Audio Hardware

In order to record your own music, on-board sound cards shouldn´t be your first choice, because instrument and microphone preamps are missing or the data transfer from the input to the output of the harddisk sound card takes much too long - keyword: latency period! So, you´ll need an individually rendered recording audio-interface that doesn´t only have the preamps you need, but also allows a low latency system.

The offers for audio-interfaces are not always clearly represented. The different data interfaces from PCI to USB and Firewire or equipment with microphone preamps, as well as digital in- and outputs in their different formats have to be kept in mind. Especially interesting are the number of audio channels which can send and return the inteface to the computer independently.

A universal interface should offer at least the following features: 1 - 2 microphone preamps including phantom circuit, 1 input for e-guitars/e-bass (often called "Hi-Z"), 2 line-ins and -outs and 1 S/PDIF-interface which you can get for only € 200 in high-quality (e.g. M-Audio Fast Track Pro).