seems like not many people know much about achieving high quality audio, I put up a similar post in the production forum. Here's what I think though.. there is no point in getting a good sound card (eg. audigy), that is 24 bits, when it only records in 16, and burns to CD's in 16. SO, this means the only good point about expensive sound cards is that they have gold plated rca's. So, if you don't want to buy an $$$ card, just hook all your gear up with gold plated cords, and short ones too, the longer they are, the higher quality loss risk. Then convert at the very end back to mini. This should, in theory be almost as good. the only problem is that the mini aux on the sound card isn't gold plated, but deal with it. It's either u spend $300+ or a few bucks on wires, and settle for a sound quality difference that is almost beyond human hearing.

I agree you don't need 32 bit 96 khz recordings unless you have a recording studio, but there are more differences between cheapo cards and...better...cards. From my own experience: noise, sound coloring and DC-offset. I'd say the gold stuff isn't a necessity either, using mini-jacks with a minijack-to-RCA cable works fine for me (i.e. with acceptable s/n ratio etc)

Terratec seems to be a good choice, I have Terratec maestro card (without RCA connections, but miniJack) and this works fine for me.

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Gold plated plugs won't matter really at all. If you have a good mixer and good TTs / CDJs, it'll make a difference. Send an output signal from your mixer to your sound card with a converter to convert from whatever your mixer is into 1/8" minijack. Your soundcard WILL make a difference. Soundcards by Creative Labs or onboard cards are on the low quality side. These sound cards are good:
Turtle Beach 'Santa Cruz'
Philips 'Acoustic Edge' / 'Seismic Edge' / "Rhythmic Edge'
and anything that is a professinal sound card (ie: not sold in a regular computer store).. such as the Terratec.

Get a good program to save it to .wav format... like soundforge or total recorder should to it well. If you need to do any editing to the mix, do it now while it's in .wav format. If you need to compress it to mp3 for storage or transferring... use a program called LAME. It is basically the best mp3 encoder available (get the latest version you can.. i think its 1.92, not sure though).

OK, thanks, I know about the WAV and MP3 stuff because I've modified .WAV's before, as well as encoded MP3's.

What price range am I looking at for a decent sound card?

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Terratec EWX 24/96 is about 200$ and comes with RCA inputs.
Terratec XFire 1024 is 65$. Has digital in/out. They have good s/n ratio.
http://www.terratec.com for more info..

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RetroActive 4

The Acoustic Edge (which I have) I got for $90 OEM in Canada... so that is about $55 in the US if you can find a good shop. The Santa Cruz will be about $80 US retail. I think you can buy the Santa Cruz online from www.dell.com in the parts section, for a good price.

why wouldnt gold plated wires/connectors help? It gets a cleaner signal, and that's why most of sound cards meant for recording have them.. But anyways, the Terratec EWX 24/96 looks good. Does anyone know about the midiman series of sound cards? They look crazy, but most are very expensive $600+

Hi guys. I agree with the guys about buying a good card. I also agree gold plated connections are a bit of a joke. Sure they conduct better than silver or nickel (what normal RCAs are plated with) but gold actaully is a WORSE conductor than copper (what the wires inside are made of). Also you must consider how thin the plating is. bear in mind their not solid gold. The main use of gold is because it doesn't corrode easily like other metals hence the use in car audio apllications. When plugs get corroded that really stuffs up the contact.

Finally look at your 1200s. The plugs aren't gold plated are they?

Conduction is not the main problem with audio - its noise, electrical noise. Good thick leads stop this outside your computer, but inside the pc electrical noise is a SHOCKER. Professional type soundcards do a better job at keeping this away from your music.

Also RCAs on the back are a good idea for what is known as channel separtion. In an dual RCA lead you have a shield on each wire, in a 3.5MM stereo plug on your souncard the ground is shared and can cause "crosstalk" signal from left inducing noise in the right etc.

I hope this has been some help.
Ben.

quote:

Originally posted by MR-MTEC Also RCAs on the back are a good idea for what is known as channel separtion. In an dual RCA lead you have a shield on each wire, in a 3.5MM stereo plug on your souncard the ground is shared and can cause "crosstalk" signal from left inducing noise in the right etc. I hope this has been some help. Ben.

hmm I'm using a stereo plug thanks for reminding me!

Ok, I see your point with the gold plated plugs, But,, when I hook up my mixer to my amp, using a regular RCA all I get it pure static and junk noises.. when I hook it up with a gold plated RCA, everything is fine. I don't know why on earth this happens.. but it seems gold plated does make a HUGE differnce here.

Check out www.m-audio.com for information on good professional sound cards.