Best USB soundcard?

[mo0gle]

I've decided I can't live with the line noise coming from integrated sound cards anymore

Looking for something that works on both my macbook pro (OSX and 64bit Windows 7 beta) and my 64bit vista desktop ... preferably with a nice DAC and 5.1 sound.

Preferably $100 or below.. I've been looking at the X-FI 5.1 Surround

http://us.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=209&subcategory=669&product=17751

but a couple of reviews said that it lags, which is a big red flag for me.


Just wondering if anyone else out there has a comparable solution.

Thanks in advance!

 

[mo0gle]

any takers?

 

[jointhedarkside]

These two links might help

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1372834
http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1376890

I tried tried the Turtle beach srm 5.1, but that had static, and turtle beach said it needed more power from my laptop. Unacceptable. I stuck with the Asus Xonar U1, amp, dac, n sound card. I don't know about the Creative card, but my xonar is using 14 MB of memory on idle. But there's this weird bug where if you leave the driver page open, memory will increase. Mine has gone up to 120 MB. I believe there's a patch to fix it, on the asus support site that you can download, but I haven't noticed a difference, so I'm lazy to get that update.

Hope this helps

 

[pharoah]

i own that creative card,and all i can say is i love it.i use it on both my aspire one netbook,and my desktop.i have zero problems on either.

 

[criccio]

The need for 5.1 audio limits your options significantly as the "best" USB sound cards/DACs are all two channel. Just so you know.
Posted via [H] Mobile Device

 

[mo0gle]

I'm aware of that... have taken a look at the fubar... but I really want a 5.1 since i have a 5.1 set, AND i also do live mixing on my computer, which requires 4 channels and a lagless environment.

So anyways... was reading further on the x-fi... seems like the lag is a function of CPU power, so i was just wondering if anyone out there has any experience with it. Is a 2.4ghz quad core enough to offset the lag/CPU loading?

 

[nathancipher]

if you're looking for something that's going to have low enough latency to properly mix live you're not going to find 5.1 in the same unit.

in my experience higher end audio cards may have enough outputs but generally don't support surround sound natively. might be an asio thing, i'm not sure but i have yet to see surround on a DAW card internal or external.

just get a 4in/4out usb or firewire card. lot's of stuff in this market currently. audio work > movies and gaming.