I have recently gone to comuter show and built myself a fairly powerful machine, with the main reason behind it being the desire to purchase and use VDL2 with the best results possible. I was wondering what soundcard the experts recommend. (Jim Casella,etc ;)  I really have no need for anything that is made for gaming purposes, but rather something meant for pro audio, MIDI etc... any suggestions would be appreciated. Here are a couple of options I've been looking at:

-Audigy 2 ZS Platinum Pro
-Audigy X-Fi Pro Elite
-Audigy 4 (doesn't seem much different from Audigy 2, except for $$)
-M-Audio Delta 1010LT
-E-MU 1212M

Any others I should consider?

Current system...
P4 3.2 ghz
2 Gb Ram (will be 4gb soon)
250 Gig SATA II HDD 16mb cache
Windows XP Pro
Sibelius 4

Thanks,
Steve

The audigy's I have found are excellent.  What you should be concerned about are:

Inputs -- do you need any?
Outputs -- surround or stereo?
Noise -- most of the cards have good sound floors, so you won't have a problem.

Personally, I don't have any need for inputs, so an Audigy 2 is great for me, and didn't cost much.  I have a desktop 5.1, and a headphone set, and that's all I use, thus output is the only key for me.

Steve,

I would go with anything that is Pro Audio.  The Audigy series is ok but it doesn't stack up to the M-Audio and E-Mu cards, IMHO.  The M-Audio Delta Audiophile 2496 has become the standard entry level soundcard and will satisfy your needs.  Plus, the audigy cards come with all of the extra mp3 and gaming software which you won't need.  www.Sweetwater.com is a good source for purchasing,and they are more than happy to answer your questions.

Gabe

Ditto on that Gabe!

The 2496 is nice, if you're doing stereo only.  I like that card, too.

I take the Audigy 2 over the M Revolution.  Those compare directly.  If you're going higher end, the M-Audio cards are definitely the way to go.

FYI, the Audigy 4's are mostly the same; they have additional game-specific dsp's, and software that will ";upsample"; your audio from 44.1/16 to 96/24...  theoretically better, but effectively not, IMO.

If you go with an audigy, get the 2; the 4 is $$ for the reasons above.  And yes, I agree with these guys on the M for higher stuff.

One big factor with sound card performance is latency.�� If you hit a key on your USB keyboard and that snare rimshot seems to come �_ second later you have a latency problem.�� Latency can be very perceptible and annoying if you are running a card with poor drivers (eg. WDM drivers as found on most consumer-grade sound cards on PC�۪s).�� ASIO2 drivers are the standard and if you have a pro audio card (all of which have ASIO drivers) latency is probably not much of a problem for you.�� If however you have the consumer-grade card that came with your computer ��� which probably doesn�۪t have ASIO drivers ��� you probably have experienced latency.�� There is something you can try however without shelling out for a new card. Asio4all (www.asio4all.com) is a free program that you can download which will let you run ASIO drivers on your consumer-grade WDM driver card.�� I�۪ve tried it and it was like magic.�� I experienced a drop in latency from like 550ms (very perceptible) to 15ms (unnoticeable) all because of this free program.��

I would also add that a different option from a pro-audio card would be a firewire or USB audio interface (M-audio, presonus, MOTU, Focusrite, etc.) which might provide a better solution for some people.��

[quote author=drumcat link=topic=886.msg3538#msg3538 date=1133079964]
The 2496 is nice, if you're doing stereo only.  I like that card, too.

I take the Audigy 2 over the M Revolution.  Those compare directly.  If you're going higher end, the M-Audio cards are definitely the way to go.

FYI, the Audigy 4's are mostly the same; they have additional game-specific dsp's, and software that will ";upsample"; your audio from 44.1/16 to 96/24...  theoretically better, but effectively not, IMO.

If you go with an audigy, get the 2; the 4 is $$ for the reasons above.  And yes, I agree with these guys on the M for higher stuff.
[/quote]

Great info here too. Thanks drumcat!!

