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Advantages to upgrading to a better soundcard?
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| Magnus |
I've been using the Audiophile 2496 for a couple of years now. Its a basic entry level card that runs about 80-90 bucks. There are plenty of better, more expensive soundcards out there so I'm wondering would an upgrade really benefit me and if so, in what way? Does better circuitry and higher quality components equal better sound? What is the advantage to moving up to a better card?
Thanks in advance! |
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| cryophonik |
| Are you recording, or just using your soundcard to monitor? |
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| dannib |
Advantages:
There will be benefits whether you are using the card to record/route otb to hardware fx and processors or whether you are just using it to monitor through the DA converters.
If you are using it just to monitor, upgrading could result in better stereo imaging, clarity and seperation of the sound.
You probably wont hear a massive difference in quality though unless you have a good acoustically treated room and good monitoring. What converters are you thinking of upgrading to? You probably wont hear a huge difference unless you upgrade to at least mid level converters such as RME or apogee. You will notice a huge difference (depending on your monitoring) if you upgrade to high end converters (mytek, lavry, prism, cranesong etc)
The benefits are going to be a lot bigger if you are recording and using outboard fx. The signal is often degraded a lot more when sending a signal back and forth through the AD/DA converters of a lower quality converter. |
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| DJ RANN |
| quote: | Originally posted by Magnus
I've been using the Audiophile 2496 for a couple of years now. Its a basic entry level card that runs about 80-90 bucks. There are plenty of better, more expensive soundcards out there so I'm wondering would an upgrade really benefit me and if so, in what way? Does better circuitry and higher quality components equal better sound? What is the advantage to moving up to a better card?
Thanks in advance! |
I used that same card for years and it was a reliable good sounding piece of kit - probably on of the best value soundcards ever made.
As Danni said, You won't be able to take advantage of the better quality DAC's in a superior soundcard unless the other factors are complimentary of it.
The most important factor is what monitors you use. If they are entry level of very basic then don't bother - you will not hear the difference. If they are decent to good (such as mackie HR 824s, Genelecs, Focals, K&H, upper range Yamaha's, Quested, etc.) then it's worth thinking about a better soundcard.
After that, other considerations come in to play - room treatment, audio cables used, proper listening position, etc.
If you're serious about it and at some point can get round to these considerations as well, then do it.
Apogee($$$$), Motu($$) and RME ($$$) are all worthy brands but it really is a case of YGWYPF. |
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| Magnus |
Thanks for the responses. Dannib that is very informative. I'm doing no recording at this point and just using it for monitoring. So your line there that says:
"If you are using it just to monitor, upgrading could result in better stereo imaging, clarity and seperation of the sound."
That is sort of what I was looking for. Please forgive me but when you ask what converters I'm thinking of upgrading to, do you mean what type of soundcard I'm looking to upgrade? Or do you outboard FX such as hardware reverbs and compressors and things of that nature? I'm possibly using the wrong terms as I don't have a lot of gear knowledge.
Do you have some recommendations? I'm using a PC so the Apogee would be out as that is Mac only I believe. Thanks in advance! |
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| dannib |
Magnus,
Yes i mean the soundcard.
A/D and D/A (analogue to digital and digital to analogue) converters are a very important part of the propfessional studio. DA works to try and give a completely true representation of the audio that is being played from a digital medium (storage device) through an analogue one (monitor speakers in your case).
First you need to understand AD conversion:
To be able to re-produce audio in a digital form, the analogue audio signal is passed through an analogue to digital converter (A/D) which involves the process of converting the analogue (varying voltage) signal into a number of samples which are sampled at a rate of thousands of times per second to reproduce an accurate digital form of the original analogue signal. These samples are represented by a number of binary numbers (zeros and ones).
Every time the waveform is measured (several timer per second) a binary number (zeros and ones) as mentioned above is created. These numbers represent the voltage of the waveform at the time it is measured. This process is described as quantization. The binary numbers are called bits, which is short for binary digit.
At this point, the binary numbers are stored magnetically onto disk. This process is known as coding or channel coding. The signal at this point is in a full digital format.
After the analogue signal is converted to a digital form as described above, it is then possible to reproduce this digital signal and convert it back into an analogue signal. This process is called D/A conversion (digital to analogue conversion). This is a process of converting the binary numbers back into an analogue signal made up of voltage steps. At this point, the signal is then passed through another filter called an anti-imaging filter which smoothes the rugged steps in the signal, resulting in the original analogue signal.
Different devices can reproduce and convert digital audio with different results, depending on the quality of the A/D and D/A converters. This conversion also relates to what bit-depth you are using.
The bit-depth relates to the binary numbers as described above, and results in the fact that the higher the bit-depth, the more accurate each measurement will be sampled. The higher the bit-depth, the less chance you have of the digital audio signal distorting. This is simply because it is being sampled more accurately, thus giving more headroom.
So you can see why converters are so important, especially to professional recording studios.
I hope that helps. I just felt like giving out some useful information. |
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| Magnus |
| Dannib, a humongous thank you for such an informative and helpful post. Your detailed explanation makes everything much clearer. :) DJ RANN thanks for those links I will check them out. |
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| Magnus |
So after reading those threads and doing some research online, I was thinking of deciding between the following since I'm on a PC:
1. Emu 0404 USB 2.0 Audio/MIDI Interface
2. Focusrite Saffire
3. MOTU UltraLite-MK3
Which would you recommend? I looked at the RME Fireface 400 and 800 but they are just way too expensive for me at this point in my life.
Thanks! |
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| DJ RANN |
| quote: | Originally posted by Magnus
So after reading those threads and doing some research online, I was thinking of deciding between the following since I'm on a PC:
1. Emu 0404 USB 2.0 Audio/MIDI Interface
2. Focusrite Saffire
3. MOTU UltraLite-MK3
Which would you recommend? I looked at the RME Fireface 400 and 800 but they are just way too expensive for me at this point in my life.
Thanks! |
The RME's while really good are just out of most people's budget (including mine).
I actually used to provide tech support for all these brands.....
Stay away from the EMU cards - I don't think they are really any better in terms of quality that the M-audio and I have personally seen an EMU 1212 card catch fire while in someones computer.
The focusrite is decent but again, I'm not sure how much of a step up it is. Focusrite make good kit, the saffire is fine, but not amazing - I know several people who use them without any problems but IMO, the motu offers the best quality, stability and plenty of connectivity for the price. I think out those three the Motu wins on all fronts.
Hope this helps. |
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