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external sound card advice

Posted: Wed Sep 08, 2010 5:31 am
by balthazarely
im a Dj/Producer and im looking into play club gigs more and was thinking that i should invest into a external sound card. Is it true that it will increase the quality of the sound that my computer is putting out. i know it has it's advantages such as being able to preview a song on a channel too so it seems worth it. what would you suggest in terms of a fairly inexpensive sound card that would be fitting, meaning not too expensive. any one got any suggestions? thanks

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Wed Sep 08, 2010 4:05 pm
by Bazzle09
balthazarely wrote: Is it true that it will increase the quality of the sound that my computer is putting out.
Depends on what you are using at the moment and what you will buy. And that goes for any interface, internal or external.

At the moment it seems to be either the


Native Instruments Audio Kontrol 1
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or the Focusrite Sapphire LE
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Both around £200 last time i checked.

I use the AK1, a few here do, they have excellent A/D-D/A converters and are very robust.

Regarding the Focusrite, you'll need to ask someone else but they are very good quality cards.

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Wed Sep 08, 2010 4:09 pm
by Sharmaji
if you don't need inputs, the NI DJ series is great.

yes, if you're going to be presenting your music in a professional setting, you need a soundcard. internal soundcards, especially laptops, are uniformly awful-- bad transients (less punch), fluctuating frequency response, jittery clocks, hard drive noise-- all make for thin, weak, noisy sound.

The low end of USB/FW boxes aren't audio bliss, but they're 1,000 times better than anything internal.

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Wed Sep 08, 2010 4:32 pm
by dntazemebro
For high level distribution sure, but for bedroom production and local club scene DJing you will reap very little rewards for the not so miniture price-tag. If you got the spare cash, sure why not, if not perhaps delve into Soundfonts to maximise your current set-up before up-grading.

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Wed Sep 08, 2010 4:36 pm
by DZA
Bazzle09 wrote:Focusrite Sapphire LE
Im sure this has been discontinued

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Thu Sep 09, 2010 6:42 am
by viberous
I've been using the audio Kontrol 1 for gigs and production for about 2 months and would recommend it to anyone. Its a tank, and has midi which can be great with laptop djing.

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Thu Sep 09, 2010 10:44 am
by JFK
DZA wrote:
Bazzle09 wrote:Focusrite Sapphire LE
Im sure this has been discontinued
It has and its a pain in the balls to get it running with windows 7 as well. I still use mine though, fookin love it! :D

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Thu Sep 09, 2010 12:57 pm
by DZA
JFK wrote:
DZA wrote:
Bazzle09 wrote:Focusrite Sapphire LE
Im sure this has been discontinued
It has and its a pain in the balls to get it running with windows 7 as well. I still use mine though, fookin love it! :D
:? Really? never had a problem with mine

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Thu Sep 09, 2010 1:20 pm
by JFK
DZA wrote:
JFK wrote:
DZA wrote:
Bazzle09 wrote:Focusrite Sapphire LE
Im sure this has been discontinued
It has and its a pain in the balls to get it running with windows 7 as well. I still use mine though, fookin love it! :D
:? Really? never had a problem with mine
You running Windows 7 yeah?

I had to roll back the drivers on mine to get it to work.

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Thu Sep 09, 2010 1:25 pm
by DZA
Yeah using windows 7 and the latest drivers

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Thu Sep 09, 2010 11:52 pm
by paravrais
Bit of a thread hijack but I have a numark omni control that I use for djing. Will that be better to runvableton through than my standard dell laptop one? I tried using it once but could have sworn I had more trouble with latency than usual..

Re: external sound card advice

Posted: Fri Sep 10, 2010 7:35 am
by JFK
paravrais wrote:Bit of a thread hijack but I have a numark omni control that I use for djing. Will that be better to runvableton through than my standard dell laptop one? I tried using it once but could have sworn I had more trouble with latency than usual..
I used an Omni control as an interface for production for ages. It worked fine.