Advice on sound card

[Monkey Allen]

Please help me...

I want to purchase a new soundcard. I can spend around $500-600 Australian.

I woud use it for recording one track at a time. Acoustic guitar, then overdubs, then vocals. All one at a time though.

I don't want to buy anything in the Creative range. I want to get something more professional if I can.

It would need to have directx.
I would be connecting from a mic200 preamp (mono) via xlr I guess preferably.

Can anyone give me some suggestions?

thanks

 

[Tifstorey]

Might want to check out the M Audio range. If your only going to be recording 1 track at a time, then i doubt youll need to spend $500-$600 (although i dont really know the conversion rate on australian). Anyhow, have a look at the audiophile 24/96, i know many people that swear by it!

Heres a link: http://www.dv247.com/invt/2062

 

[apl]

The Presonus Firebox is about US$400. Or an Echo Layla.

 

[Rokket]

Here is my standard answer:

I will give you a couple links to what musician's friends has to offer (on some of these, you can search other companies and find them even cheaper):

PCI

USB

Firewire

 

[Tifstorey]

The Presonus Firebox is about US$400.

Forgot about this one! I use this myself, and its great! If you can afford this one, i say get it!

 

[Monkey Allen]

Yeah, does it have XLR? I had a quick look and it doesn't seem to.

What is the latency like on them?

Do the M-Audio series support directX?

Or for that matter, do any of the more professional soundcards support directX?

 

[Tifstorey]

The Firebox does have XLR, 2 actually. Has phantom power and has very good pres. Ive not had any issue with latency so no need to worry about that.

 

[Monkey Allen]

If the card itself has preamp, do you need to use an external preamp, or are preamps on pro cards enough?

 

[Tifstorey]

It all depends on the card itself, but the pres on the firebox are great. ive never had to use my external pre. Like i said, i cant speak for all cards, this is just the firebox that im talking about.

 

[Monkey Allen]

I heard the M-Audio 2496 does not have XLR connectivity. And I also heard it has no headphone jacks...this sounds a bit odd to me...about the jacks...I mean, where does the sound come out? Does it have line outs for connection to speakers instead?

 

[Tifstorey]

The connections on the audiophile are RCA. So you would need to invest in either some RCA>Jack or XLR leads, or buy some RCA>Jack adapters. Simple enough to get hold of, just something you need to think about before you purchase it. nothing worse than buying a new toy and not be able to use it because your missing something!!!

 

[Doe Diggla]

Is Sound Blaster Live a good sound card for audio recording? its only $40. Do i need a more expensive card,like a Sound Blaster Audigy 2 NS Platinum it cost $189?

 

[Kevin Deschwazi]

The SB cards are made for gaming. Not really suitable for recording at all.

Try the soundcard selector:

http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/?page=shop/soundcard_selector

 

[Monkey Allen]

Are the more pro audio cards bad for gaming? In what way are they bad for gaming? Is it because they dont have headphones out? Or is it because they dont support direct X? Or is it because they don't feature 5.1/7.1 surround sound that people like for their speaker sound gaming?

In what way are they bad for games? I mean, surely they pump out nice sound...so what's so bad about that for games?

 

[Tifstorey]

Theyre not bad for gaming at all, what Kevin was saying is the SB cards are bad for recording. Nothing at all about using pro soundcards for gaming.

 

[Monkey Allen]

Oh, ok, cool. I wouldn't have thought the pro soundcards would be bad for games.

Do they generally have a headphone jack though?

 

[Kevin Deschwazi]

Oh, ok, cool. I wouldn't have thought the pro soundcards would be bad for games.

Do they generally have a headphone jack though?

Yeah, I've never used my PC for gaming so i wouldn't know about that (I'm a console guy).

The only recording soundcards I've seen with headphone outs have had some sort of interface with preamps and other bells and whistles. The regular PCI cards like the M Audio delta range just have line outs on unbalanced RCA or balanced 1/4" jacks. The best thing for headphone monitoring is a small mixer which will probably give you a couple of extra pres as well and Aux sends/returns so you can put a bit of outboard verb on a vocal overdub. I find this really useful as most singers prefer a bit of reverb in their monitor mix but you'll actually be recording dry and can add verb at mixdown if needed.

Or you could always just get a headphone amp.

 

[Monkey Allen]

What's to say I couldn't just plug my headphones into the line out jacks?

Is there anything inherently wrong with that? Am I going to blow something up?