i'm using a SB 5.1 audigy with kx driver. looks like it's broken now (still investigating though..). pls suggest me a good (but cheap ) SC which is a good balance for music/movie/games & some music production as well (sequencers, VSTs..). i know historically SB cards are good for games but musicians hate them because of the latency & poor performance/control. i hv been using kx driver which somehow does improve the performance. so should i buy another SB again or what? i do have a usb audio interface but this normally is for my laptop.

btw, what kind of card slot we have these days? my SC is still using the old PCI u know

What is 'cheap'?

There are still PCI/PCI-E sound cards out there.. But enough interfaces tend to be firewire these days, and a couple low end ones being USB

You could look somewhere like here
http://www.zzounds.com/cat--Audio-Interfaces--2418

It also really depends what kind of functionality you need - like, do you need mic preamps, or how many inputs, how many outputs, need digital I/O, etc.

M-Audio seems to make some decent budget interfaces, although I have personally never tried any of them.

if you're into music production and want external (which is much useful and versatile than internal) soundcard, this.
http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/FireWireSolo.html

if you strictly want to spend as little as possible, this. but i don't recommend anyway, stay away from USB 1.1 if possible.
http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Transit.html

if you want internal soundcard for some reason, this.
http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Audiophile2496.html
or this
http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Audiophile192.html

but there're other specific needs like surround and things digital input/output, mic preamp or not etc etc, be more specific and I can help you choose one.

the reason why all m-audio because you can buy at timesquare (or from friends you know) and local supports are there. it's not like when your soundcard problem you bring to chapalang technicians to repair.

The Emu 0101 is always the popular choice.....
But I would always recommend something like the Line6 POD-UX series if you want to do vocal, guitar or bass recordings...... comes with great software AND hardware.
However, they really can't be used for games and stuff like that...... just purely recording stuff.

That's the problem..... soundcards that are good for games/movies generally isn't that good for recording, and vice versa. Best bet? Get a cheap Soundblaster (or asus Xonar) for gaming, and get a medium priced UX hardware interface.

cheap as in under RM500

hmm.. most recommendation are for pure musician use. i'm trying to find something of balance. i got a 5.1 pc spk system which i still intend to use. all those external interface normally only have stereo line out/headphone out which are more suitable for monitor type spk & not pc spk. i guess i still gotta look at SB one, i'm afraid.

i'm looking at maybe SB PCI-express X-Fi titanium (RM3xx) which said to support low latency ASIO?

It seems to me that you want a gaming soundcard then..... as musician's rely on all the different inputs as well as the speed.

I personally don't like Soundblaster any more, because of their whole policy on drivers. Try out the asus Xonar range. Good driver support and decent latency as well.

soundcards all getting cheaper and cheaper

im on a now ancient SB audigy 4.
suits my purpose for gaming / movies / music just fine.

not really for gaming but more for music/movie playback with occasional music work. my current SB with kx driver seems ok for my needs. for more serious music work (midi keybrd & guitar) i already have a decent audio interface which i use together with my laptop. asus xonar looks good as well & seem to have good support for ASIO. i'll have a look at it. is this easily found in low yat? is the price range similar to SB?

The specs that define good for an amateur recording soundcard are mainly the DAC bit rate/sampling freq (24bit/96kHz being the studio standard) and also SNR aka Signal to Noise Ratio (the higher the better in dB).. Most high end soundcards of today meets these specs easily though..

Meanwhile, latency issues only comes into play if you are doing realtime recording with plugins and effects.. 99.9% of latency issues are software related, meaning that it can be fixed with the proper ASIO drivers.. So far I haven't had any ASIO issues with SB cards.. For generic drivers, I suggest that you use ASIO4ALL which supports most soundcards..

yeah i did use ASIO4ALL on my SB before. but after i found out about kx driver, i use it instead. it got it's own ASIO driver

Also, I think you'd be better of in the Hardware section. There are better comparisons there.
Here, we can mostly recommend musician's soundcards that does really nothing but recording instruments...... but recording them REALLY WELL.

check out www.musician.com.my theyve got some good audio interfaces there. im getting an m-audio fast track pro soon. its got 2 inputs, 4 outputs, headphone outs, midi in outs, EVERYTHING you might need for a home studio setup

The problem is..... he wants to use it for movies/music and games more than recording

if you're not into serious music making, you're fine with soundblaster.

however, when you want to work on high level monitoring with studio monitor, this is where you'll notice gaming soundcard won't cut it.

the very first thing is the noise floor on the output. you'll hear hissing simply by just turning up the volume and nothing at the output. it'll be troublesome if you're trying to listen to the details but the noise is distracting. also it'll be hard for you to monitor whether your input is clean or with hissing.

then you'll notice the clarity and frequency linearity of the output. gaming soundcard are not accurate on the frequencies, they're shaped in order to give you a more pleasing listening experiences - boosted treble and bass, scooped mids etc, although not by a lot. but you won't get to hear the whole spectrum. also, better soundcard offer better clarity on the sound. you'll be surprise there're things you never notice in your favourite songs until you listen on a better soundcard, even with the same speakers.

and lastly, latency. good soundcards are effecient and offer low latency without causing clicks and pops. yes, you can tweak with ASIO4ALL or KX, but won't get you any near those soundcards made for music productions.

you get what you pay for, and there's no in between too. either you use it for serious music making, or use it for gaming.

i do enjoy gaming on my m-audio FW410, though. and going to upgrade to ProFire 610 if anyone wants my FW410.

i agree with all yr points here. as i said i already hv a USB audio interface for serious music making on a laptop. i'll look at some of the SB card & asus xonar which support ASIO. i think i should be fine with either brands, for lite music making (hopefully)

any comment on this card :

http://www.audiotrak.net/products/prodigy71hifi/

one shop list it at RM400

i have an a capella group...
so what type of sound card should i use... (cheap also!!)

i need help....i dont know what sound card i have 2 buy...i want 2 compose music...and work with some software...what brand what model...plz help me.....