[quote author=mwozniak link=topic=886.msg3539#msg3539 date=1133193129]
One big factor with sound card performance is latency.  If you hit a key on your USB keyboard and that snare rimshot seems to come �_ second later you have a latency problem.  Latency can be very perceptible and annoying if you are running a card with poor drivers (eg. WDM drivers as found on most consumer-grade sound cards on PC�۪s).  ASIO2 drivers are the standard and if you have a pro audio card (all of which have ASIO drivers) latency is probably not much of a problem for you.  If however you have the consumer-grade card that came with your computer ��� which probably doesn�۪t have ASIO drivers ��� you probably have experienced latency.  There is something you can try however without shelling out for a new card. Asio4all (www.asio4all.com) is a free program that you can download which will let you run ASIO drivers on your consumer-grade WDM driver card.  I�۪ve tried it and it was like magic.  I experienced a drop in latency from like 550ms (very perceptible) to 15ms (unnoticeable) all because of this free program. 

I would also add that a different option from a pro-audio card would be a firewire or USB audio interface (M-audio, presonus, MOTU, Focusrite, etc.) which might provide a better solution for some people. 

[/quote]

This is a great post mwozniak. Many folks haven't had to learn the difference between ASIO audio drivers (found in pro audio cards), and other low-end drivers that are commonly found in consumer cards like MME or DirectSound (most likely what came bundled in most windows PCs).

Lower latency taxes CPU more. Obviously, if performing in a ";live"; situation (i.e. playing a mallet kat, triggering VDL2 vibes), extremely low latency is crucial. When writing from a notation program, latency is a bit less important, and I've found that raising it a bit (around 40ms) can help reduce a bit of burden on CPU. When latency gets too much higher than that, fast drum rhythms (like double-stroke rolls) can become lop-sided and ";swingy"; sounding. So it's important to get the soundcard latency settings dialed in on any particular system.

Thanks for the added expertise guys!!

One last place to look and compare:

http://www.techspot.com/reviews-audio.shtml

This is all great info!

What is the difference between ASIO and ASIO 2? Is one better than the other for VDL2?

Also, for those of you that have the M-Audio Audiophile (2496 or 192), how is it that you connect to speakers or headphones? I see they have line out connections...would this require a powered monitor system?(Please forgive me if this is a dumb question ;-)

Thanks!!
Steve

http://techreport.com/reviews/2005q4/soundblaster-x-fi/index.x?pg=7
http://techreport.com/reviews/2005q4/soundblaster-x-fi/index.x?pg=17

This will back up my Audigy 2 vs Revolution statement earlier.�� Less CPU, lower floors.��

ASIO2 has a ";word clock";.�� I don't think it'll matter much for you.�� ASIO drivers will provide better, faster access, no matter what you have.

The audiophile is stereo rca out from the card, or SPDIF from the breakout.�� If you use the old midi interface for your keyboard, this will let you midi-in, also.�� Most new midi keyboards offer USB, too.

http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Audiophile2496-focus.html
http://www.m-audio.com/images/en/callouts/big/audiophile_2496.jpg

Does anyone have the emu 0404?  It claims to have near-zero latency MIDI input for only $99, plus has 1/4"; in/outs.  A review I read said they were able to set latency at 4 ms when using Cubase.

It's PC only though. 

My buddy has one, and really likes it.  He hasen't noticed much latency, and he's running a slower computer.

I know this is a very old posting (2005) but I thought I'd bring it back to the surface because of a recent experience.  I had a Creative soundcard which provided only MME and DS playback interface options.  So I went to Dell and explained that I needed a new soundcard, one with ASIO compliancy.  They told me the Creative X-Fi Xtreme Audio board was the ticket.  Of course, when I installed it and looked for the ASIO interface it wasn't there.  I contacted Creative who confirmed the new board was not ASIO compliant and then Dell, who apologetically suggested I return the board for full refund.  I could have done that and considered it but it seemed so disruptive.  So before going ahead and removing while looking for an ASIO compliant board, I decided to look into the Forums for board recommendations and found this thread.  I downloaded the ASIO4ALL software and how cool was that?  It works beautifully.  I'm done.  No new board and I have the ASIO interface while using my newly installed Creative card (which is not a bad card - just didn't have the ASIO interface).  Thanks to the Forum and mwozniak for saving me a lot of effort and additional costs.

Since this posting helped me in 2009, it may be beneficial for others so it is back!

Steve Filippelli
CVMB