Recommendations so far: 1. Echo Indigo I/O Looks good. Only thing I'm worried about is the converters being inside the computer. Is it really well-shielded and flat noise floor? I guess if there's some whine but it's *much* lower than a typical sound card, I could live with that. They look pretty inexpensive, regardless. $180 or so. Maybe I should just get one and try it. > They deliver real-time performance at 96kHz, 24 bit > down to 32 samples. By "down to 32 samples" are you talking buffer size? Is this what JACK calls "frames/period"? > USB works well, but most people have to really coax it to get it working with > lower latencies. That may change with USB 2.0 support coming for new cards, > but I'd hold off for now. Yeah, that is the experience I had with the Edirol and M-Audio I tried. Usable, but I can do better... I was looking at FireWire devices, but if they aren't supported in Linux yet, I'll hold off on that, too. So PCMCIA is definitely capable of low latency, comparable to an internal sound card? (Comparable to PCI, I guess?) 2. Echo Mona/Layla/Gina/Darla/other girl names Looks good, but a little overkill. The newer smaller ones would be great, but don't have the PC card interface. Layla24 $550 Mona $650? PC card $200 If the Gina 3G had a PC card (that didn't cost 10 times its components) and was well-supported, I would get that. Or something like M audio's Firewire 410 or Firewire Audiophile. That is the range I am looking at. 3. > RME HDSP Multiface - you won't ever look back. Linux support is superb. Looks good, but overkill. I can't imagine I would need all those ins and outs. Maybe in 5 years I will, but I will also be able to afford it more easily then. $650 for the multiface and $300(!) for the PC card. I am looking for something in between these in price range. $300 or so. The Indigo would probably be ok, but maybe better than that... Is there anything with MIDI, too? I haven't learned enough about MIDI interfaces to understand the kind of latency involved, or used it very much with ALSA, but something that could handle both at low latencies would be great. (Or two separate things, but I only have one PCMCIA slot.) I have a Midisport 1x1, but it has bad latency in windows, and I haven't bothered to figure out how to get it working in Linux. Why do they make things that go up to 96 kHz but with frequency response cut off at 20? I don't get it. I would love to be able to record ultrasound for like science experiments or for maintaining all audible frequencies when slowing sounds down. And audiophiles think they can hear it. Sounds like the manufacturers would want to have it go up to at least 35 or so in their interfaces, but nooo... Maybe I should just make my own...
