Digitizing/Archiving LPs with M-Audio Audiophile 2496 in Windows 7 & Audio Studio 10

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JFCMan

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Digitizing/Archiving LPs with M-Audio Audiophile 2496 in Windows 7 & Audio Studio 10

HELP!!! Advice/guidance needed to set up M-Audio Control Panel for Audiophile 2496 in Windows 7 - Have found all kinds of advice/guidance to set up same for Win 98 & XP, but nothing exists for same in Win 7??? I have a 50-years old Vinyl LP collection that I've been waiting to digitize now that I'm retired and have nothing better to do, but this problem is throwing a major monkey wrench in the works.
 
Look around for some install compatibility mode. I wouldn't know if versions of W7 let one do this ?
 
The best software I've found for this task is one that was designed and built for the purpose by someone keen on the task themselves.
It's called WaveRepair and is great for cleaning up clicks, pops etc manually or automatically as well as splitting the file into tracks, EQing as needed, dealing with phase. DC offset etc etc. It's pretty cheap too..
I use it most on a XP computer but it is also on this net computer W7.
I REALLY suggest for your current software/hardware, or if you look at WaveRepair, that you buy a cheap/2nd hand PC, install XP and leave it set up to your turntable. It takes real time recording to do the job and the processing of damaged LPs can take a while depending on the preferences set & the manual/auto path taken. You will find yourself unable to use the computer for other tasks whilst recording the audio. You don't need much processing power to do the job and using an PCI based AD/DA will make that even easier.
I've been digitizing my rarer LPs for about 20 years and have used 5 different computers to do so, a nice, stable OFFnet XP has given the best results. Oh, optimizing XP for audio is pretty comprehensively covered on line as well. I'm not sure how well W10 works when it comes to shutting down all of the backing running.
 
I have spent quite a bit of time trying to get my 2496 to record internal sound (Radio 3 ektually!) without success.
Tried SAM Silver cloud, Sam Pro X Silver, Audacity, AA 1.5 and Reaper. No joy. This WILL work if you revert to the OBS, the Reatek horror but I for one do not want to do that.

What DOES work is plugging the outputs into the inputs (keep wick at buggerall and advance slowly, might feedback) This is a doddle for me because my cards come up to the wall in a breakout box, one TRS input and two TRS outs and I STRONGLY commend the breakout box idea to you.

Otherwise you can buy RCA plugs to two RCA outs and link with a short RCA-RCA stereo cable. Even better would be to build a small BOB with a switch for the link.

I am dead bang certain that IF you can get hold of the original Control Panel software it will work on W7 and there is a Monitor Mix function that does what we need. My efforts to find such software have failed. I have the original M-A CD "somewhere", if I ever find it I shall send you a burn!

Dave.
 
Getting the M-Audio working would be good, but, frankly, I use the on-board sound, often enough. That's a front end is more important approach. Not all on-board is equal to the task, but modest levels to the analog in are good enough for me, many times. More options the better. I can use a Blaster card in my laptop, because I think the output op-amps sound better, etc.. Music with more "spectral" content would, hopefully, benefit from a nice card.

Having only two tape loops at the moment, one set is on 3.5mm stereo. To go into a PCI/USB card, I have to pull the leads off the gx-600db deck. Not easy as it's all by feel, but I do that often enough, also. I have those leads free, at the moment, for going into digital hardware recorders at this point in time.

Now, even back in the ISA old days, I had a separate computer set up with a 486 to record albums and that "audio" stuff. A xp computer can be cheaper than dirt.
 
"Getting the M-Audio working would be good, but, frankly, I use the on-board sound, often enough." Oh! I understand that there is no quality hit using OBS, Youtube etc sound is as bad as it is ever going to get! No, I just can't be arsed to keep switching twixt ASIO 2496 and the disable Realtek.

The later generation of Blaster cards are said to have very good D to A, it is the drivers, latency and clunky MO that makes them poor for recording.

Dave.
 
I don't know how many realtek I have, basically dealing with the laptop. Here with the laptop, are this box and a IBM, which both use soundmax. To me, the effectiveness of the onboard chips is more about who is making the mainboard and implementing them to various degrees. I know the new(but outdated) machine in my Music Room and the old box have realtek and they are off in BIOS. The new one is a cheap mid tower Dell and the old one a custom XP Media Center - I don't have much faith in either MB for sophistication. haha

Hmmm
In ISA, I have ?? two Ensoniq, a SB 16, and two generic using the Yamaha synth chip

PCI is SB PCI128, PCI512, 1st model !live, Aureal Vortex 2 8330 and three ECHO with breakout boxes. I actually like the old CT4620, but used hacked PAX drivers, until KX brought out drivers. The deal with the Vortex and !live was the SF, ARL, and DSL sound banks, but the !live has two different op-amps for output. None of that has much S/N - the X-Fi Notebook card is S/N98. But it sounds good : )

I've considered something in PCIe, but I don't really need it, or, the latest generation of interfaces .

This computer has USB interface recording off the those loose tape loop leads and also USB playback for that 384k PCM and DSD 12.8 audio

The only thing I have close to the 2696 is the 20-bit ECHO Gina and I wouldn't hesitate to use it for anything
 

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