created reboot your computer. You can use their reboot terminal command to do this After your backup and running it's time to check if the software control is working open a terminal again type all some mixer and hit enter Now press f6 and select your scarlett device from the list Use the arrow keys and enter to confirm After the device is selected press f5 to view all settings of the device Nate we can now enable or disable phantom power Change input impedance and toggle the air mode on each preamp individually as well as control hardware input monitoring and Make the phantom power be persistent across device power cycles Perfect to change the settings use left right arrows to select and either Spacebar or up down arrows to alter the values Apart from the persistent phantom power all of these will give you instant visual feedback on the device itself To exit also mixer you can simply close the terminal emulator with alt f4 or hit escape If you intend to use it for something else By the way, when the USB audio driver is loaded with the special setting It's possible to also disable the msd mode Mest storage device that the interface comes in out of the factory Once the msd mode is disabled the control gets hidden in also mixer, which makes sense You'd probably not want to turn that on again unless you've managed to hack it already But if you do it can be brought back by loading the driver with device setup 3 parameter instead of device setup 1 that we used previously All right, let's go I've measured total run trip latency using a patch cable Where I plug one side of it into the output another side into the input And then I use the jack IO delay program to measure the total Latency which means the time between when the sound leaves the program to when the sound enters the program Which gives us complete latency of both software and hardware I've been testing two interfaces and I've noticed that this one has slightly better latency than Berenger UMC 202 HD But it's marginally better and also there is so many variables depending on your system configuration on Linux to the USB port you use to Your system load to your use case that I I really won't swear by my results You can check them all out. They are in a public spreadsheet. I'm gonna link them in the video description The bottom line is the latency is perfectly good for both live processing, which means real-time and For recording Okay, let's wrap up this review The pros the interface is small and sturdy and it's easy to move around All of the controls are on the front panel. You don't have to reach out to the back There's plenty of visual feedback with the LEDs the preamps have four state level indicators because they can be off Green yellow or red except for the analog potentiometers Everything is controllable via software and the software controls all work on Linux using also mixer If you add a specific driver parameter now for the cons the device starts out in a mass storage mode Which is unnecessary and requires some extra actions to get rid of and locks you out of higher sampler rates And clarifies your desktop. So that's a no-no by default Scarlet will have the phantom power turn off after every power cycle But you can change this in the settings only only in software Also for some lack of an immediate functionality will be a minus But I don't use that so I don't care the scarlet also comes bundled with some proprietary software Which I have no use for so I hope it's not more expensive because of that The front panel seemed a little bit unergonomic before I started using it But it turns out it's perfectly fine because you can access all the buttons with your thumb While pressing the device down with your index finger so it doesn't slide Also, if you don't apply too much force to the buttons You can push them without holding the device down because the rubberized feet have decent friction Overall, I used this device for a good few months. I've done multiple live streams I've done multiple videos with it and I can totally see myself continuing to use it as a daily driver I cannot say too much about the sound quality because I Have no real way or interest in being extremely scientific about it So if you want to go and look into you know pre-app noise floor, etc Go watch a video by Julian crosser or hey Julian cross yet If you want to dig deeper into using focus rights carlet devices and Linux There is a github page that I can recommend. Here's the link and it will also be in the description, of course By the way a little side misadventure. I Got a PCIe USB extension card to test how multiple USB audio interfaces will perform with pipe wire Can I sync them together etc? I haven't done this yet, but I bought one of these It worked for a couple months then stopped working in one of my PCI slots and only worked in another one Then stop working altogether. I got a replacement and it's exactly the same thing just great all in all USB is jank. Okay, that's all for this video. Thanks for watching I also would like to give my biggest thanks to the generous person who has donated that allowed me to purchase the devices for testing You know who you are. Yes, there's gonna be more. This is just the first device on my list I'll get you. I also want to thank everyone who is supporting my work financially If you would like to join these people and help keep this show going Please go to patreon.com slash Anfa or Liberapay.com slash Anfa where you can support me with a monthly donation And if you would like to meet more people interested in using Linux and open-source software for music production Check out my community chat at chat dot Anfa dot XYZ If you wanted to make sure the Scarlett 2i2 3rd gen works fine on Linux before buying you can safely buy one now if not whatever now go and Make some music According at least I'm gonna maybe capture some extra bureau Apart from like the media masterclass for art or this video must have been like for the longest time in the production I don't think I had so much time between the first captured takes and last captured takes