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Sound Cards

Well, in another thread, I got great advice on this topic, which I am now exploring further. I am looking to be able to record LPs and perhaps CDs.

I found this good link, which tests various sound cards along various technical criteria: http://www.pcavtech.com/soundcards/compare/index.htm

The Turtle Beach Santa Cruz is the highest-rated "consumer" card, rated "excellent" in all areas except signal-to-noise ("very good") and dynamic range ("very good"). This card lists for $80, and costs a mere $40 extra when buying a Dell.

I'm trying to decide if this is good enough.

1. A poster pointed out that the Turtle Beach card doesn't do A/D conversion at 24/96 (it does 18/44), and that even though CDs are only 16/44, the extra headroom allows for digital manipulation of the "image" without loss of quality prior to recording. What if I don't care to manipulate the sound files (I don't imagine having time)? Will there be an audible difference between 18/44 and 24/96 when doing "no-fiddle" copies from LP or CD?

2. The more expensive cards seemed aimed primarily at musicians, and allow mixing signals from various sources, and the like. None of this applies to me. Are these more expensive cards harder to use, or less appropriate for my purpose for any reason?

3. What is S/PDIF? It seems to allow attaching the CD source directly to the sound card (internal to the computer). Is this desirable? Or is it preferable to write the file to hard disk first, then burn it, to avoid timing issues?

4. Since the cost of the higher-end cards is about the same as the cost of a mass-market standalone CD burner stereo component, would I be better off just buying one of the latter?

5. Finally, what higher-end card do people prefer? I've found three internal cards that are listed in the above link as "excellent" across the board, cost $400 or less, have Windows XP support, and do 24/96 A/D conversion:
-- Digital Audio Card Deluxe. $400. Well-reviewed in this forum.
-- Midiman Audiophile 2496. $230. The only one of these three that doesn't support balanced inputs. Also reviewed positively in this forum.
- Echo Audio MIA. "Under $250". Not mentioned in this forum so far.

Thank you for any comments/advice!

- Eric
ehart
rwwear
2,848 posts
 
Yes you can get a Philips cheap but it is not a pro model. And when making digital copies, you don't go through the A to D converters. I would not own a consumer model CD burner. Sorry, but consumer CD burners have too many limitations. And the Marantz standalone unit that I have has just as good or better A to D coverters as the Philips. The Marantz is a pro model Philips.

Robert
gumbydammit
186 posts
 
Uhh, Robert, I was not insulting your Marantz.
In fact your post was not even visible to me when I wrote about the Philips.
Also, I am not touting the Philips as the "tank....end all..best in the world"....I am merely saying that for the money, it is a hard machine to beat.
The music CD's you have to buy are cheap cheap cheap if you know where to get them. Hence, not an issue for me.
I sure would like to hear some folks talk about experices they have had with home studio cards with multiple inputs..
beatlefred
17 posts
 
I was curious to know about the Marantz: can it make copies of a compilation CD? In other words if I make a CD of songs from my CD collection- can I then use the Marantz to make multiple copies of that CD I created -or is it copy-protected or I can make only slow real-time analog copies?? What is the model# of the Marantz you have and might you know what the # is for the newest model that was mentioned came out??
rwwear
2,848 posts
 
Yes, you can make as many digital copies as you want which is true of all pro models. Mine is an older model a CDR-630. You can get the newest model in single-well for less. J&R sells it for 479.00 I beleive. You can get a dual-well from them for 679.00, or there abouts. I also use a TDK CD burner in my computer that I use for most of my CD copying. The Marantz is slow unless you get a dual-well which will record at twice the speed.
beatlefred
17 posts
 
Thank You for your reply and helpful/informative info. I have a Plextor 24/10/40A which I bought recently- just havent had the time yet to use it as much as I'd like. I noticed it can burn fine up to 20x, but when its set to its highest-> 24x, its performance really slows down for some reason- so, until I figure out why, I have to be content with 20X. I also did upgrade my soundcard to a CreativeLabs
Live! from an older generation one. It took a few times for the driver CD to install on my computer- I went to the CL website to see about if any new driver patches - but they have very poor info there regarding that- dont see where the drivers are to install! Used www.google.com to search for sites with drivers, got the card working now but I noticed my computer with Win 98 SE hanging up more often now. As for the Marantz: thanks for explaining to me- I thought all standalones (as opposed to pc-based)didnt allow copies of a copy. So, in other words- if I buy that dual Marantz- it will do the same thing as my computer Plextor Burner (copies of compilations) at approximately the same speed?
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