Newbie Price/Performance

[jbiddy]

A friend of mine is a musician and we've recorded a few CD's. I'm pretty computer fluent, especially in the software area. However, audio is something that has remained somewhat of a mystery to me over the years. Getting good audio for gaming and movies, I can do, but for recording, I know next to nothing about. I'm looking to get better sound quality out of the setup I already have, ie not buying a new sound card.

Currently, I have an nForce 2 motherboard that has SoundStorm. I've just been using a mic to mini jack setup since he plays acoustic stuff.

But since I have SoundStorm, which I understand is fairly decent audio-wise, wouldn't it be best to us the S/PDIF inputs, thereby bypassing the ugliness that is AC'97? What would be the best way to do this? My first assumption is that there is no converter for the mini jack at the end of the mic to make it S/PDIF. I would guess a preamp with S/PDIF output?

Whatever reccomendations are made, could someone give me links to the gear with the best price/performance ratio?

Thanks, all.

[Kevin Deschwazi]

Yes, you'd need a mic pre with spdif out. The ART digtal MPA is the only one I can think of:

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/DigitalMPA/

Personally I'd get a soundcard designed for recording (decent A-D/D-A converters, ASIO drivers etc.) and then you can use whatever mic pres you want.

For a simple 2 in, 2 out card (with MIDI and spdif) I'd recommend the M Audio audiophile 2496.

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/Audiophile2496/