With such a large amount of I/Os, a WordClock connection is essential, so you’ll find two BNC plugs on the rear panel. A MIDI duo provides communication between the external gear and the computer. Two FW400 ports allow computer connection and daisy-chaining with another SK48, a DK32, a PowerCore FW or anything else, assuming you keep an eye on the bandwith when you want to use all available channels. I would have liked to have a second SK48 to check how they behave when daisy-chained, because if a set of two interfaces works fine, then the price-I/O-preamps-effects ratio is really attractive.

On the display side, five LEDs give information about the validity of the digital connections (ADAT, TOSLINK, S/P-DIF, MIDI and FireWire) and eight bar-graphs with six segments assure basic monitoring of incoming signals (but not outgoing). You won’t be using them for precise control, that’s the job of the TCNear software, but they’ll allow you to avoid any distortion and clipping. All the more so since you can use the SK48 in stand-alone mode, without a computer, hence the TCNear software. In this case, the interface uses the last active settings before the computer shutdown. TC Electronic has built its interface “around” the Dice II chip. In development by the TC R&D from 2003, this chip handles all I/O and is particularly suitable for FireWire; it guarantees up to 96 channels at 96 kHz (32 inputs, 64 outputs). Other manufacturers have begun to use this chip in their own products: PreSonus with the FireStudio or LightPipe, Alesis with its MultiMix mixers... As for the converters used in the SK48, they are made by AKM.

The chip also includes a hybrid technology in order to reject the jitter, which differs from the usual dual PLL (Phase Locked Loops) and DDS (Direct Digital Synthesis): called the Jitter Elimination Technology (JET). In terms of intrinsic jitter as well as in jitter rejection, TC has done several experiments showing that the JET peforms almost as good as the System6000, and sometimes even gives better results, under certain circumstances. Another interesting technology is the Advanced Clock Recovery, which leys you, when an external clock is lost or is of bad quality, to continue to work without audio drop-outs: the interface automatically shifts to its internal clock, with the last received clock rate. You’ll not find this feature on many interfaces, and the SK48 does it really fast and in a transparent way, it’s quite amazing.

On the other hand, the SK48 is slower than the RME Multiface (first generation) or HDSP9632 installed on my G4 and G5 when you need on the fly resync. If you change the sample rate while an audiofile is playing (imagine an Undo of a Convert Sample Rate in Peak, for instance), the RME and the TC will continue to provide audio output, after a very short drop-out and not at the correct “speed”. If you press Stop, Undo, then press Play, the RMEs are immediately synced, while the TC will remain silent for 4 or 5 seconds. And if ever you have digital gear connected, therefore locked, you’ll hear an unpleasant digital noise... The resync is faster if you change the rate directly in Audio & MIDI Setup.