Sound Card Question

I have a Realtek AC97 Audio Driver. Is this good enough for Sonar Home Studio 6 XL?

Short answer..no. It's a soundchip on the motherboard, OK for playing back CD's, MP3's etc, but no good for recording. The sound is average at best, and the latency can be terrible.

I had one to start with, traded up to an M-Audio 24/96, excellent sound and cheap too. (about £60/$100)

either the m-audio 24/96 or the emu 0404 are the best starter cards, also echo miamidi. m-audio is perhaps getting a bit long in toooth but is reliable. echo has excellent converters, emu also has great converters and the best software bundle. stay away from soundblaster/audigy if you can. see Beagle's soundcard page (just search Beagle in this forum until you find a link, or he'll prob be along in a bit to give it himself!!)

That's what I'm running on GT3. The sound quality isn't that bad. If you run the ASIO drivers it probably will work for you. If Sonar is as inefficient code in it as GT3, then you won't be able to apply real time effect without horrible horrible latency. Otherwise it works just fine on GT3. I will admit I don't have Sonar so I can't tell you how it will precisely work there.

???????????????????????????????Sonar inefficient code or s@*t soundcard???????????????? wonder what everyone with sonar/hs will think, hmmm.....
Thanks for the *help*

Mark - don't feed the trolls.

sorry. but the guy has got 330 posts...somewhere....

Sorry I don't know too mcuih but what is an analog input? thanks

The audio inputs are the little 1/8" stereo jacks on the back of your computer (using a realtek AC97). They are usually marked "mic" or "line". The mic level has a cheesy preamp associated with it, whereas the line level does not. If I'm correct, you have 3 of these jacks. The BLUE one is "line in", the GREEN one is "line out", and the RED one is "mic". A better soundcard has more/fancier inputs and outputs, but yours should work well enough to get you tinkering around. I used an old Soundblaster SB Live card (with associated Y-cables and adapters) for quite some time while learning about "computer recording". I believe it's usually better to outgrow the gear that can "get the job done", rather than spend wads of cash before being comfortable with the processes involved. A decent soundcard is, however, IMO, a mandatory upgrade for acceptable results.

Good Luck-
Rob

It can be done either way. I suggest you start by using the LINE input, however and then move to mic'ing the cab since that is harder to do well.

Without knowing what kind of amp that you have, the answer is (probably) yes. But you are asking a simple question to an unbelievably complex question, won which has plagued man for the last 40 years

The method for recording guitars will effect the final tones that you get incredibly. It is too big a subject to cover in this thread and at your stage of recording, but I saw it summed up wonderfully in another thread where someone said that you can discuss, guitars, amps, mic's, soundcards etc but in the end moving the mic 2 inches will make a bigger difference than any of the above.

It also obviously depends on what kind of music you want to record. I mainly record Rock and for what I want I do not believe there is anything better than a guitar, into a tube amp into a mic. many use amp sims and solid state modelling amps but for me ( and the music Iam recording) it's not my preference.

I do however record direct in from a guitar processor ( no amp) sometimes when looking for cleaner tones, simply because my amp doesnt suit clean stuff. Horses for courses I guess.

If the guitar is more of a background effect or layer, different methods can suffice.

Good luck

Glenn

ORIGINAL: fsunolesfan11

On my amp i have a Phones/ Record Out Jck would i hook the line in/ line out sord to record?

fsunolesfan,
Just a couple things to add to what Glenn said.
Set the Line In control to about 75% in the Windows Recording Control.
Set your amp volume to ZERO.
Bring it up and keep an close eye on your meters.
It will sound different because you are bypassing your amp cabinet.
With your AC97, it will probably be best to record a good, clean track, then insert an amp sim or other effect in the FX bin to modify the sound, if you choose.
Play with your settings some. It's doable, but it might take some fiddling.
And, yes, when you can afford it, a good sound card makes for a much more pleasant experience. An investment of about $200 will make a huge difference.

So does midi, line in and microphone all record stereo or mono or can you set it?

Well then how come when I share earphones with someone and I am only listening to one I hear for the most part all the music?

I am probably going to get a Behringer XENYX 802 Mixer. But how on earth do you hook it up to your computer and where do you hook it up to? Thanks.

Then would it just be better to just have an USB audio interface to start off instead of a mixer? I was looking at the M-Audio Fast Track USB Audio Interface. Would that work better?

haha now ur opening up another can of worms, cos external soundcards come in different flavours too. personally i would get a pci soundcard and a mixer, it is more flexible than just using a soundcard. if you do want to go the external card with mic pres i'd look at the emu 0404 for usb2.0 connectivity (or the 0202 if you don't need 4 ins and midi), or get a firewire interface such as the echo audiofire2/4 or m-audio firewire audiophile....
but although it sounds complicated, once you get ur mixer connected to ur soundcard, that's it. you just leave it connected. so say emu0404 pci + souncraft compact 4 = $200/£110 and should keep you going for a while. (and with a proper soundcard, you don't have the problems with cabling, it's just a patch lead)