I use an EMU1820 and 1820m on another computer. dont know about the 1616m but i guess is pretty much the same with less inputs and outputs.

The converters are very very nice I love them so much. I wouldnt change my soundcard/interfase its so good and easy.

the patchbay software for them is very nice you can config a lot of things there like sample rate, I/O s routing.
I get about 2.05ms latency (in) and 1.4 (out)

theonly thing i didnt like when i got it was that it took me a while to figure out how to route my ins and outs hahahaha but its not really hard at all.

The ASIO panel es very user friendly very simple.

The MBOX in the other hand. I dont like it that much I think its way to expensive for what it is. I would look for motu or rme .

Mbox vs E-MU 1616/1616M is not a direct comparison. If you want or need Protools, then you are limited and forced into only a few choices. I own and use the E-MU 1616M and find it to be a very high quality digital audio interface and to be a fantastic value for the money. Not many products are like that these days.

i've been using the 1616 for a few months now, and haven't had any kind of problems with it. the software bundle it comes with is very capable of doing the job it sounds like you're looking for.

the pcmcia card has the hardware effects built into the card and can help quite tremendously if you're trying to put effects through the software.

one of the best parts is the adat connection; if you want later on you can hook of a string of pres through that.

go with emu. the mbox2 only uses usb 1.1, which is really pretty bad for latency.

oops, didn't see the date. he probably won't read this.