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low latency usb sound card?
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| movingincircles |
im about to buy audigy 2 usb from ebay without research, is this good for my notebook?
I just need something to monitor with, or I can use this audigy 2 for output and use my laptop sound as a monitor through headphones
Is this a good low latency usb sound? |
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| Doctor-No |
| If it supports the USB2 or Firewire standard i would go whit that, USB channel is just too damn slow. |
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| tvmann |
| I have an Echo Indigo DJ card - plugs into cardslot - 2 stereo outputs but no inputs. Works fine and no USB cable, I leave it plugged in all the time. Latency I usually run is 12 msec but 6 and 3 msec also can be used but that's pushing it to the limit (Traktor 2.53, 2.8 GHz P4 laptop). |
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| Vero |
| quote: | Originally posted by movingincircles
im about to buy audigy 2 usb from ebay without research, is this good for my notebook?
I just need something to monitor with, or I can use this audigy 2 for output and use my laptop sound as a monitor through headphones
Is this a good low latency usb sound? |
NO NO NO!!!!
stay away from the audigy.
USB and USB 2.0 make absolutly no difference when it comes to audio. it works like this: USB 1, 1.1, and 2.0 all have the same bandwidth. USB is faster when it comes to bit for bit transfer because it uses a higher compression rate. firewire on the otherhand has a much higher bandwidth than ANY USB format. think of it like this.
USB1=A 2 lane road with a speed limit of 40 MPH
USB2=A 2 lane road with a speed limit of 60 MPH
Firewire=A 4 lane road with a speed limit of 50 MPH
now a sinlge car will travel the fastest on the USB2 road, but in rush hour traffic (aka your live HD audio) the firewire road will be able to accomodate this the best. this is LATENCY.
this is why no audio interfaces (not soundcards) bother wasting ink printing USB 2.0, cuz it really doesnt matter. as far as the audigy, these cards are designed for gaming and multimedia, if you want something designed for professional audio, look into the M-audio USB interfaces. go firewire if you can.
the echo cards mentioned above are nice too, but anything PCMCIA should beable to support: TRUE ZERO LATENCY, which the echo cards to not. |
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| movingincircles |
| how about pcmcia audigy? |
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| Vero |
| quote: | Originally posted by movingincircles
how about pcmcia audigy? |
probably much better than USB, try and find the latency on it. Under 10ms is pretty good. |
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| tvmann |
There is no such thing as "true zero latency". The latency is determined by the number of samples in the buffer used by the sound card. No sound card has zero latency because that means no samples in the buffer.
At 44 KHz or 44,000 samples per second here is how it works:
512 samples = 11.6 msec latency
256 samples = 5.8 msec latency
128 samples = 2.9 msec latency
You really can't have zero latency since you need a certain number of samples in the sound card buffer.
The actual minimum latency you can set your card to depends on several factors - type of music software you are using, CPU speed, system load, memory & bus speeds, driver efficiency etc.
Depending on the music software being used, there may be no need for a low latency. Some software works fine with latencies as high as 100 msec.
| quote: | Originally posted by Vero
the echo cards mentioned above are nice too, but anything PCMCIA should beable to support: TRUE ZERO LATENCY, which the echo cards to not. |
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| movingincircles |
well with my current laptop, I was screwing around in ableton live, and there are these huge delays from what i was doing and what sound came out through the speakers.
I wanted an usb audigy since I can easily use it both on my laptop and pc, but I'm not sure what to get.
can anyone recommend a cheap product for my laptop (low latency, either usb or pcmcia). |
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| Vero |
| quote: | Originally posted by tvmann
There is no such thing as "true zero latency". The latency is determined by the number of samples in the buffer used by the sound card. No sound card has zero latency because that means no samples in the buffer.
At 44 KHz or 44,000 samples per second here is how it works:
512 samples = 11.6 msec latency
256 samples = 5.8 msec latency
128 samples = 2.9 msec latency
You really can't have zero latency since you need a certain number of samples in the sound card buffer.
The actual minimum latency you can set your card to depends on several factors - type of music software you are using, CPU speed, system load, memory & bus speeds, driver efficiency etc.
Depending on the music software being used, there may be no need for a low latency. Some software works fine with latencies as high as 100 msec. |
sorry bro, but zero latency harware monitoring does exist. check out the EMU 1616, and the Delta 1010 from m-audio. as well as all the digidesign HD and TDM systems. |
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| Zild |
| Check out the Maya44 USB. It isn't an EMU, but it won't cost near as much either. |
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| SpecRadio |
Just go all out and buy a EMU 1820m :crazy:
Have 0 latency :wtf: |
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