onetonnemusic

Originally posted Feb 22, 2003 by funnel

And by and large, it appears that they have been successful, and updating your soundcard has become a bi-yearly event for most users, and for those of us that use the pc for music creation – every time we can afford it. It’s appropriate that we look at the Audigy 2 from a musical perspective. When Creative bought EMU, they put the EMU10K chip in it for synthesis – a move that alone sold them hundreds of thousands of cards. This gave the SoundBlaster a pedigree that meant something to the music community. From 99 onwards, the SoundBlaster live in its various iterations became a decent entry level option for those interested in dabbling with making music on their PC.

Providing more than adequate recording facilities, the Audigy 2 is a great place to start for someone who only needs a few channels of input to work from, and has ideally some SPDIF digital compatible mixing gear (If you want to get multiple tracks down at once), which for example, can be bought for as little as $900 for a Behringher UB series mixing desk. For most users 2 simultaneous inputs will satisfy their basic recording needs. Especially for those who just like to musically doodle down their thoughts as it were. Even in multi thousand dollar home studios, this is often the most regular recording that goes on – you could also hire a digital compatible desk for a weekend if you wanted to get down a full arrangement using your home rig. That’s part of the beauty of SPDIF, It’s dead cheap for the company to add it as a feature, and it’s a quite powerful option too. Anyone looking to build a project studio could certainly do worse than the Audigy 2 for basic recording functionality and nearly universal compatibility. If you were mad keen on the SPDIF and didn’t want to bother with the other features, Guillemot do a soundcard called the Fortissimo3 that comes with optical SPDIF for less than a hundred AUD.

One sore point from the creative cards from days of yore was the complete absence of ASIO support. For the uninitiated, ASIO is the chosen method for interfacing with programs such as Cubase and its myriad of plug-ins. (ASIO = Audio Stream Input Output) Previously SoundBlaster users have had to suffice with the direct X audio drivers which meant latency. ASIO provides an efficient way to manage all of the traffic and latency is reduced greatly, even on a fairly low-spec machine. This in itself is a good reason for many existing Creative customers to make the step up. Relatively low latency recording combined with facilities for everyday gaming certainly make this a pretty tempting option.

Creative usually bundle a fair bit of software with their higher end gear to try and make it more appealing for those of us who can’t justify the extra dollars by features alone. First up is the creative media player, which is – kind of crappy. You can make use of its native de-clicking (To remove vinyl clicks and static) or various other onboard effects from within the software, but it doesn’t really hold enough for this writer to want to uninstall Winamp. Basic functionality is there, but it’s all a bit superfluous. It comes with a limited version of Native Instruments’ rather fine Traktor mixing program which is well worth checking out. Creative also promotes the use of soundfonts www.soundfonts.com with the Audigy. Which are basically freely available midi patches. Handy and freely available over the net. It also comes with a special edition of Cubasis, which is ideal for anyone thinking of that first audio program – not the greatest in terms of features, but more than enough to get the swing of things. It also comes with a version of Ulead Video studio, which is most likely due to the inclusion of the firewire connector.

Connectivity wise, the card offers more than enough for recording from most garden variety music making devices – the quality is certainly comparable to other devices at this price point. If you were to spend the money on pure 24bit digital to analogue (D/A) converters in a card/breakout box, you’d struggle to get more than 4 I/O. Although the quality of the D/A converters would more than likely be a step up from the type found in the Audigy. Will you notice the difference as a project/bedroom muso? Probably not. Another reason to recommend the Audigy is that you get a card that should function perfectly for playback and sound in computer games and the like – with added hoopy features like EAX which any pure D/A A/D conversion card won’t. It has a 106db signal to noise ratio, which is quite impressive for a card of it's type.

We’ve mentioned a few things like digital/analogue conversion, 24-bit, Signal to Noise ratio, etcetera which we will look at in greater depth in different articles – further down the track, stay tuned for those. In summation, it’s hard not to recommend this, if not on the basis of the connectivity, but on the software bundle – or the fact that it’s a complete setup for someone looking to turn their pc into a musical sketch pad, or want to begin to explore recording on your computer without a massive financial outlay.

Price: $489.50 AUD at the time of writing from www.auspcmarket.com.au

Specs:

24bit 96kHz Recording

106dB Signal to Noise Ratio.

THX Certified

Dolby Digital EX

6.1

EAX Advanced HD

SB1394 Firewire

ASIO (finally!)

DVD Audio

Rather groovy remote control

Connectivity:

Coax SPDIF in/out

Optical SPDIF in/out

Headphone out

2 x Line in/mic in

Midi in/out

SB1394 (IEE1394 or Firewire)

6.1 audio output

Bundled with:

Soldier of Fortune 2

Hitman 2 Double Helix

Cubasis Suite

Ulead Video Studio

Native Instruments Traktor SE

Verdict:

Quality 5/5

Value 5/5

Functionality 4/5

Overall 4.5/5

Distributor: Creative

Web: http://www.soundblaster.com