Stereo Line Input - Do all new sound cards have it?

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spindlej

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Ok, I am a noob and forgive me for my ignorance.

My Goal: Record Tapes and CDs (in Stereo) to PC, then burn to CDR.

I have a machine that has onboard sound. The MB is old (1998) and the line input is not stereo (or at least I don't think it is).

I have a vestax mixer, and a RCA - 1/8 converter to get the sound into the line input on the MB. I am fairly sure that the converter supports stereo so I assume that the line input on the MB doesn't as you don't hear a difference between left and right speakers.

I have Cool Edit 2000 and want to record some tapes and records I have, so that I can burn them to CDR.

Now my question is this: Do all new sound cards have stereo line input? Also, is there a way I can check to see if older cards have stereo line input or if my onboard sound has stereo line input? I don't need supreme sound quality when recording and therefore am looking to spend less than $50 on a PCI sound card, unless somehow I can get stereo input with my onboard sound.

Can anyone offer some suggestions?

Thanks!
 
im gonna guess your line in is stereo....

take 2 tracks from your mixer and send them to the soundcard but pan them hard left and hard right......make sure the 1/8" plug that you are going into the sound card with is a stereo plug..........
 
Ok, I will have to try that when I get home. Now as far as the converter, I was told if it had two lines on the connector, that means it's stereo, one line is mono. I bought it at Radio Shack (I know) a while back. Do you know if this is correct?

See the attached pic for illustration.
 

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The top pic is a stereo to mono converter. the bottom is a stereo ADAPTER, The mini phone plug on the right is a TRS connector. (Tip-Ring-Sleeve)
 
So if I find out that I am still not getting stereo line input, what should I look for in a new adaptor?

Is finding one that says "Stereo" good enough, or do I need to worry about the TRS side?

The last time I checked my adaptor at home, it had two lines and looked the the picture on the bottom, however it wasn't gold plated.

Thanks for all your help everyone!
 
Use your stereo adapter and try feeding audio into just one and then just the other RCA jack. If, in either case, you get sound out of both speakers, you have a mono sound card.
 
Gidge & Derek,
Thank you both for your help. I must not have realized it, but the line input is stereo and all is working great. At some point I thought that I wasn't recording in stereo; maybe I was hooked up to the mic input.

Regardless, thanks again for your help! I am off to record my stuff.
 
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