The editors of Electronic Musician bestow 2004 Editors' Choice Awards on three new MOTU products.

Digital Performer 4.11—Best Digital Audio Sequencer

Digital Performer has garnered the prestigious EM Editors' Choice Award an unprecedented four times in the last five years: 2000, 2001, 2002 and 2004. This year, DP4 for Mac OS X won "by virtue of its elegant and finely crafted new user interface, its intuitive design, and its nearly bottomless feature set." The bottom line? "Digital Performer is better than ever, and that's no small feat for this perennial award winner."

MachFive—Best Software Sampler

"Finally, a new sampler that doesn't make your old libraries obsolete!" exclaim the editors of EM. "This universal sampler plug-in lets you import, audition, and load sound banks in a long list of sampler formats, including Akai, Roland, E-mu, Kurzweil, SampleCell, EXS4 and Giga. And that's not all: MachFive can also import samples in WAV, Acid, AIFF, SDI and REX formats." They go on to say: "Machfive strikes a welcome balance between simplicity and functionality." Even with its long list of high-end features, "MachFive never sacrifices its straightforrard architecture and easy-to-use interface. Add to that its new direct-from-disk sample-streaming capability, and MachFive is unquestionably a winner."

828mkII—Best Digital Audio Workstation/Audio Interface

"We singled out the MOTU 828mkII for this award because of its impressive combination of performance, features, and value." Based on the original 828 (another Editors' Choice winner in 2002), the 828mkII "offers significant additions and improvements, inlcuding 24-bit, 96 kHz audio; front-panel mic-instrument inputs (featuring Trim controls and switchable phantom power) on XLR/TRS combo jacks; and MOTU's CueMix DSP system, which allows for near-zero-latency monitoring." Clearly impressed with the 828mkII's impressive list of new features, EM's verdict is simple: "Add it all up, and you have another winner for MOTU."