Weekend Open Forum: What audio interface do you use with your desktop/laptop computer?

[tonylukac]

On my music machine it's via hi def 5.1 audio with a logitech 5.1 speaker system plugged in. On the htpc it literally is hi def audio from ati becaue it's encoded into the hi def tv signal where the tv speakers function. Nice for onboard. Asus and asrock make great motherboards respectively.

 

[captaincranky]

The question is whether or not TS members send the audio signal from their computers through a fancy-pants audio box before sending it to their speakers. As you can gather from the preceding comments, most of us do.

Wow, being involved, (ever so slightly), with music, I thought the question meant, "what audio interface do you use to get music INTO your computer. Because, that's also how they refer to those jim-dandy little boxes, that let you hook you guitar, (or what have you), into your computer for recording.....

Of course you can also drive speakers from the outputs of those devices. Hm, in out, it out, in out, its the way of the world. "What goes in must go out"..... (Maybe I should change my screen name to, "Bawdy Newton")....

 

[FLWrd]

Now why would anyone do that? Is it not far simpler, not to mention cheaper just to plug your speakers or headphones directly into your sound output? I plug my headphones directly into my Asus Xonar DX soundcard and boom, I'm good to go, no fuss, no muss. Can't you do the same thing with fancy pants speakers?

I'll give you another analogy. You could also watch movies by playing them from a VCR on a 13" CRT, but it's not the same as Blu-Ray on a nice, big OLED screen, is it? An audio interface sounds considerably better than the built-in hardware, especially when you listen on decent monitors (and monitors means speakers in musician speak), and offers extra control.

 

[captaincranky]

I'll give you another analogy. You could also watch movies by playing them from a VCR on a 13" CRT, but it's not the same as Blu-Ray on a nice, big OLED screen, is it?

When we're finished with analogy, will we be moving on to metaphor? I love metaphors, but I'm only lukewarm about analogy.

An audio interface sounds considerably better than the built-in hardware, especially when you listen on decent monitors (and monitors means speakers in musician speak), and offers extra control.

Actually, a "monitor", could be someone watching the halls in a public school somewhere. Or, it could be almost any type of viewing device used for review of many different types of video source material. In this case, "monitor" means, "this junk doesn't have a tuner".

But specifically related to a sound source, "a monitor" is usually a loudspeaker designed for use in the recording studio.

For example, JBL used to make the "4310 Studio monitor", for use in, of course, a recording studio. When they sold the same damned thing, (pretty much save for the block foam grille and different finishes), for home use, they called it the "Century L-100".

Sometimes really crappy loud speakers are called, "monitors", so that they can be sold to socially conscious, but really stupid people.

In other words, if you can connect a car battery across the woofer leads without it going up in flames, that's a "monitor:" too, bro.

Moving on to one personally annoying facet of what, (should), "sounds better" my personal experience has been that SPDIF can't find the beginning of an audio track on a CD.So, no matter how cool or accurate the light powered digital transmission concept may be, if you want to hear the first few seconds of your favorite songs, use the analog line outputs.

 

[plyanthony321]

I use the Presonus Audiobox USB. I wouldnt recommend it as it doesn't have a clean output at high volumes, my new HTC M8 beats this thing hands down in audio quality (which is kinda messed up). But its one of the cheapest audio interfaces you can buy (you get what you pay for here). I use M-Audio BX5a studio monitors and Audio Technica ATH-M-50 (thanks to Techspot).

 

[Guest]

For home: Aune T1 with 7308 tubes into Hifiman HE-500 headphones
For work: Mayflower ODAC/O2 with RCA combo into Hifiman HE-400 headphones

I think spending a little on a good sound setup is like spending a little more to get an IPS screen. It's worth it considering how much I use my computer.

 

[FLWrd]

In other words, if you can connect a car battery across the woofer leads without it going up in flames, that's a "monitor:" too, bro.

You should change your nick from captaincranky to captain-not-reading-carefully-and-living-out-every-hangup-online-y.

 

[Pinkie Pie]

I'm not really an audiophile but plugging straight into a sound card makes me cringe; they're so weak. My desktop sound card's line out is connected to an old Sony STR-D565 receiver. It's nice having some power to drive my headphones and actual bass.

