[sdiy] MIDI + Ethernet

[Rude 66]

hmm, midi, usb, audio, cheap cards..

first, imho midi is the most brilliant invention of the last 30 years.
almost none of the music or businesses currently dealing with anyhting from
sequencers to vst synths couldn't have existed without it. could you imagine
a world without techno? ;-)

midi-usb? possible. won't work flawlessly though.. when using usb 1.1 or
less, don't connect any other usb gear, especially not mice and keyboards.
(the typing kind, not the musical kind). speaking of the last ones, a good
solution is those usb masterkeyboards. one usb cable to the computer, and
midi from the keyboard to the rest of the studio. be careful with the
cheapos: m-audio and evolution keyboards can seriously screw up your midi
timing. i've seen it happen more than once, and mostly on macs.

usb audio.. not worth the trouble. only box working fine is that one from
emagic. use firewire, or an usb 2.0 box but there aren't many. those cheap
cards you're talking about are not really for serious recording. most of
those things don't even have asio drivers, which leaves you with serious
latency times. the multiple outs are really only for surround sound. and the
'better' ones aren't even that more expensive, so why bother with a cheapo?
something like an m-audio 410 has 8 outs, midi, firewire, blah blah and
they're cheap. there's an even cheaper firewire card from hercules coming.


r../


----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Higgins" <higg0008 at tc.umn.edu>
To: "Glen" <mclilith at charter.net>
Cc: "synth-DIY" <synth-diy at dropmix.xs4all.nl>
Sent: Friday, July 09, 2004 9:14 PM
Subject: Re: [sdiy] MIDI + Ethernet


> On Friday, July 9, 2004, at 02:09 PM, Glen wrote:
>
> > Some of their USB and firwire connected external audio interfaces use a
> > different chipset. The specs for some of these is slightly better, but
> > only
> > slightly. When dynamic range is already over 100dB, will improving it,
> > by
> > let's say an extra 4 dB, make any really noticeable improvement?
>
> Well, I'm sure the propellerheads on the list might have some comment
> on that.  : )  The real issue tends to be S/N.  And manufacturers
> sometimes really torture the data to make the cards look better than
> they are.  Caveat emptor.  Cards with converters on board, and
> especially cards with _low-level_ inputs that plug into a PCI card will
> often have S/N problems or at least not have as stellar specs as the
> external boxes.  As always, YMMV.
>
> -PRH
>
> Paul Higgins
> email: higg0008 at tc.umn.edu
>