Sound cards (Was: Re: no sound

[Hartmut Noack]

Am 20.05.2011 13:54, schrieb Ralf Mardorf:
> On Fri, 2011-05-20 at 12:48 +0200, Robert Klaar wrote:
>> Any Rme card is good, although they're a bit expensive. Didn't have to
>> do a thing to get my hdsp 9632 working.
>
> Hi Robert :)
>
> the main reason to switch the sound cards is the audio sound quality.
> I'm able to pay around 700,- EUR / 800,- EUR (right now, regarding to my
> "profession", I usually don't have any money). Btw. I noticed that not
> only my sound cards do cause loss. When recording soft synth just by
> JACK, without the sound cards being involved, there's a loss for the
> sound quality too!

No, there is none.

Any software, that generates sounds from scratch like a softsynth wil 
produce exactly the same stream with any soun card. In fact such 
software will even generate the very same stream if no soundcard exists.

And if you record such a stream with Jack you simply store that very 
stream bit by bit.

I assure you, you get the very same data in a recording via Jack if you 
play the same patch of the same synth on a work station with a RME 
Hammerfall or on a Laptop with a built-in HDA.

The only level on wich a soundcard is related to a softsynth is the one 
on wich you actually hear the stream. And some synths can render 
differntly, if Jack is running at 96KHz instead of 48 or 44.1.
But this has only remotely to do with the sound card let alone its quality.

> And soft synth already do sound less good than real
> old synth. Unfortunately those real old synth can break and there're no
> microchips available to repair those synth, resp. they are hard to get,
> very expensive and without warranty.
>
> My two TerraTec EWX 24/96 needs to be replaced,

Tell me where you dump them, these 2 more stereo-dacs would be most 
welcome in my box ;-)

All the trouble with the envy24-cards is related to (mis)configuration 
and to stupidities like automatically zeroing all channels caused by PA 
in most cases.
As of now these problems can be solved by the user. They are *not* 
acceptable, they are bugs that need to be solved. But these bugs are not 
show-stoppers.

> before I don't have got
> the money anymore. FWIW S/PDIF doesn't work for my Ubuntu Studio with
> the TerraTecs, hence I can't use "good analog IOs" that would be
> available via S/PDIF. Btw. "good analog IOs" in this context does mean
> consumer DAT Sony DTC-670 and Aiwa HD-S1, both are without any loss of
> sound quality, when listening by my consumer equipment. At least good
> consumer sound quality is what I expect of a "professional" sound card,
> even if internal Linux there still would be loss caused by JACK or
> caused by what issue ever.

Jack does not cause any "loss in sound-quality" because Jack does not 
have any influence on the way, the pcm-stream is produced by the 
driver/sound-card.

> Once Brauner borrowed me a Mac with a Motu
> firewire device.

The MOTUs are quite okayish and they sound exactly the same on any 
system that supports them.

> the Mac's sound quality

There is no such thing.
No Mac-expert would endorse something like a special "Mac-related" sound 
quality. Do not mix that up with "sound performance" that has to do with 
latencies and stability but *not* with how good it sounds in the end.

You know why? Because no professional would want to buy/use any 
computer/OS, that attempts to manipulate the sound produced from a 
pro-interface, be it for better or worse.
OS/Driver etc *has* to be absolutely neutral in that, everything else is 
"super-bass-enancer" nonsense that one my expect in a cheap MP3-player 
but certainly *not* in a computer-system built for pros.

> accomplished this requirement! No, I'm not using Brauner microphones for
> my home studio ;), all I need is good consumer sound quality.

All your experience is fired by the real quality of the DAC/ADC-hardware 
on the cards you have used and to some extend may be influenced by 
mixer-settings.


no offence ment but RTFM please.


best regs
HZN


> Two question about the RME card, I'll read more about sound cards later
> and during the weekend and maybe I'll order a card next week.
>
> http://www.thomann.de/gb/search_dir.html?xsid=294c1645e0e16b761c35fa8f9ebcec51&sw=HDSP+9632&x=0&y=0
>
> At a max of 4 analog IOs? The unbalanced breakout cables are part of the
> product content?
>
> Cheers!
>
> Ralf
>
>