One fatal, frustrating flaw that renders this nearly unusable without extensive workarounds for me.
Let's start with the positives:
It's easy to use. Software is simple, setup is minimal. Getting started with this equipment isn't hard. Also 60£ for a mic, headphones and an audio interface is insanely cheap, no matter how you look at it. Also the audio isn't shabby, certainly better than what you'd expect from a product this cheap.
So what's wrong with it? Well, it seems that Focusrite decided to cut corners with the features. I don't expect a piece of equipment this cheap to be incredibly flexible but why, I reiterate, WHY- can't you shut off direct monitoring into your headphones? This seems like such an oversight, and downright lazy. Certainly there's a use for direct monitoring, but I don't want it turned on all the time. I would honestly have thrown another 20£ at this product if it would have had this feature.
It genuinely frustrates me that they decided to leave this feature out, as it basically renders this piece of equipment unusable for conference applications, such as Zoom or Discord, as you can't have input from your mic without having it blasted through your headphones as well. The only viable solution would essentially be to use your inbuilt audio in your PC (if you have it), or alternatively another audio interface for your headphones. Such an amazing and affordable product undone by this lacking feature, which would have been tolerable on a cheap audio interface from 15 years ago, but not from one this new.
