What's new at Zefiro?

Last updated 4/16/00

WARNING, We've found a bug in the new VIA Apollo Pro133 chipsets for 500+Mhz computers. Until VIA can provide a fix for the problem, we advise all ZA2 users to avoid motherboards with the newer VIA chipsets.

New NT and Win95/98 driver! this is it folks. See 1.78 or 1.79 below.

(10/1/99) After a year and a half of steady InBox sales and glorious reviews we've decided to take the next step in distribution and have joined with our new partner Opcode Systems to help get the word out about the InBox! The Opcode DAT-PORT USB to S/PDIF box makes the perfect InBox companion and we are pleased to have these two products standing side by side. Because of the new arrangement with distributors and retailers, we can no longer offer the InBox for direct sale.

Ok, as some of you may have noticed there may be some snags in the move to Opcode as they are going through a 'reorganization' right now... We are working on a new distribution model for the InBox but supply might be tight for the 1st half of 2000. We are also extremely sad to note the loss of Mike Denecke who passed away from a heart attack in March. Besides designing the much celebrated microphone preamp on the InBox, Mike will be fondly remembered in the film industry as the inventor of the timecode slate and many other pro sound and timecode devices.

At the moment the best places to track down an InBox are the Sound Professionals at (800) 213-3021 and Core Sound at (201) 801-0812.

The Zefiro InBox! The InBox/AD20 was jointly developed by Zefiro Acoustics and Denecke Inc. and is the perfect addition to your current DAT deck or digital I/O card. This handheld portable 20 bit Analog to Digital converter has a built in low noise microphone pre-amplifier. The InBox has stereo balanced inputs on two XLR jacks and digital outputs by both optical S/PDIF and coaxial S/PDIF (on a 1/8th inch mini jack). A 1/8th inch mini to RCA female cable will be included for standard S/PDIF. The InBox will run for over 8 hours on a single alkaline 9volt battery or the box may be powered by an external 9volt wall-wart (optional). The blue aluminum box measures about 3x5.75x1.25 inches and weighs about 14 ounces. Stereo gain adjust is provided by individual gain pots for left and right. Low noise 125.4dB EIN unweighted at max gain (-46.4dB from digital 0dB). Dynamic range at minimum gain (-5.2dB from digital 0dB) is 98dB. Optional XLR to RCA cables with built in 20dB pads can be used to attach the InBox to any standard line out. The 9volt battery clips to the top of the box using Denecke's patented quick snap design. The external AC power connector could alternatively be plugged into the top. On the bottom of the InBox are the dual XLR balanced microphone inputs. On the side of the Inbox are the dual gain pots, battery low LED, Coaxial S/PDIF output (1/8th inch mini), and Optical S/PDIF output (Toslink). The InBox samples at 44.1kHz and produces a SCMS=00 signal. The InBox now sells for $495.

An Optional accessories pack for the InBox will be made available by Zefiro Acoustics. The pack includes the AC adapter, a Toslink cable and a pair of the XLR to RCA padded cables. For use with the Sony 7pin portables, check out Core Sound for their modified InBox, Core Sound also supplies Y cables to adapt mini 1/8th inch stereo to dual XLR. The InBox does not supply phantom power, but Denecke sells a stereo version of their popular PS-1 48V regulated portable supply for use with the InBox. The InBox does NOT have any meters on it, the intent is to use the meters on your DAT deck or Digital Audio Workstation (when used with a ZA2 or other digital card).

The Zefiro InBox (Color - 380k)

And now a quick note on dither... Although the InBox uses a true 20bit A/D converter chip (AKM5351, a slight improvement from the AKM5350 found on the ADA1000 converter), the actual dynamic range is just around 98dB. This means that although there may be more signal in the noise, the S/N ratio is really only giving you about 16.5 bits of real information above the noise floor. Oddly enough this works to our advantage for working with 16bit gear (like CDs and DAT decks) because there is already a natural 'dither' in the 16th bit as it is being recorded from the InBox. There is no NEED to add additional dither noise to the signal because the signal is already hanging right off the edge of 16bits. If the InBox truly delivered 20bits of real information (that would probably require a so-called 24bit converter!) then a 20bit to 16bit truncation would result in the quantization noise that the human ear finds offensive... this would require additional dither noise to be added just beyond the 16th bit to randomize the signal such that the 16th (truncated) bit was not perfectly quantized. So what does this mean? Basically the InBox will sound great with your 16bit gear due to the natural dither in the ADC, but if you go through the effort of capturing 20 or 24bits (with a ZA2 for example) then you'll still gain a few extra dB and perhaps a bit more signal below the noise floor.

(8/25/97) Sonic Foundry's Sound Forge XP4.0 is now included with all ZA2s!

And on a side note... If you're experiencing glitchy audio with your soundcard (ANY soundcard) when performing a lot of VGA graphics acceleration, you may be interested in this post: VGA KILLS AUDIO

ZA2 users! download new stuff here...

The NT4.0 driver is in the same ZIP file as the 1.78 or 1.79 driver.

For Windows 2000 users, Gary Smith has made some changes in the Oemsetup.inf enabling the current NT4.0 driver to be installed under Windows 2000.