The hosts outscored Ulster by three tries to one but Mark McCall's men were the masters of their own downfall.

Too many times Ulster lost the ball in contact and when they got into scoring positions the final pass didn't go to hand.

There were a few positives for Ulster though with the lineout functioning well and the scrum holding up.

Niall O'Connor missed an early long range penalty opportunity for Ulster after a good charge from Tommy Bowe.

Andy Maxwell nearly opened the scoring when he chipped Mark McCrea but Kieran Campbell was able to get across and take the ball into touch.

Edinburgh took the lead on 15 minutes with a well worked try from centre John Houston.

Nick DeLuca took a quick line out in his own half and released winger Andrew Turnbull, his pace took him clear before he offloaded to the midfielder who went under the posts giving Phil Godman's an easy conversion.

Edinburgh were awarded a penalty try on the half hour after more good work from Turnbull. Godman's cross kick was well fielded by DeLuca and he popped to Turnbull who soared passed Bowe but McCrea hauled him down. The home side wanted quick ball but Ulster illegally prevented it coming back and the referee awarded the penalty try with Godman adding the conversion.

Ulster wasted their best chance of the first half when O'Connor kicked a penalty close to the Edinburgh line but the forwards closed the gap at the resulting lineout.

Bowe should have done better when he came onto a crash ball from O'Connor but was dragged down close to the line and lost the ball trying an ambitious offload.

O'Connor opened Ulster's account with a simple kick in front of the posts four minutes after the restart as the home side got penalised for not rolling away.

A good driving maul from the forwards then resulted in a penalty to Ulster but O'Connor was unable to make it count.

Edinburgh were again able to take advantage of more sloppy play from Ulster to score a third try on 56 minutes.

Bowe lost the ball in contact and Ben Cairn hacked on - Turnbull showed his pace to outsprint Mark Bartholomeusz and win the race for the touchdown with Ally Warnock converting.

Bartholomeusz got Ulster back into the game when he picked a great line to wrong foot the defence and slide over with O'Connor on target with the conversion.

Edinburgh had lock Ben Gissing sin-binned with 15 minutes remaining but once again Ulster managed to lose the ball in contact as Ryan Caldwell charged through from a line out.

Caldwell, who had already been warned by the referee, was sin-binned for stamping on 74 minutes as Ulster tried to force the game.

Warnock slotted over another penalty as Edinburgh closed out the match.

Edinburgh: N DeLuca, A Turnbull, B Cairns, J Houston, A Maxwell, P Godman B Mayer, A Allori, A Kelly, G Cross, C Hamilton, B Gissing, M Mustchin, R Rennie, S Cross.

Replacements: S Lawrie, R Grant, F Pringle, R Reid G Laidlaw, Al Warnock M Dey.

Ulster: B Cunningham, S Danielli, T Bowe, S Mallon, M McCrea, N O'Connor, K Campbell, J Fitzpatrick, N Brady, T Court, J Harrison, R Caldwell, M McCullough, David Pollock, R Wilson.

Replacements: M Miles, D Fitzpatrick, T Barker, K Dawson, P Marshall, A Larkin; M Bartholomeusz.

Referee: J Jones (WRU)