Soundcards

Producer_GyaL

Producer_GyaL

IllMuzik First Lady
ill o.g.
Battle Points: 182
bthis!
bthat!
I got a quick question. I bought the Saffire soundcard from Focusrite. For some reasons, I feel hesitant about my choice. I was wondering if you guys had to choose, which soundcards would you go with for your PC ??

Saffire (focusrite)

410 firewire (M-audio)

1616m (E-MU)

1814 (E-MU)

Saffire pro10 (focusrite)

Firebox (Presonus)


Thank you guys for your help.. is it pretty needed..
PG
 
dahkter

dahkter

Ill Muzikoligist
ill o.g.
Battle Points: 4
Hey PG,

Is it for a Laptop or Desktop?

Me personally, I went with the Mackie Onyx 1220 with the free firewire card. I've had it a year and a half and love it.

A friend of mine just got a nice laptop and is also looking for recommendations, so interested to see what people have to say...
 
Chrono

Chrono

polyphonically beyond me
ill o.g.
Battle Points: 5
I use the 410 and love it. I also use m-powered protools for all my vocal recording which is a great environment to work in. But anything that would keep the output latency low would be ideal if your not plugging a "studio" into it. i get about 13ms at 512 samples with the 410 in Reason. hope this helped, take care ;)
 
AMG

AMG

God:Mind~Asiatic
ill o.g.
I have a Presonus Firebox...it's nice, but sometimes the latency is f'd up at times. Maybe cause I'm using it on a laptop. It doesn't have enough inputs for me as of now(I have 2 synths, 1k, and 2 mics). If plan on going with desktop/latop combo then a Firebox will do you fine. If a desktop only, I'd go with E-mu 1616M, because the 1820(not 1814) has been discontinued and may no longer be supported by E-MU.
 
Symphonic

Symphonic

Custom User Title
ill o.g.
is on the m-audio 1010LT the unbalanced rca a problem for noise recordings? And is balanced better?
 
Formant024

Formant024

Digital Smokerings
ill o.g.
no, unbalanced is better because it gives more headroom but also implicates you need balanced cables and gear with balanced I/O...but its worth it

what i dont understand is the arguments for picking a card? All i see is hearsay while in specs the emu has the best quality and performance, which also comes with some degree of understanding of an inline console/inline mixing. If you just work with a pc for beats then you got a good card and its ready to runn, if you got a lot of gear to hook up then the card will point out why its such a good card.

If you got just a pc and a mic in your set, then this will suffice more then plenty (PT HD3 converters 24/192 and 2 high-Z trs pre amps)...if you got none of that whatsoever, just a pc and wanting to make beats with software then just get a good card for monitoring like the 1212M and a good set of nearfields.
 
thedreampolice

thedreampolice

A backwards poet writes inverse.
ill o.g.
Battle Points: 21
bthis!
"unbalanced is better because it gives more headroom" Not true
http://www.harmony-central.com/articles/tips/balanced_vs_unbalanced/

"while in specs the emu has the best quality and performance" Numbers dont make a sound card better. Maudio has better AD/DA convertors and Drivers than EMU

Being able to run pro tools with Maudio stuff is also a big advantage.

"is on the m-audio 1010LT the unbalanced rca a problem for noise recordings"
no it sounds great, check out the songs on my site that I recorded for "fourth Time around" Every thing was recorded with a 1010lt http://www.chrisscheidies.com/?q=node/62

I have now switched to an 18/14 and its great as well.
 
Symphonic

Symphonic

Custom User Title
ill o.g.
Formant024 said:
no, unbalanced is better because it gives more headroom but also implicates you need balanced cables and gear with balanced I/O...but its worth it

what i dont understand is the arguments for picking a card? All i see is hearsay while in specs the emu has the best quality and performance, which also comes with some degree of understanding of an inline console/inline mixing. If you just work with a pc for beats then you got a good card and its ready to runn, if you got a lot of gear to hook up then the card will point out why its such a good card.

If you got just a pc and a mic in your set, then this will suffice more then plenty (PT HD3 converters 24/192 and 2 high-Z trs pre amps)...if you got none of that whatsoever, just a pc and wanting to make beats with software then just get a good card for monitoring like the 1212M and a good set of nearfields.
Click to expand...

It's for recording beats made on the mpc 1000, so i need at least 6 chanels + 2 for my mixer/turntable for scratches, i dont want to switch cables so that why i planned buying an 1010LT, so i can use it with protools.
 
Formant024

Formant024

Digital Smokerings
ill o.g.
oke, its not a neccesity to have your setup balanced, the point in the article where i can say is crap is the fact that balanced cables are good for long distances, like the ever so brilliant mogami would be great for 30feet cable (x24)x4+ signaling to patchbay I/Os and patch cords, i dont want that bill lol. We measured mogami, its best (outstanding) performance is a cable no less than 1m(3ft.) with goldplated neutrik, 2m is perfectly exceptable but not as hi classified as we thought. Anyway, the significance arrizes when you have a 24 chnl inline setup and trying to gain more headroom, we just overhauled our console for a balanced setup and switched from rme to motu. On the first test drive i noticed the sound wasnt that much louder but i did notice more detail in the sound. I dont think a bedroom techie would hear the difference, nor have the use for it as not many really use a lot of hardware unless you record bands or buy high end analogues.
 
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