Keyboards and Sound cards

6 Replies, 1988 Views

I need to get a midi controller keyboard and a sound card to use on my PC. From looking around and speaking to a few people, so far I am mostly attracted to the following:

E-MU 0404 Audio Interface

E-MU XBoard 49 USB/MIDI Controller Keyboard


I have a thing for E-MU cos of thier samplers, but at the relative proce ranges for the items above, I couldn't really find anything more attractive.

Any thoughts/ideas/suggestions?
www.astrophonica.co.uk           
Echo Audiofire interface. Top Notch converters. Come in a variety of different I/O configurations, depending on your needs and budget.

all midi controllers in that sort of price range will be much of a muchness.
scope Wrote:echo audiofire interface. top notch converters. come in a variety of different i/o configurations, depending on your needs and budget.

all midi controllers in that sort of price range will be much of a muchness.


true say on all that. Xyxthumbs


presonus firebox and focusrite saffire have been really well received too.
i bought this

http://www.turnkey.co.uk/web/productActi...ontext=WEB
A friend of mine has the X-Board 49. He loves it. Its got great keys, and sexy blue lights Smile

Check out the new novation keyboards as well, lots of knobs/faders and great keys.


Anyone have any experience with MOTU soundcards? I've been looking at the MOTU Ultralite. Was going to get an Echo Audiofire but I need something with more i/o than the Audiofire4, and the Audiofire8 is too large for me... Decisions decisions...
I have my trusty Oxygen 8 (had it for about 3-4 years and it's still running fine). I would highly reccomend one, but due to there being a lot of ... prettier midi controllers out there today, you might not like it. But it works.

As for soundcards, I have the motu traveller. It's cool. Was a bit dissipointed with the cuemix software. You can route sound from your computer into cuemix, but it is possible to mix all your levels from a input source into the traveler. Other than that, I have no complaints with it. For those on a budget, try the ultra lite. I've seen it in action and it's pretty solid.
Just bought the ultralite Smile

Was a bit scared because of the whole Firewire/laptop issue, especially with Dells... If you don't have a Texas Instrument chipset for your firewire card, you may have glitches. It's happened to me before with a different laptop and the Firebox.

Anyways, I got some glitches at first. I then turned off the WiFi and other devices I didn't need running on the laptop, and now it runs smoothly. Those devices were sharing the resources firewire does, so it causes problems when they are all running. No problem for me though, this laptop is only for music.

It sounds crisp clean. I understand how some people think it may sound a bit "dark", because it does sound so clean. However, I only had an hour to test it out. I'll give it a runthrough this week and let you know Smile It's a sexy little beast.

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