Steinberg has announced the release of a new IXO series of high-quality, lightweight portable audio interfaces at affordable prices. The first two interfaces in the series are the IXO12 (see Figure 1) and the IXO22. They both feature two inputs and outputs, support sampling rates up to 192 kHz at 24-bit resolution, offer latency-free input monitoring, and USB 2.0 connection via USB-C.
The IXO12 interface has a combination microphone/line input on the front panel (see Figure 1). There is a class-A microphone preamplifier on the microphone input and phantom power can be switched on and off. There is a separate Hi-Z input for use with guitar and bass. There are gain controls knobs for each of the two inputs, along with two mute buttons, two signal/peak LED indicators, a phantom power button, a monitor button (switches between direct monitoring and loopback), an LED loopback indicator, and an output...