As a musician and engineer I have had a natural interest in music recording since the 1970’s. Back then we had to use a Reel to Reel Multitrack recorder, which I part owned with five friends; this was far from ideal, however it gave me a great insight into how to layer tracks and edit time lines. When we had saved enough money in the 80’s, we moved up to a dedicated hard drive recorder. This was a huge step up from recording on tape but still not an ideal solution as we still had to share the resource between the five of us, and it was only one of many many other components making up the recording gear. The computers in those days, fitted with basic PC sound cards, just took care of midi-sequencing via a keyboards on-board sounds; we dare not ask them to do much more, as they were just so unreliable. In the 80’s, operating systems were no where near as robust as they are now and frequent crashes and freezes were plentiful and just part of the process we had to deal with. This resulted in the fact that recording simple vocals, guitar with effects pedal, a drum pattern (created on the midi-sequencer), bass and keyboards took at least 4 days. However, this was still a lot less expensive than hiring a recording studio and engineer.

I purchased my first serious desk top computer in the early 90’s and as was the norm back then, computers did not come with any PC sound cards. Being an avid gamer and home recording enthusiast, I naturally rushed out and purchased a top end sound card of the time that I was informed would do the job. I remember that simply fitting pci sound cards and getting them to work was a time consuming experience and problems with drivers and compatibility with operating systems became a constant frustration. It appeared to me that although the technology was available at the time, compatibility issues still meant it was not possible to have a personal home recording studio that was reliable. However, with the addition of the digital sound card at this time, gaming on the computer suddenly came alive!

My first serious PC sound card was the Creative Sound Blaster AWE64 Gold, it was a thing of beauty. The box alone filled me with hope and excitement (sad – I know!). I purchased this when I was onto my 3rd or 4th computer upgrade in about 2001. Then in 2004 moved onto the Creative Sound Blaster Audigy ES that included the first generation break-out box. This was a step into serious quality recording and 5.1 surround sound, and coupled with Cakewalk’s Sonar Home Studio, I was now capable of recording live music performance directly into the multitrack software, layering sound adding digital effects and mastering. The only issue I had was not enough hard drive space and processing power. Technology still needed to catch up and be affordable.

At long last, these days I use a much more powerful desk top computer with over a Terabyte of hard drive space and a Novation nio 2/4 portable USB audio interface/ USB sound card. I plug it into one of many USB ports. It is a great little device; it allows me to input balanced microphones with phantom power through XLR. It has an input for electric guitars or external keyboards; it caters for midi-through to control virtual instruments; it has two volume controllable jack outputs for headphones. I output the Nio 2/4 to a Rotel amplifier via gold plated phono cables and use a pair of Tannoy flat response monitors. This is home recording on a budget, however, the results I achieve are as good or even better than what used to be created by professional recording studios back in the 70’s.

In the two years of having my dream set up I have recorded over 30 live performances which include 2 albums for a good friend of mine, who now in his late 50’s had written some great love songs back in the 1960’s. He plays the 12 string electro-acoustic, and with the help of two other friends we have bought his songs alive with the addition of live saxophone, bass and drums. We have also used vocal harmonies and I can master the tracks easily with dedicated mastering tools. He wanted to bring his songs into the 21st century, and he needed to have a record of his dreams from back when he was a young man. What used to take me 4 days in the 1980’s I can do in 3 hours, and my friend who now has his songs recorded is over the moon. PC sound cards have come a long way.

Dr SGriff has over 25 years of experience in performing and recording live music, he is also a qualified systems engineer and addicted to technology and how it can be used to improve ones quality of life. Dr SGriff, has a particular interest in PC sound cards and audio interfaces and is very happy to share his experiences and knowledge in audio, in order that those with a passion for quality digital sound can make informed decisions when building computer systems for there particular application. Whether your interest be home recording, gaming or creating professional presentations, read more about making the right choices here:

http://pcsoundcards.org/

http://pcsoundcards.org/pc-sound-cards/pc-sound-cards-%e2%80%93-an-introduction-5