After reading that S-word like fifty times I can't type it.
But _they_ are multimedia cards. For playing sound while you watch a movie...
Awesome for playing sound.

I'm not 100% sure but I think that thing you're getting that you call a preamp might be an external sound card already... Just guessing though.

I am confused - I don't believe the Art MP w/ USB is a soundcard. It is just a amplifer with limter from my understanding.

Here is a link to it.
http://www.bswusa.com/proditem.asp?item=TUBEMPPS-USB

the main website is:
http://www.artproaudio.com/products.asp?id=124&cat=1&type=79

Perhaps I am mistaken. either way then what is the recommended soundcard, or would I need 2 soundcards - 1 for playback and 1 for recording. I could do that if the recording one was PCI but again I prefer to have only 1 soundcard.

Thanks,

Blake

PS. SOUNDBLASTER - LOL

Fair call.

BKStoltman wrote: I am confused - I don't believe the Art MP w/ USB is a soundcard. It is just a amplifer with limter from my understanding...

From a description on musicians friend :

USB
USB (Universal Serial Bus) is a common hardware interface used for quick and easy connection of peripherals like the ART USB TUBE MP. The TUBE MP features a single Type B USB peripheral connector on the rear panel for outputting audio over USB to your computer. One of the nice features of USB is its Hot Swapping capability, allowing the Tube MP to be connected and disconnected without turning your computer off. The ART USB TUBE MP is fully USB 1.1 compliant, operating under Windows 98SE or newer, and Mac OS 9.1 or newer.

It looks like it will get audio to your computer, but I don't see any of the vitals on the A to D such as SNR, harmonic distortion, sample rate, bit depth etc.

For pod casting, and not multi-tracking, that SB you have will work, but if you ever want to do multi-track recording your cards will need to be in sync. Check out what M-Audio has. They are great entry level cards.

I would have said something similar but I use this.
http://www.roland.com/products/en/ua-25/
Not 5.1 but cheap and useful. And hey, it's not USB2.0 as I say.

Intense times.

Hmm....M-Audio Delta 1010LT has plenty of capacity for inputs, is about $250 and uses a PCI slot. I'd opt for that.

BKStoltman wrote: I currently have an older Soundblaster Audigy 2. Next month or so I am going to invest in a new soundcard. What do I use it for. I have 5.1 Audio system hooked up to my computer - a Logitech Z5500 digital. I play games here and there, but as many of you know am now going to be dabbling in recording for podcasting.
I need the card to be vista compatible, and would prefer PCI-E. I love to listen to music, play games, and soon to add record with my computer.

Several things. You want it for surround sound for your video games through, probably, lousy speakers. Those speakers will do nothing to improve your sound. But, if it's just games and podcasting...may be OK. It doesn't sound like you want anything approaching "professional quality" sound, or you wouldn't have a music computer with games.

Do any of your video games use MIDI information? If so, an audio interface without MIDI-playback capabilities may not be right for you. You'll want a MIDI-capable soundcard. By that, I mean the means to play back MIDI with built-in sounds, or loaded samples. Or, software that will let you play MIDI Soundfonts or something through anything. I forget what that is.

The 'soundcard" will also need to be capable of running those 5.1 speakers, so depending on how those are configured, you'll need to check into that, if you intend to use them.

The "recording problem" with SB is that they just kind of suck, compared to a better quality digital audio interface. I still use one for MIDI Soundfonts on my MIDI computer, and it's OK for what I do with it. I don't record audio into it, though. I have another computer for that.

Kapt.Krunch

The Delta 1010LT is a nice card for multi-track recording. You can have up to 4 in your system and sync them all.

Before my Delta 1010LT I used SB cards for multi tracking, and learned quickly why it wasn't a good idea. I was using 3 stereo cards for 6 inputs. At first everything sounded fine, but after recording for a few minutes, there was a noticeably delay from card to card. The snare drum microphone was no longer in sync with the overhead drum microphone. My understanding is that this is because the oscillators on my 3 SB cards are all running at a different speed simply because tolerances of the parts used. One could be at 44101, the other at 44099, or something like that. In the end I had to do a lot of stretching audio to get them to line back up, and that introduces sample artifacts. There were also glitches where the software tried to correct the issue by rejecting some of the samples every 5 minutes to realign the incoming digital data.

Kapt.Krunch, You are right that the Delta 1010LT cannot do surround sound, so it is probably not a good fit for BKStoltman.

Do you think it would conflict in my system, if I were to purchase the new Soundblaster Titanium which is a PCI-E card and use it exclusively for gaming & music playback & DVD playback. And then install a M-Audio card of some form in the PCI slot and use that for Recording - or do you think windows would be a pain in the butt about it.

Thanks,

Blake

PS - I checked out the Hammerfall soundcards - Dang those are nice looking (and expensive.) - LOL

GeckoMusic wrote:
Kapt.Krunch, You are right that the Delta 1010LT cannot do surround sound, so it is probably not a good fit for BKStoltman.

I didn't read where the Kapt said the 1010 cannot do surround sound.

As another note of interest, it can.

I don't see why 2 soundcards wouldn't work. Unless of course you're running Vista. I've done it before in XP, although I haven't used both at the same time.

I think I currently have 3 cards running at the same time, although I don't think I've ever used all 3 at once........

Space wrote: [quote=GeckoMusic]
Kapt.Krunch, You are right that the Delta 1010LT cannot do surround sound, so it is probably not a good fit for BKStoltman.

I didn't read where the Kapt said the 1010 cannot do surround sound.

As another note of interest, it can.

Thanks for the clarification Space. You are right, Kapt.Krunch did not say anything specifically about the delta 1010LT. I miss spoke. I was trying to say that the 1010LT would not fit the bill of:

The 'soundcard" will also need to be capable of running those 5.1 speakers

[which I am probably wrong about but...]

I have a delta 1010LT, but I have not dabbled much in surround sound. The delta 1010LT does have a "bass management" section for surround sound that allows you to align the phase of the channels for the sub woofer, but I can't figure out how to get the analog channels to output each speaker on a different channel. It has plenty of channels for that. I think you still need a 5.1 receiver to do that. I had an SB card that had connections for the satellite speakers.

So really all I wanted to say is that a multimedia card may be better for surround sound than one made for multi track recording.

MAudio 1010 LT...

Space wrote: [quote=GeckoMusic]
Kapt.Krunch, You are right that the Delta 1010LT cannot do surround sound, so it is probably not a good fit for BKStoltman.

I didn't read where the Kapt said the 1010 cannot do surround sound.

As another note of interest, it can.

It may be able to do 5.1 if you have a DAW capable of 5.1 but if you're watching a movie or playing a game, I think you are SOL. Also AFAIK they have yet to produce a PCI-E version of these cards. edit: they are in fact compliant to PCI-X now.

I'd have to go with the multiple cards idea. In fact I would probably get a USB or Firewire interface. Since all you're doing is podcasts, you likely don't need more than one or two inputs anyway.