Decent soundcard and memory

[The Rhone]

A friend is building me a PC just for music, as I can't afford a Mac. Can anyone reccommend a good soundcard, with at least 4 in and out. Also I've heard alot about different types of memory, can anyone reccommend a good brand or type.

Many thanks

 

[kev]

m-audio 1010lt?

 

[JBroll]

The 1010LT is a good card. If that's a bit steep the M-Audio 2496 is a two-channel card that has the same chip as the 1010LT (ICE1712) and doesn't have built-in preamps.

As for memory... you need to see what your motherboard is compatible with. There will be some numbers like DDR2 866, DDR2 800, or somewhere along those lines, and you match the sticks to what the motherboard says it likes. As for brands, Crucial, Kingston, and Patriot are great.

Jeff

 

[The Rhone]

Thanks for the info dues

 

[Notuern]

If i where you i would aim for a set of paired Corsair-dimms(total it to 4gb), that way you will have a faster ram then most people ever get(Sence most people buy multiple single-packaged dimms.).
Try to download the manual to the motherboard and check what brands and models of ram that are certified with it, i bet Corsair is one of them(And they are badass and cheap.).

As for soundcards, you might want to check around EMU cards too. They have alot of cards with a built in DSP for VST-effects, so you wont have to load your processor with all your gates, compressors and verbs. ;P

 

[deLuther]

Quality of E-MU dsp effects is not superb, supported sampe rates is 44.1/48. I heard that processing restricted to 16 bit...
But converters (ADC and DAC) is top of the line on 1212M and 1616M. 1212M does not have preamps - only line in/out.