Hi guys, I've been trying to hop on the external (USB) sound card bandwagon... and was wondering what can be done about the horrendous bandwidth issues I'm facing... i.e. unless I have the buffer set to some god-awful high setting, playing more than X tracks (a small number) or putting too much stress on audio engine causes drop-outs.

Maybe it's the particular "card" I'm using? I've currently just got an M-Audio Connectiv plugged into USB audio out.. and yeah, it's not doing a great job.

Will a firewire card completely fix this, or continue to have the same types of issues?

I'm running an i7/6gb/vista-64, so the drop-outs aren't CPU-hardware related... purely a sound-card thing.

Any insights? I want to get in with this external-sound-card thing..

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"You walked on this earth but you didn't leave a footstep..."

I don't have any issues with USB soundcards, I can live with 25-30ms latency on huge scale projects, it works well for me.

I did fry 2 firewire cards in the past, never going back to those, one jerk with the firewire cable at the contacts could be enough for the firewire chip to fry, and I'm too clumsy for that, I'll take USB anyday

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Bandwagon? What fucking bandwagon are you on? USB is NOT the way to go for digital audio converter inferaces ("Sound Cards"). Just go with an Audiophile 24/96 and shut the hell up.

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Ahahaha.. owned.. that made me laugh. Anyway, thanks.. I kind of agree as of lately, myself (and actually the Audiophile is something I've wanted to buy for ages now.. :P).

Kudos to prompt replies as always, folks.. thanks.
-g

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"You walked on this earth but you didn't leave a footstep..."

quote:

Originally posted by Tarpex I don't have any issues with USB soundcards, I can live with 25-30ms latency on huge scale projects, it works well for me. I did fry 2 firewire cards in the past, never going back to those, one jerk with the firewire cable at the contacts could be enough for the firewire chip to fry, and I'm too clumsy for that, I'll take USB anyday

Apparently only happens to poorly designed cards. RME fireface 400s are protected against this supposedly.

@ the OP, what sort of latency are we talking about as unacceptable? up to 1024 samples is pretty normal for larger projects, but you should be able to get it down to 512. Might be the card, but it could also be something else thats interfering with it, like another device on the USB buss, or something else running on the computer, USB driver etc.

I'm not an expert but don't write off your card straight away.

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Last edited by kitphillips on Aug-05-2009 at 09:06

Are you using the right ASIO driver?

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quote:

Originally posted by Lucidity Are you using the right ASIO driver?

Yeh. :P The M-Audio ASIO USB drivers, latest version off their site. I'd bet 512 samples would be fine--I was at 128, then 256, and that might have just beem too low for comfort. Actually, the M-Audio XPonent as a makeshift USB external soundcard performed much better than the M-Audio Conectiv (or it just seemed like that to me), so obviously there are better and worse, and I'm betting both aren't top-of-the-line for this purpose either..

Also, for the record, if the external card is used strictly for its ASIO (i.e. route Windows sounds, like YouTube, to the internal sound-card..) this kept a lot of unnecessary stress off it (as the Conectiv, for example, couldn't be doing both types of playback at once--at least using one output).


As far as USB bandwidth, I'm actually ok--only got an error once after having plugged in like 5 things :P ..so yeah, I guess all in all, it is what it is. Works fine, but really seems to be more of a laptop thing. Since I'm running a dedicated desktop DAW, I'm still of the opinion that internal sound would be more right-on for me.

Also, I hear ya about firewire not being so terrible.. but is it MUCH faster than USB? (In regards to, say, using 128 samples..)

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"You walked on this earth but you didn't leave a footstep..."

Firewire!

http://www.cwol.com/firewire/firewire-vs-usb.htm

Well all I can say is, I use a Focusrite Saffire, which is firewire, I can get it to 5ms latency if needed for recording vocals with no hiccups, but, for huge projects with many many tracks, the highest I need to go is 10ms latency. As for samples i don't know, since, when configuring my latency, it only shows in milliseconds. But, I know, that for me could even work somewhat comfortablly at 20 ms, but my interface works comfortabally at 10ms, my point anyway is that, Saffire is firewire and I have zero problems, and I love it, don't think I would ever go to USB. Just my opinion. :-)

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quote:

Originally posted by Lucidity Well all I can say is, I use a Focusrite Saffire, which is firewire, I can get it to 5ms latency if needed for recording vocals with no hiccups, but, for huge projects with many many tracks, the highest I need to go is 10ms latency. As for samples i don't know, since, when configuring my latency, it only shows in milliseconds. But, I know, that for me could even work somewhat comfortablly at 20 ms, but my interface works comfortabally at 10ms, my point anyway is that, Saffire is firewire and I have zero problems, and I love it, don't think I would ever go to USB. Just my opinion. :-)

10 ms = 512 samples

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