so, are the e-mu and m-audio soundcards good for multimedia purposes?

R

rane

New member
in other words, are they great (not decent, not okay), but AS GOOD AS, say a soundblaster audigy zs platinum, in terms of playing dvd's, mp3 music, and etc etc?

i like recording as a hobby, but if say i bought an emu 1820 (which i am on the verge of purchasing), i dont want it to interfere with teh other activiteis are also utilize my computer for.
 
The m-audio audiophile doesn't have onboard midi playback capabilities like consumer soundcards (read: soundblasters) but apart from that, my audiophile replaced my soundblaster live for everything. I use it for recording but also playing games, dvd playback, etc. Flawless.
 
The E-mu cards, under the current drivers are not appropriate for DVD playback.

The M-audio cards can handle DVD playback with both software decoding to multiple analog channels or digital stream over the SPDIF.

Neither card can do hardware game surround acceleration like EAX. You'll either have to do with software emulation or generally fine stereo sound from either the E-mu or M-audio offerings. I used the M-audio stuff extensively for game audio in the past with no problems. These days I'm having generally good performance from the E-mu, the one exception being I can't use Teamspeak (a rather popular voice chatting software made for use with multiplayer games...)

Note that these cards don't have a problem coexisting with your existing Sound Blaster Audigy...
 
One more thing, those cards typically don't have a hardware connection to a CD drive like the SoundBlasters do, but most media players these days can play CD audio by reading them and routing them to the soundcard's digital audio stream like any other source on the computer.
 
Oh god, don't dare use that cable to hook up CD audio! The converters built into CD drives are just awful. Some of the cheaper use as bad as 12 bit converters on them. Really. I haven't bothered with those cables for the last 6 years and never went into a situation where I needed them...
 
I have the M-audio Revolution 7.1 which is their "soudblaster" product and I must say it sounds a lot better. I've read some reviews way back from computer magazines that the D/A decoders are almost as good if not better than good home theatre recievers. I would assume that the Maudio pro cards offer the same kinda quality.
 
thanks fro the replies, most of you are suggesting that i go for an maudio, if i want to play dvds and use game audio.

im really looking into the emu 1212m though, that or the 1820--but as sklathill said i HAVE heard about emu's drivers lacking in what i need

well, thanks again
 
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