 

[captaincranky]

You should change your nick from captaincranky to captain-not-reading-carefully-and-living-out-every-hangup-online-y.

Nah, I shouldn't, and you can't make me.

You should explain to me once again how, "monitor is musician speak for loudspeakers".(*)

Sometimes when you get caught with your hand in the "pedantry jar", (whether by accident or design), someone's going to call you on it. Try and remember that, "syntax is everything". And take notice how mine seems to have put a big ole burr under your saddle. Do enjoy the rest of your day.

So we're on topic, I generally don't use an "audio interface" with my computer. I transfer all my audio and video files to free standing equipment. Well, save for the times when I put on headphones to monitor (*) a potential Mp3 purchase. I don't want to unnecessarily dignify the 20 buck set of Sony headphones I use to do that, by calling them "monitors". But we can if you like.

Notice the term "monitor" being used as a verb in the infinitive.

 

[Guest]

Hi, I'm using Scarlett 2i2 external usb soundcard from Focusrite connected to my home PC. It wasn't expensive and have really great sound and I personally really like two knobs - one is speakers volume and the second is headphones volume, so I can change volume directly on this unit in front of my monitor instead of software way. The next good thing is, that it has TRS output, so I'm using TRS cables and Samson Resolv A5 speakers and I hear no noise, ony pure sound . Also my Sony MDR-7506 headphones were great choice. My next equipment is M-Audio keystation 49e masterkeyboard, which was also unexpensive choice and works already about 5 years only with small troubles with usb connector...

 

[captaincranky]

Hi, I'm using Scarlett 2i2 external usb soundcard from Focusrite connected to my home PC...[ ]...

Some would argue, since you're invested in recording your own music, you might have held out for the 214.

Although, the 212 is a fine performing and often recommended piece of gear....(y)

With that aside, it is nice to see someone accessing a more literal meaning of "audio interface", when replying to this thread...(y)

 

[MonsterZero]

Onboard sound, razor headphones. Get's the job done for gaming music etc. I don't really see the purpose in dropping $200 on a soundcard. A lot of them have weird driver incompatibility issues, its also another link in the chain if you happen to run into audio issues and need to troubleshoot.

 

[FLWrd]

You should explain to me once again how, "monitor is musician speak for loudspeakers".(*)

Did your memory fail you? You could have tried wikipedia. Here it is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Studio_monitor

Sometimes when you get caught with your hand in the "pedantry jar", (whether by accident or design), someone's going to call you on it.

Says someone who can't distinguish a lowercase I (*) from a 1. The Focusrite interfaces are called 2i2, and 2i4, not 212 and 214.

(*) try to enter a lowercase I; it won't let you.

 

[captaincranky]

Did your memory fail you? You could have tried wikipedia. Here it is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Studio_monitor


Says someone who can't distinguish a lowercase I (*) from a 1. The Focusrite interfaces are called 2i2, and 2i4, not 212 and 214.

(*) try to enter a lowercase I; it won't let you.

I entered "monitor" as a simple search term. These are the results that came back:

https://www.google.com/search?q=mon...fficial&client=firefox-a&channel=np&source=hp

Take note that computer panels, "The Christian Science Monitor", and a definition for the word monitor, are all on the 1st page results.

Yet oddly enough, there are no mentions, of anything to do with loudspeakers.

Ask me if I care how the Scarlet audio interfaces are correctly named. Even you should have grasped the fact the the 2 (whatever) 2, is 2 channel input, whereas the 2 (whatever) 4, is 4 channel input.

As I stated before, please don't come in riding your high horse, with s*** like, "monitor is (big time cool) musician speak" for loudpeakers".

Because I can read between the lines, I don't care who you are, much less care who you think your are, and the word "monitor" has a much wider definition. And BTW, I used to sell them a very long time ago.

Because, when a quote like that falls on these old ears, all I hear is someone loudly and proudly, stating the patently obvious.

So, (*) asterisk, (1) one, (!) exclamation point, (l) lower case ell. Or, 2!2, 2*2, 212, 2l2. And FWIW, none of that even tripped the spellchecker.

Now I have a question, "are we having fun yet"?.......

 

[kissx]

I still use Creative Inspire 5.1 speakers I got back in 2005.

