I have the 3rd gen 4i4 that I am happy with. It does lack the buttons to control channel functions. I had to use the open source GUI to set up the routing. I have a mixer plugged into the rear inputs and I need the audio sent to my speakers by default. I only do basic recording, but it easily covers that. I've not used the MIDI, but that is an area I want to explore. I just got an Akai MPKmini keyboard that I want to experiment with. I'm more of an analogue musician really.

!BEER