Yeah, it’s about the same as dithered vs undithered CD audio - it’s almost inaudible.
The perceived front-to-back depth of the stereo image seems very slightly flatter. If you’ve ever recorded anything straight to tape, it’s like the difference between listening straight off the tape vs. digitizing the tape through decent but not amazing converters (like an older MOTU interface, which is what I was using when I was recording to tape in the mid 2000s) and playing that back.
I like to use this visual metaphor for it:
You’re sitting in a room with a plate glass window overlooking a field. The glass is relatively clean and flat but you’re still looking through a thick pane of glass.
Now imagine replacing the window with a cutting edge, high definition display showing a high quality live video feed (with infinite depth of field) of the exact same view. In a lot of ways it’s more revealing than looking through the glass - the colors are more vivid, distant objects are more distinct - but it’s a two dimensional image on a flat plane.
That’s the best way I’ve come up with to describe how the difference between fully analog monitor and monitoring through average quality converters (on the Octatrack or otherwise) sounds to me, Octatrack or otherwise. It’s a non-issue now because I monitor everything through the DAW these days anyhow. It sounds more than good enough and I never hear what I’m losing so I don’t miss it (much).
I’ve got no complaints about the Octatrack’s sound quality.
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Interesting. I wonder though how you compared this? Did you AB the same piece of music as is from your daw with a version that went though the converters of OT? I ask because it’s a pretty wild observation so I hope this is not a feeling but really checked in a test. Otherwise there are just too many possible psychological influences amongst other things that can influence this perception.
And we’re talking about an OT without FX /filter/TS right ? Just purely the converters
I highly doubt it is noticeable or that the converters really are that average. If I find time I might do a an A/B with a hifi production. If anyone has a suggest for a piece of music and can provide a lossless file, let me know. I’ll do a null test and see if I can get a perfectly leveled A/B/X test to post here. Might take some time before I have time to do this. It’s really not that important but it is interesting. Certainly because a few people have made some pretty interesting claims which would be fun to see if we can confirm those.
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Like I said, it’s barely noticeable and doesn’t matter in the context of an instrument, but it’s there. I’ve done blind ABX tests of stuff that’s a lot more subtle (the difference between a CD and a burned copy of that CD on the same player is a good one - audio CDs weren’t lossless in the way data discs were, and error correction is audible - or it was when I was 10 years younger than I am now), the OT was obvious enough I never felt the need to formally test it but minor enough that it doesn’t matter to me at all.
“Average” converters doesn’t mean bad, they’re fine. Most modern converters are, until you get into the really low end stuff. The closest thing to high end converters I’ve ever been able to own myself was a BLA signature modded Digi002 and it sounded noticeably better than the Presonus Studiolive 32r that I use now, but not better enough to offset having 4x as many inputs, lower latency, more stable drivers, all of the other quality of life things the Presonus offers (on top of being a full 64 channel digital mixer in a box).
Really high end converters like you would find in a mastering studio are going to cost mor eper channel than the entire Octatrack costs, but you’re also well into the diminishing returns zone at that point. The difference between a $30 interface and a $300 interface is pretty big. The difference between a $300 interface and a $3000 interface is fairly small. The difference between a $3000 interface and a $30,000 interface is almost negligible at best. With the Octatrack we’re talking about the $300 interface zone - it’s not the best but it’s more than good enough for what it is, and it’s absolutely not going to ruin your music or something. It definitely sounds a lot better than the MBox that came with Pro Tools when I had to buy it for work a few years ago.
Like I’ve been saying, I’ve got no complaints about it.
If you want to get really nitpicky about this stuff, here’s an interesting AES paper about the audibility of antialias filters and 16 bit quantization:
https://secure.aes.org/forum/pubs/conventions/?ID=416
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So a sound test between a Waldorf Quantum/Iridium vs Elektron Octatrack mk2 would be fair 
On the other hand, this is a fantastic sounding album, one of the best, fidelity is overrated.
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I disagree, on a well tuned high end system or a ‘normal’ stereo you will get a complete different experience.
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I don’t believe it, considering how many posts you made on this thread within the last 8 hours.
If you were really so busy you wouldn’t have had the time to post so much.
Come on, start the new thread already. 
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I run my octatrack as main hub for all my gear (at 24 bit) but then i ALSO run octa into a vintage 1970’s mixer, that has on board spring verb so i can send aux to sweet sounding spring verb. It adds line noise to the mix, but considering half the music i listen to reaches for vintage and/or glitch type vibes, it’s pure gold to me…
i do like Surgeon, usually just stereo mix from Octa, but can also send another mix to spring verb and go back and multi track other parts if i want. After you send it all to mastering, if you can’t get something to sound good, you probably didn’t have anything good to begin with?
I make house and techno, i know PLENTY of “famous” tracks made with shittier samplers, LoL
And in a “live” capacity, if your music doesn’t suck, nobody is going to care about sound quality with 120db in their face…
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“Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face with 120db.”
Mike Tyson
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Subjective thread
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Wait, are there objective threads?
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the other day a friend of mine, the honey badger and I were having this discussion and he said “stimming don’t care”!
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I googled it and, yes, there are objective threads. This ain’t one of them.
Objectively, there are threads.
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I’d love to know more about using your OT in a fast way like the DT…as I am still deciding before my purchase of either one
One simple way I use the DT is to gather a bundle of sounds/samples, either on my PC or if I have some folders loaded on the DT that I browse - just for four or so tracks. Maybe a longer loop or two - beat, a pad, a bass melody and some hits. I might even key match on my DAW before I start. Then I just start messing with them on the DT, tuning them, chopping them DT style.
Within minutes I’ll have something going that makes some sense as a riff. Then copy to other patterns and variate.
When first using the DT I was like ‘this is so quick and simple!’
I’d spent years with the OT taking a far more complicated approach given all the features and took far longer to get that first riff going. Mainly too much time in the sample editor, random slice locking, FX experimenting, time stretching etc. I rarely got to even a second variation having gotten too focused on the first and then thinking about different machines per track, banks, crossfader usage …
However the straightforward DT approach works just as easily on the OT. I was just getting over complicated on the OT and losing my initial mojo.
Hope that makes sense! It’s obvious in hindsight but the DT is a great focus machine, but you can approach the OT in the same way.
One advantage of the DT is its snappier sonic quality/FX seems to encourage slightly more quick gratification at sounding polished. Also I’ve a mk 1 OT and suspect I just like the DT buttons more!
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thanks for the detail!
sorry but what is a BOUM