Can you recommend a pro- soundcard?

[lemonadesoda]

I'm in the market for a pro-level soundcard. Anything BUT creative. Suggestions welcomed...

Main features/criteria

1./ Very high signal/noise ratio
2./ Pro quality recording
3./ Works are a Windows Audio device, so can game with it.
4./ EAX etc. not important.

PCI/PCIe preferred, although would consider a USB/Firewire device if it will make a big difference to quality.

 

[Tau]

I'm in the market for a pro-level soundcard. Anything BUT creative. Suggestions welcomed...

Main features/criteria

1./ Very high signal/noise ratio
2./ Pro quality recording
3./ Works are a Windows Audio device, so can game with it.
4./ EAX etc. not important.

PCI/PCIe preferred, although would consider a USB/Firewire device if it will make a big difference to quality.

Anything from ESI.

 

[lemonadesoda]

I do like that: http://www.esi-audio.com/products/julia/ very clever. You can turn the card upside down for different feature set!

 

[department76]

i wish i could remember which model it is, but a guy i know on another forum raves about m-audio...

http://www.m-audio.com/index.php?do=products.family&ID=PCIinterfaces

 

[Polarman]

HT Omega Claro

http://www.htomega.com/index.html

 

[department76]

HT Omega Claro

http://www.htomega.com/index.html

dont think the claro or claro+ are pro cards...

 

[ste2425]

if you want true pro i have a usb mixer attached to my rig that is used as a sound card it has specs allot higher then any sound card and produces much better quality sound only draw back is it supports no EAX but if sound quality is your thing then its a must id never go back to an actual 'card' after this, plus its an alesis product so great quality

http://www.alesis.com/multimix8usb

 

[lemonadesoda]

if you want true pro i have a usb mixer attached to my rig that is used as a sound card it has specs allot higher then any sound card and produces much better quality sound only draw back is it supports no EAX but if sound quality is your thing then its a must id never go back to an actual 'card' after this, plus its an alesis product so great quality

http://www.alesis.com/multimix8usb

Can you use that as a SOUND CARD or is it just for mixing/recording?

 

[Sihastru]

Asus Xonar Essence STX?

 

[ste2425]

Can you use that as a SOUND CARD or is it just for mixing/recording?

both mate thats why its soo good you can configure it as a sound card and play your music from your comp through the aux outs or the headphones or direct outs l/R but you can also configure all the inputs as mic ins through the usb so in short yes you can

 

[Tau]

I do like that: http://www.esi-audio.com/products/julia/ very clever. You can turn the card upside down for different feature set!

Yeah I was considering putting one of those in my studio rig they look mighty tempting.

Also anything from M-Audio should be fine as well.

 

[coodiggy]

cakewalk?

 

[vladmire]

m-audio would be a great choice.

 

[HeadlessChicken]

http://www.htomega.com/clarohalo_xt.html

or

http://www.htomega.com/clarohalo.html

or

http://www.htomega.com/claroplus.html

here is a comparison of the cards

http://www.htomega.com/faq9.html

 

[lemonadesoda]

As an interim solution, while researching and deciding on final choise, I picked up a Terratec 7.1 PCI for EUR 1.

Installed card, installed XP drivers (onto W2K3). Didnt work. Any ideas why this is the case? Could it be because of the PCI-X slot I put it in? Are interrupts handled differently? Or is it software incompatibility (while XP drivers should work on W2K3, there could be sloppy programming blocking compenents of the install working in a W2K3 environment).

PS. USB sound card Terratec Aureon USB works fine. But I want an internal higher quality product.

If the PCI-X slot if causing a problem with soundcards (designed for PCI) then perhaps I should look at PCIe soundcards. And recommendations?