Universal Audio Volt 2 USB Audio Interface

I’ll tell you the most important thing about this equipment, the sound is very similar, or practically the same as the Apollo, but for a small fraction of the price. It’s worth every dollar invested.

I’ve been through about 3 other interfaces and can really say that this was my favorite.
Not only is this very aesthetically pleasing but very high audio quality. it’s been a year and a half since I bought it and it’s still perfect. It even came with really nice drum and bass VSTs that I use quite often. My favorite purchase ever!

bought this audio interface to record my guitar. setup was easy, comes with a slew of free software and tools for music production. interface is intuitive. great value purchase

First, the packaging is as fine as it gets – a beautiful gift box inside with excellent product protection. It was a joy to unpack.

More importantly, the audio interface works instantly – plug and play. I have not recorded through it yet, but based on other reviews I have high hopes.

I HAVE been mixing down with the interface and I find the signal to be very clear and revealing. For whatever reason the stereo perception seems excellent, which to me is critical for pristine mixes.

I’m going to hazard that it’s the best interface in the price range and by far when factoring the included free software. I need to update my computer and DAW to take advantage of the software, but if you are wondering if this interface will work with an older system: I have a Late 2012 Mac Mini running Catalina. The interface was recognized upon plugging in and works great!

I highly recommend and I an sure if/when I upgrade again it will be to another UA interface.

(I’ma submit some product ideas to the company too because I have no intention of getting into the manufacturing business and their are some deficits in clever, affordable out gear these days.)

Using this is a dream. One button press and I’m ready to record.

Compressor:
The compressor is killer! – It not only makes the vocals sound fuller and easier to understand, but it effectively works as a limiter too. So this means I can get extra loud or extra quite with my voice, or move closer and further from the mic – and not have to waste time in editing fixing the volume levels. Amazing for my uses and works far better than Elgato’s attempt at this.

None of the reviews I saw mentioned this but it’s in the manual – you can adjust the compressor via the gain knob. – Basically the compressor sets the top limit and the harder you push your gain the more you push your quite stuff into the loud stuff.

In other words, this thing is freakin fantastic. I can get compression that’s extremely mild – all the way to pretty insane compression – depending on use/preference.

Note:
(Please note that while I’m very knowledgeable in audio and I’ve been working in audio/video for over a decade, I’m still not an expert audio engineer and I have not used a professional standalone compressor unit (other than software plugins, but there too I am not an expert). So I can’t say for sure exactly how this stacks up to the big boy stuff and I have not compared them side by side.)

Price:
Price feels a little steep especially if you want multiple channels. But for a professional device this is worth every single penny. All my issues from my four previous interfaces have gone away. And this kicks the back side of any USB mic that I know of (except *maaaaaaaybe* the Rode NT1 5th gen but that doesn’t fit my uses and of course it’s limited to one built-in mic)

Phantom power:
Small complaint is that for my main mic (the insanely good Earthworks SR117) I have to switch on phantom power each time I use this interface. For example if the computer goes to sleep then the Volt might turn off for a few seconds and the phantom power resets to the off position.

This IS good for safety with some rare mics that can be damaged by phantom power. On most modern mics this isn’t an issue but it’s a nice safety feature to have anyways. When it’s on there’s a pretty red light which is nice.

But since the default is phantom power off every time, it’s happened a couple times where I started troubleshooting my mic and cables etc before realizing this was the issue. But it’s a single button press to turn on so as long as you’re aware of this then it’s hardly a problem. And anyways this only applies to powered mics.

There’s other quality of life things like the when enabling phantom power it goes silent for a few seconds so your mic doesn’t cause a pop. Very nice!

If I’m not mistaken all the other settings are remembered after power off. Most importantly all the gain and volume etc since those are physical knobs.

I have the single input version of this Volt as that’s all that was in stock at the time.

Meters:
The audio meters on this are better than all my previous interfaces but still not enough different levels for what most pros would want. But with the awesome compressor it’s really not an issue because I can’t peak anyways. – so for my uses I’m anyways adjusting based on how the compressor sounds and not based on any visual indication.

If you don’t need fancy effects running on your interface (other than the awesome compressor) then I don’t know of anything better. Stunningly well made device.

Alternatives:
I was considering the Rode interface since it has a ton of effects and adjustments but looking at Amazon reviews there seems to be issues with the device failing so for now that’s a no-go for me. And it’s not exactly cheap (500 ish). Same for Lewitt’s interface. Looks like they need to work on reliability.

Conclusion:
In conclusion. I love it. 100% recommended. And it’s pretty too. Nice eye candy for the desk. The lights and buttons on it look exceptionally good! Not just cheap LEDs.

Photo:
Photographed in my desk drawer where it lives in front of my microphone switcher (which is both for testing/reviewing mics and for switching between different recording locations where I have different mics permanently set up). This keeps my desk clean and my devices safe from my cats.

Compatibility notes:

Mac:
Works great on my Mac. Plug and play.
Small issue is that with the compressor on it’s a bit too quiet when recording into Final Cut. There’s probably a solution to this but for now I just make it louder before publishing the video (which takes a few seconds to do).

Camera:
For use with a camera (which I do often) I can output from the headphones output of the Volt into the mic input of my camera, then plug in my headphones into the camera’s own headphone output. This works great because the headphone volume knob on there volt works as an additional amplifier to adjust the output volume *after* the compression. This would have been nice to have for the USB output too, as mentioned above with Final Cut.

The Volt has of power so I can set the camera’s built-in gain to the lowest setting and then overpower the camera’s noisy preamps to keep noise low.

Playstation compatibility:
***(most people can ignore this)***
This interface is *not* compatible with the Playstation 5 in case anyone is trying to record videos on that. But even with interfaces that ended up being compatible (elgato Wave XLR, Shure X2U), the PS5 seems to record audio in a super low bitrate and it’s totally unusable if you want something that sounds nice. So I’ve switched to just recording my screen with a camera – worse image but audio is x10 better which for me is much more important. Plus manually coping recordings off the PS5 is a huge pain if you need to do it often. I could do screen recording with a second computer but I don’t want a second monitor on my desk. Another option might be some professional recorders like the Atomos ones but I don’t want to spend money on that right now.