Ste69 Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 I am thinking about getting an external sound card for my laptop as the built in sound card is pretty rubbish to put it nicely. I was wondering what the best economy one would be? I was wondering whether to get either a good USB one or a cheap firewire one, any suggestions?
david.elsbury Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 Yes IMO they are worth it though I have no suggestions as to what to get, firstly as I'm in NZ and secondly I picked up the last few from work (Dick Smith Electronics, similar to Maplins) and they were our own branded ones with the Audimax chip. Or you could do what I'm going to do, which is to build a toridal transformer based supply for the lappy... thus eliminating the nasty switchmode psu cr@p. But that's going to cost me around $NZ400 I think.... beats running the lappy on battery however. David Edit: do a quick search- I'm sure we have discussed this sort of thing before. Edirol and M-Audio etc...
Jivemaster Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 Please also consider a USB mixer. There are several Behringer and Numark ones and no doubt others. Really it depends what you want from the finished assembly.
Andrew C Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 But that's going to cost me around $NZ400 I think....Jeeez! How much? Or is a $NZ worth about a farthing?
Ste69 Posted April 28, 2007 Author Posted April 28, 2007 I have a mixer and stuff, I just want to be able to record it in good quality.
david.elsbury Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 That's what I priced it at... a half decent toroid transformer is quite expensive, 19v @ 5amps/100watts. Then a road-worthy case and the rest of the bits.
Ben Langfeld Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 Please also consider a USB mixer. There are several Behringer and Numark ones and no doubt others. Really it depends what you want from the finished assembly. Note that Behringer don't make a USB mixer.
camerongp Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 I am thinking about getting an external sound card for my laptop as the built in sound card is pretty rubbish to put it nicely. I was wondering what the best economy one would be? I was wondering whether to get either a good USB one or a cheap firewire one, any suggestions? £130 probably isnt what you'd call economy. but the EDIROL UA-25's are nice little usb audio interfaces. theyv got midi in/out, phono out, 1/4" jacks out, and 2 jack/XLR inputs depends on how much you can spend, and how much you actually need to use the device for. but if I had £130 id go for one of these. :)
paulears Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 If you recognise the fact that the internal card is sonically not up to it, then I'd suggest you don't try to skimp on price - as virtually all the external audio D/As are designed to be better quality devices. The biggest difference is the quality of the mic pre-amps and many have switchable phantom power - the Edirols are quite good, as said. A hunt around the SOS website will pay dividends, info wise.
peternewman Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 Note that Behringer don't make a USB mixer.That's not entirely true, they do the Xenyx range of mixers, some of which include a free interface, as well as a selection of more general audio interfaces.
Ben Langfeld Posted April 28, 2007 Posted April 28, 2007 Note that Behringer don't make a USB mixer.That's not entirely true, they do the Xenyx range of mixers, some of which include a free interface, as well as a selection of more general audio interfaces. A USB interface isn't a USB mixer though. The UCA200 is a completely separate piece of hardware which takes an unbalanced line input. You can buy them for £22 on their own.
jamesperrett Posted April 29, 2007 Posted April 29, 2007 I can recommend the M-Audio Mobile Pre as being better than all the internal laptop soundcards that I've heard. It won't solve any ground loop problems as it isn't isolated from the laptops power supply but it sounds fine for most things. Cheers James.
paulears Posted April 29, 2007 Posted April 29, 2007 We're getting a bit confused here. The OP wants to get decent audio in and out of his laptop - a discrete unit - the M-Audios, Behringer xenyx mixers, Edirols etc all do this function. They have different facilities and are designed to do the job. If the op just wants audio in/out or mix facilities there is plenty of choice.
robloxley Posted April 29, 2007 Posted April 29, 2007 I bought an external USB soundcard for my new dell as the on-board sound is horrendously noisy. Unfortunately I went for the Creative, which was pretty much money down the pan as it's barely any quieter!
Ste69 Posted April 29, 2007 Author Posted April 29, 2007 I bought an external USB soundcard for my new dell as the on-board sound is horrendously noisy. Unfortunately I went for the Creative, which was pretty much money down the pan as it's barely any quieter! Suppose that's due to the fact that creative are more computer hardware manufacturers rather than audio experts. Will bear that in mind. Thanks
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.