Soundcards...

[D Double U]

Am i missing a trick here? Why do alot of people have soundcards what use are they to you if you are not recording from external insruments/mics etc...

 

[Prideinyouride]

The built in soundcards in computers are high latency, so when producing anything whether live instrument or soft synth in real time the sound will not be a direct and accurate representation of what actually being recorded/worked on. Plus normally the components are of a higher quality than a internal Soundcard thus providing better sound quality in general.

 

[D Double U]

I thought that latency would be the issue however...

What affect does this have between making the tune and bounce...are you saying that my experiance will differ after a bounce down from what ive been assesing the rest of the time?

 

[DJWhizzkidd]

Your souncard won't have any effect on a bounced track, However, cheap onboard sound will put out lower quality audio to your speakers than a decent sound card would, potentially affecting your ability to mix it right.

You can make tunes using onboad audio, just use ASIO4ALL drivers and there isn't any latency.

 

[D Double U]

Im using a macbook pro but tbh ive never looked at the s/c spec, kind just asumed it would be of grade...would never trusted a laptop s/c so would have bought one by now if i was still on win...

---------- Post added at 13:54 ---------- Previous post was at 13:50 ----------

Actually from just having a look at the mbp spec on apples site they dont even have a audio spec!!! Little worried now as I can reference on other speaker systems...

S/C recomendations

 

[Prideinyouride]

I got the Focusrite Safire. Great unit for the price. Not suitable for multiple instrument recordings.

 

[D Double U]

Would only want a mic in really...

 

[lostnthesound]

It's all about the preamps and the A/D to D/A conversion quality. A top end sound card will produce the most accurate playback in terms of audio fidelity (Digital to Analog conversion, or D/A). Likewise, a top end sound card will be able to record an instrument (guitar, bass, vocal, turntable) with better results (Analog to Digital conversion, or D/A).

Of course, the latency issue is key as well in that an internal sound card will always have increased latency as opposed to an independent sound card/audio interface.