 

[totto2222]

I run a Creative x-fi titanium hd card into a schiit lyr tube amp with 59 bugle boy ecc88 tubes feeding my senn hd-650's
basically the titanium hd is my dac in the audio chain,sweet sounds.

 

[bluto 2050]

On this man cave PC I just have a modest $250.00 USB Schiit Audio stack for the phones ( dac and separate phone amp ) and nude optical right out of windows 10 PC or alternately with the PC d/soundcard EQ to optical to my Sony ES 7.1 HT AVR in a 5.1 setup with 4 ELAC B6 6.5 " 2 way speakers.

I made up a same speaker sensitivity & impedance obviously series parallel wired custom 6 driver 2 way 24" long small 4" mid bass driver center speaker w/ same grill cloth and finish as the 4 Black ELAC B6 speakers with that centered in the top shelf of a 31" h x ~52 "w black grain 3 open shelf executive bookcase with the Sony ES 7.1 -770 watt AVR I custom installed at the middle shelf with a cutout on the rear of the bookcase to accommodate the phatt 30Lb + spendy AVR and some airflow, Sony ES is miles above the regular Sony AVR .,
its like a Mercedes S Class AVR if you will no plastic either and you you can hear the difference it's clean at 0dB attenuation and + 15 dB over that you ain't touching that with anthing less than something else like that and 150 wpc RMS @ stereo vs 110 wpc x7 all full rage of course and not sagging to 65 wpc like cheaper AVR

The 2016 55" Samsung 4K HDR 1000 QDOT smart TV is on the wall bolted to full motion mount with bottom of TV centred about 1 ft above the bookcase with the TV parked at stright out or I can angle it to the matching PC desk here with a 2016 HP pavilion core i5 mid tower of course clean windows 10 on an SSD and a 27" PC monitor and the Schiit Audio stack and the powered sub up here with HDMI to The TV from the PC @ 2160p fr extended Windows desktop ,

This TV can play up to 4K HDR Youtube I don't think PC's can do that yet and my 2015 4K HDR Sony in the family cinema can only play 4K SDR You tube internally but the usual up to 4K HDR Netflix and Amazon IPTV like this TV also ,

All the PC ,AVR, ,TV Video sources for D*TV and Roku sometimes ,media hdds and thier cables to the hidden Samung TV one connect box are hidden as is the one (one connect) cable + AC cable to the TV and optical from the TV and 5.1 speaker wires .it's all very tidy and works well and just the way I like it and I can get very clean THX pro 115 dB -20 Db at 10 ft back for THX pro Cinema audio levels in here and the 6 dB room gain is factored in there of course and if crank the AVR it can gi 15dB over that but trus`me bro me you do not want to do that at all and hear anthing well much longer .

2.1 /2.0 Audiophile Quality lossless Music from my Media frives and Tidal Hifi both uo to 24/96 sounds tral decent in here and THX Pro 115dB -20bB level movies are not the norm in here that is +10dB all around louder than THX home which pretty loud anyway .

I record audio with Open source Audacity on a digital audio path.
and always 16/44 or sometimes 24/4

A l lot of my music including digital contact meda for the older stuff is 24/41 from the labels and not commercial CD mixes squashed for uniform loudness like that and only if no alternative maybe 24/96 or whatever I can get at 16 bits and I have 16 bit as well some of is fine and on a good 16 bit mix thats more than all we can hear below the 22.2Khz lower Nyquist rates anyway,

TBH hires is only legitimate if you can't find something at 16 bits or something not squashed at 16 bits ,we cant hear the file format difference above 16 bits on the same nix anyway.

 

[bluto 2050]

Wow, being involved, (ever so slightly), with music, I thought the question meant, "what audio interface do you use to get music INTO your computer. Because, that's also how they refer to those jim-dandy little boxes, that let you hook you guitar, (or what have you), into your computer for recording.....

Of course you can also drive speakers from the outputs of those devices. Hm, in out, it out, in out, its the way of the world. "What goes in must go out"..... (Maybe I should change my screen name to, "Bawdy Newton")....

Cap u just playing the devil's advocate, (albeit correct) the implications of the OP question are obvious ,you may be as bored as I am now when you posted which is painfully obvious in my rambling post above ha ha