ouroboros Posted September 4, 2002 Share Posted September 4, 2002 ok...im very very new at trying to make psytrance, and will freely admit that i suck. but i am getting better. up to now most of my music making has been in the realm of industrial. and not clean sounding ebm like vnv nation but dirty sounding stuff like dive (the guy did a whole live show with nothing but a reel to reel tape player a mic. and one spotlight...hehe it was fucking awsome), so up till now my crappy soundblaster live was just fine. what i want to know is.....what exactly is the advantage of a sound card made more for music production? what is the difference in terms of actual percievable sound? sorry if this is a lame question...but i just dont know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Mike Indidginus Posted September 4, 2002 Share Posted September 4, 2002 Hey Ouroboros It's not a lame question at all man. There are zillions of different specs for soundcards, but often what they plug is the fact that they have low latency (This article describes what that is in much more detail than I can!)./a>. And the fact that you can record at higher bit rates (although I don't think this is going to make a huge difference to your music just now as I believe that all CD's are recorded at 16 bit, 44,100Hz as a standard). Some soundcards (like the Yamaha DS2416) have onboard mixers, digital effects & dynamics processors which are helpful because they don't drain your CPU as much as plugin effects & processors. I hope that helps you some Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Mike Indidginus Posted September 4, 2002 Share Posted September 4, 2002 Sorry about the extended link! The section after the /a> should be read as if it wasn't underlined! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest llazi Posted September 4, 2002 Share Posted September 4, 2002 The are a lot of diferences between soundcards, but I think that the most important thing nowdays (and specially for you) is the LATENCY. Crappy sound cards can go up to 30ms while professional ones go down to 2ms. Now you may not know what latency means. The latency time measured in milliseconds is the time that needs the pc from pressing a key in the midi keyborad (or something in a software synth) to the sound that you hear in the speaker. Hope you understood Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest etherdesign Posted September 4, 2002 Share Posted September 4, 2002 Studiocovers Go there, there's pretty much everything you need to know about recording, regarding your question, click on the Digital Audio link, there's alot of articles that describe the merits of recording in a higher bit depth/sample rate than 16/44.1.. basically what it comes down to is the more processing you do to your audio (effects, compression, etc.) the higher resolution you want so your audio quality will not be degraded.. Anyways, there's alot of info there as it gets pretty technical, but the main thing is what sounds good to you, most people I know work at 24 bits/44.1khz unless they're recording something like an acoustic guitar.. Another issue of higher quality soundcards is cleaner AD/DA (analogue to digital and digital to analogue) converters, that will (hopefully) not color your sound or introduce any noise or distortion into your signal path so you can really hear what you are doing. And finally, connectivity.. as your studio grows, you're going to want to have more inputs/outputs, or even if you're going to work entirely in software, you're going to want at least one set of high quality I/O to connect to your monitors or stereo.. the 1/4" jacks carry a stronger signal than RCA or mini jacks, and 1/4" jacks can be balanced (you can read more about balanced jacks at the Studiocovers site), which makes a hell of a difference.. I have a pair of Event 20/20bas monitors connected directly to my card.. At first I had unbalanced cables, and there was definite interference (electromagnetic, low hum, some static), but when I switched to balanced cables this all disappeared and the sound is quite clear.. Anyways, check that site out, I hope others will find it useful as well.. I think it's the best site on the net for audio production information, at least the more technical side of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest idoru Posted September 4, 2002 Share Posted September 4, 2002 thnx guys. im sure those sites will be very helpful. ill check em out when i get home. another quick question: while i know what latency is, what i dont know is.....does the latency matter if you do not plan to do live stuff? what im asking is...does the latency factor in once everything is sequenced? i understand it has to do with how long it takes from the time you press a key or tweek a dial to when you hear it, but does it still matter once all those things are recorded? so if im working with a sound and i change say the decay time, it takes time for the sound to change...but if i record that decay time change when it plays back will it still take the same amount of time from when the change starts for me to hear it? im not sure if im explaining my question properly. thnx again for the help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest llazi Posted September 6, 2002 Share Posted September 6, 2002 Well the best answer for that is, try it by your self and you see. In most software synths u have the possibility to change tha latency, so go ahead and try some possibilities like try to do a track with 30ms latency and a track with 4ms latency, u'll see that the latency with give you major problems in listening to that what u are currently doing, and of course if u can't listen perfectly to what u are doing then u are doing nothing at all. U know what I mean Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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