If you are like me, my research for a guitar connection to my iPad left me with choosing between the iRiffport and the Jam. I recently purchased, and then returned, the iRiffport. I am very pleased that I purchased the Apogee Jam as a replacement. Here are the reasons why:

1) The connector on the iRiffport (the one that goes into the iPad) is not a strong connection at all; it feels as though it could disconnect at any time. I have a stand to put my iPad on when jamming such that the iPad is in landscape mode, so the cord feels as though it will come out of moved the wrong way. With the Apogee Jam, the connector is just like the iPad’s connector, except it ALSO has the “prongs” that come out of it, securing the connector into the iPad. To remove the connector from the iPad, you need to squeeze the buttons on the connector to make the “prongs” go in so it can be removed…very, very secure. I use the “Gumdrop” case on my iPad, which has a flap that goes over the charging port when not being used. This flap feels pretty tawt when it is open while the charging port is being used. IMPORTANT: if you have such an iPad case, like me, I certainly feel that the Jam will provide a much more secure connection to your iPad over the iRiffport. In fact, the structure of the iRiffport connector was so large, that I felt that it did not fit well through my case. On the other hand, the Jam’s connector is the same small size as the iPad’s original connector. This is also something to consider if you intend to use your iPad in portrait mode on a stand with the connector on the bottom of the iPad.

2) Probably the largest reason I prefer the Jam over the iRiffport: you can hear sound directly from the iPad. With the iRiffport, you MUST use headphones or attach external speakers. I tried headphones with the iRiffport and playing the guitar was very awkward. Nonetheless, with the Jam, I could attach headphones or external speakers to the iPad if I chose to do so. I wanted something that could make my iPad an amplifier for easy mobility around my house, without having to purchase another amplifier or external speakers. With the Jam, I have this.

3) The Jam has a gain meter (i.e., an LED) and a gain control. The iRiffport does not. When not being used to measure the level of the incoming audio, the LED lets you know if you are connected to the iPad, but not to any software (blue light), or if you are connected to the iPad AND to a software application (green light). There are no batteries needed for the Jam or the iRiffport.

4) I personally like that I can use my own guitar cord with the Jam. If the cord breaks, I simply replace the cord, not my iPad connection device. The iRiffport uses its own cord, and the connection to my guitar did not feel as strong as my “normal” guitar cable I used with the Jam.

5) Although a fairly minor point, it is nice to know that the Jam is advertised by Apple (look at their website and their Garageband video). And, since I have Garageband on my iPad, I was pleased to see that the advertising material on the Jam states specifically that it works with Garageband.

So far, I’m very pleased with the Jam.

I bought a cheaper interface first, to ‘try out the concept’ of playing and recording with an iPad. As a guitar player and songwriter, feel free to take my word for it. It works!

That said, the cheaper mic port connectors can be noisy and problematic, and will be quite unpleasant if you have any hopes of using some of the higher gain settings on any of the amp sims in GBand or elsewhere.

If you play guitar, sing and/or write songs and want to do so on the iPad, save yourself the or you’ll end up spending on a cheaper interface and go straight to the Apogee. You’ll save money because once you run into the limitations of the other interfaces, you’re going to end up buying the Apogee anyways!

The Apogee will give you a clean and direct digital connection to the iPad. The mic input on the iPad actually has circuitry that changes the sound to favor the range of the human voice. Guitars sound okay, bass not so much. Again, any gain of any magnitude whatsoever will produce a lot of squealing and feedback in the headphones if you’re using a cheaper interface.

In GarageBand with the Apogee, guitars sound great and so does my Fender Precision bass. I play it through a cleaner amp setting and it sounds tremendous. I haven’t run a mic through it yet, but it’s a clean interface so with an adapter any dynamic (no phantom power, sorry) mic will sound great. Plenty of great vocals (and instruments) have been recorded over the years with simple dynamic mics, so please don’t buy into the advertising myth that you absolutely have to have a shock-mounted, phantom powered microphone to get a great recording. You don’t.

There’s also the question of volume. The cheaper interfaces are too quiet (one way of dealing with the feedback issue). The Apogee lets you play plenty loud with whatever sound you like. Very nice I must say!

For songwriting on the go, traveling, whatever, Garageband and the Apogee can’t be beat. I say this as a long time Windows user, and I can assure you I’m not dumping my Thinkpad anytime soon, but this is really a blast. Being able to tap out a beat, record guitars, vocals whatever on this little iPad is really nice in terms of songwriting workflow. As other have said, you’ll get so involved the time just whooshes away!

If you want phantom power and a more sturdy, powered setup, try the Alesis audio dock. For me, though, this is perfect.

Bottom line: If you’re a songwriter looking to replace your old four track, SKIP the cheaper interfaces. Spend some more money now and you’ll be glad you did.

*** Addendum: Latency with GarageBand is very good, but not air-tight. You’ll feel a bit of drag when doing any sort of moderately fast soloing, but it’s not that bad at all. I’ve just been spoiled with the very low ASIO latency I get on my PC. My feeling is that this is not due to the Apogee hardware, but rather imposed by the software. GB has to gear itself for the best latency under the worst circumstances, which would be an iPad 1 with virtual instruments and effects on every track. Hopefully future releases of GB will give users some ability to tweak latency for various scenarios and hardware levels.

I also tried this on my wife’s Macbook with the (included) USB converter cable and it works great. No driver installation or anything. Very nice!

Why 4 stars and not 5? You’ve got to jump through some serious hoops to get a 5 star rating, otherwise it has no meaning! Apogee did a nice job here but that’s it. There’s nothing special going on here that won’t be done at least as well and more cheaply by other manufacturers. Apogee could have priced this much more cheaply but prefer to cash in on the cachet of their name. This is in their own best interest, and seeing as they’re the first to introduce a compact digital interface for the iPad, I’m happy to pay the premium for now.