Do I have the right sound card?

  • Thread starter Thread starter JohnnyScience
  • Start date Start date
JohnnyScience said:
I am running a 64 bit system & want to have everything run on the 64 bit platform to maximize my 8g of ram.

I'm going to be getting Sonar 8.5 64

But I want to make sure that my sound card will be able to express the 64 bit quality.

What specs should I actually be looking for?

Here is a link to my card:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829118105
Click to expand...

im betting the a/d/a converters in that thing are HORRIBLE. ive never heard of turtle beach but it looks more like a gaming kinda card. and are you really recording surround sound?

you would actually probably be better off with something like this
http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/product/Behringer-UPHONO-UFO202-USB-Audio-Interface?sku=476149
 
Hmm. What sound cards are good ones for a setup like this?

What is that a little sound convertor that bypasses the soundcard that you hook up to speakers?
 
JohnnyScience said:
Hmm. What sound cards are good ones for a setup like this?

What is that a little sound convertor that bypasses the soundcard that you hook up to speakers?
Click to expand...

It's USB audio interface. Basically a soundcard that plugs in through USB.

Although, my personal opinion is that you could do a lot better than one of those. I can't imagine the A/D/A converters being all that awesome either. Sure it'll be better than a gamer's card...and for the price it isn't bad I guess, but if you can afford more than $30, get something else.

Presonus and M-Audio make some pretty good stuff for a pretty reasonable price.
 
I'd like the capability of recording at least 32 tracks and more if possible.

The budget can be more if it needs be. I'd like to stay around $100 or less I suppose?
 
Ok, I'll assume you don't want to actually record 32 tracks at once. And that you just mean having a tune with a total of 32 tracks etc...

Your CPU, and your RAM especially, will have more bearing on the ability to do that than your sound card. You have 8 gigs of RAM, so you'll be absolutely fine. I sometimes run over 50 tracks, and I have 3 gigs.

I have one of these.... http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Delta44.html ...4 inputs, 4 outputs, good converters, pretty good price. Cost me less than £90 (not sure what that is in dollars).
 
legionserial said:
Ok, I'll assume you don't want to record 32 tracks at once. And that you just mean having a tune with a total of 32 tracks etc...

You CPU and RAM will have more bearing on the ability to do that than your sound card.

I have one of these.... http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Delta44.html ...4 inputs, 4 outputs, good converters, pretty good price. Cost me less than £90 (not sure what that is in dollars).
Click to expand...

150$ US

10 chars
 
Hmm. Is that sound card upgrade need right away? Or can I get away with what I have for a couple months?

I'm going to go with Sonar 8.5 64, what is the difference between Producer & Studio?
 
JohnnyScience said:
Hmm. Is that sound card upgrade need right away? Or can I get away with what I have for a couple months?

I'm going to go with Sonar 8.5 64, what is the difference between Producer & Studio?
Click to expand...

it would be in your recordings best interest to get the recommended interface soon.

using ANYTHING like the stock sound card in your computer or that turtle bay or what ever card will sound....

... well it will sound terrible.
 
Kingofpain678 said:
it would be in your recordings best interest to get the recommended interface soon.

using ANYTHING like the stock sound card in your computer or that turtle bay or what ever card will sound....

... well it will sound terrible.
Click to expand...

No, it won't neccessarily sound terrible. That's an exaggeration.

But you will see a noticable improvement with a better sound card.

Whether you can get away with what you have for a couple of months depends on what you're doing. If your just doing it for fun, there's nothing to 'get away with'. I'm assuming you're just finiding your feet at the moment. If you can't afford a new card straight away, no biggie. There are still plenty of things to learn about in the meantime. Regardless of how good your soundcard is, if you're relatively new to it all, you aren't going to get massively stellar results to start with. That's where learning, reading, and practice come in. I've been recording music on and off for 6 years now, I've still got plenty of stuff I can improve on. There are people here who have been doing it way way longer than I have, and they'd say the same about themselves.

Although nice gear can help... learning, knowledge and skills will help you way more.

I'm sure that the best engineers in the world could do more with a stock soundcard than a lot of us could do with a whole studio of pro gear.
 
So do I want another PCI card or a gadget that plugs in via USB?

I'll say this, I had the turtle beach to hook up my sony 5.1 system since this is also a HTPC.

Now as long as I can get a digital optical port on a new PCI card I will replace the one I have

If I cant get an upgraded card like you guys are suggesting with a digital optical port, I may get the USB thing then.
 
JohnnyScience said:
So do I want another PCI card or a gadget that plugs in via USB?

I'll say this, I had the turtle beach to hook up my sony 5.1 system since this is also a HTPC.

Now as long as I can get a digital optical port on a new PCI card I will replace the one I have

If I cant get an upgraded card like you guys are suggesting with a digital optical port, I may get the USB thing then.
Click to expand...

That would work but here's the problem with usb interfaces, no matter how many inputs you may have they will be mixed down to only two signals which would be left and right. I'm not sure why usb has to "mix" all the inputs together, it doesn't make sense to me. An interface that connects via fire wire on the other hand would be able to transfer each individual input to its own track in your DAW (digital audio workstation).

why fire wire can do this and usb can't is beyond me. maybe someone could explain it to me.
 
Well I have an extra firewire port on the back.

So youre saying an interface would be better than a PCI card?
 
it all depends really, but its my personal opinion that you should go with firewire and heres why:
1). its capable of transfering multiple inputs two its own track
2). if it supports optical ins and outs you can expand your inputs via ADAT
3). generally firewire interfaces are very portable
4). fire wire interfaces are pretty much plug and play which alows you to switch between recording systems fairly easily

i would be mostly psyched about multi-tracking and adat expansion but to each his own.
 
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