Hello,

My Dad gave me some cash today towards a Laptop (Ti’s my Birthday today ), and I was wondering what sound card to get for the Laptop. What I want to do is connect my Triton Studio and Roland KR577 Arranger/Piano to it. This means I will need a sound card to accept two instruments. What sort of sound card will I need? – I’ve a rough idea, but not been into laptops before, so kind of new to me. Are we talking external cards ? – and if so, will I be able to get one with inputs for two instruments (My Arranger piano and Triton Studio) – or will I need another midi box or something on top of this (midiman?)

Thanks for your help in advance (TFYHIA for short

Anthony

Anthony,
I doubt that you will have any choice in sound cards for a laptop. That's integrated stuff, and unless you get an expensive plug in (PCMCIA) card .... you'll have to accept what the factory puts in the unit.

Anthony, What UD says about soundcards is right, you are pretty much stuck with whatever is inside. But, what I think you are really talking about is an interface. An excellent, reasonably inexpensive interface to connect your equipment to the laptop would be something like the Tascam US122. Edirol and M-Audio have comparable items. It doesn't sound like you need any internal sounds, so softsynths are not what you are looking for either. If your laptop is new and has a Pentium 3 or 4, then you should have no trouble getting your audio into the LT thru the interface I suggest. I have one and it is great. I would check out different laptops and compare drives, speeds and in/out availability. Almost everything uses USB 2.0 or Firewire; make sure you have enough I/O ports for your needs.

Anthony I use a small stereo mixer[Alesis Multimix 6 FX] into my new pentium 4 laptop..It records great..I wouldn't worry about the sound card in the laptop, most new models are okay..

Thank you all for the replies

Quote by Uncle dave I doubt that you will have any choice in sound cards for a laptop. That's integrated stuff

I have an AC97 (onboard) in my Desktop at the moment, and the sound is quite good - but when I RECORD (In sonar) - I get this buzzing noise (not loud, but enough to NOT sound professional) like say if the volume is on a scale of 1 to 10, I hear the noise at about 7 (in silent/quite parts)with 10 (full volume) being unusablem and 2 to 3 being not too audible (long subject no doubt - but NO Noise/Buzzing etc when I play a Windows Media file back, for example

Cassp, I will do a search round for those items, and the Alesis one you mentioned Fran (weren't alesis going bust or something?).

Funny that Tascam was the first "extra" you mentioned in your post, because I was going to get a Mixer for about the same price as a Laptop like this one : Tascam 2488

Laptops today have come down in price quite heavily actually, and £750-850 (about $1200) Sterling will get you a fairly decent model to boot - and some not much more than that come with DVD Writers!.

Thanks

Anthony




[This message has been edited by Jupitar5 (edited 03-15-2004).]

I use a Tascam US-122 for recording into my laptop also, and it works well. You'll probably want to use a mixer with it for your needs, which brings me to a new product coming out this summer, the Onyx mixers from Mackie. They look nice and Mackie mixers are legendary, plus they have an option for a Firewire interface. That would be a nice complete package of mixer and computer interface. More info.

[This message has been edited by The Pro (edited 03-15-2004).]

Music123 has something like this:
http://www.music123.com/item/?itemno=100844&t=1#tab

or
http://www.music123.com/item/?itemno=95456&t=1#tab

I don't use it so I don't know if anyone has any comment on it.

..rb

Hello and Congrats for your Bday:

About the sound cards or Audio capture interfaces, for the lap tops I would recomend the USB/Firewire,...( some with Midi I/O), Right now GC has a blow out in the Quattro (M-Audio)with 4ins-4outs plus one midi I/O...for about half price.......now if you want something with more control, the new Omega by Lexicon....also the Edirol ( Roland) the UA700 is really nice, check their web site...a lot of models to choose from.....I hope this info help you....Greetings.

Not forgetting Creative:

Audigy2NX: http://www.soundblaster.com/products/audigy2NX/

Extigy: http://www.soundblaster.com/products/extigy/

"MP3+": http://www.soundblaster.com/products/MP3+/

Trouble is the Creative external stuff only has a single line in so you will still need an external mixer.