Which sound card for computer speakers and keyboard ?

The M-Audio Delta Audiophile 2496 seems an obvious choice, seeing that you will be using it with other M-Audio equipment.

It's a very decent soundcard - I own it - with good sound quality and a solid driver and control panel.

The M-Audio Delta Audiophile 192 is a slightly more expensive option, featuring 192kHz capabilities (not very useful) and balanced output. I don't think it's worth the extra money over the 2496, as the sound quality is not supposed to be any better.

From the links you gave, I see that those speakers have both a balanced TRS input and a normal unbalanced RCA input. Whichever card you pick, you won't need adapters.

The ESI Juli@ is comparable and gets good reviews, though I don't have experience with it.

Yes I think you made a mistake. Maybe you can cancel the order or return it. You bought a card made for surround sound, which screams 24bit/192kHz like it's the best thing ever (it's not any better than 24/96), does not have MIDI capabilities and is more expensive than an M-Audio Delta Audiophile 2496.

It may sound okay, I don't know. It wouldn't surprise me at all if that card resamples everything to 48kHz or another frequency. That would be bad, though this is just my speculation. The M-Audio can handle 8-96kHz without resampling.

You bought stereo speakers, so you don't need a surround soundcard. You need a soundcard that does stereo very well. You also bought a MIDI keyboard. Though it's compatible with USB it seems, it's nice to have to option to hook it up directly to the sound card via a normal MIDI connection. In case you upgrade your keyboard in the future, the MIDI connection of the soundcard opens up possibilities as well. Then there's the M-Audio driver that does very well with ASIO, something very useful when making music because of the very low latency it offers. The soundcard you bought does not seem to have an ASIO compatible driver.

It's not that I want you to buy an M-Audio soundcard. It's the obvious choice from my point of view and it ticks all the boxes and is upgrade proof.

I understand you're confused about all the inputs/outputs, but I doubt that you need/use all of them on a 7.1 channel card.

On the 2496 there are two pairs of red/white RCA connections. One pair is the analog stereo output, which you connect directly to your speakers. You only need this pair (for now). This is the output that on other soundcards is usually a light green 3.5mm jack. The other pair is the analog stereo input, for example to record from an analog source such as a tape deck, or the analog outputs of any other device. Then there's also a many-pins connector where you connect the included break-out cable. It provides you with a digital input and output, both in coax SPDIF format, and MIDI inputs and outputs. The MIDI input you may use instead of a USB connection to connect your MIDI keyboard. These additional inputs/outputs are provided by a break-out cable because the backpanel of the soundcard is too small to fit them all.

Inputs/outputs the M-Audio doesn't have and the other card does: microphone input, side surround output, center/subwoofer output, back surround output, optical digital input and optical digital output. You won't need those. If you ever need a microphone input you can always still use the one already on your mobo. If you want quality from a microphone, you should look into a decent microphone and appropriate preamp anyway.

What you want when using a MIDI keyboard, is a latency as low as possible. This means that when you press a key on the keyboard, the sound instantly comes out of your computer. If there's a small lag, it's difficult to keep a good rhythm. This is where ASIO drivers come in handy. This type of driver, which the M-Audio card but also other more 'semi-professional' cards such as the ESI juli@ and others support, makes sure that the latency is as low as possible by bypassing as much of the operating system (Windows) as possible and keeping buffers as small as possible. That way, the sound comes out of your computer as quickly as possible.

Nice pun by the way, I just noticed. 

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Originally Posted by 0524432 

 

Did I make a mistake? Thanks for input

There's not need, I'm glad I could help. Enjoy your new equipment.
 

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Originally Posted by 0524432 

Thank you very much for this info. How can I repay you?

That's correct.

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Originally Posted by 0524432 

I assume I just need to order a cable like this http://modncomputers.info/shop/images/AV%20CABLE.jpeg so the new m audio sound card will work?

Sure. I am very pleased with cables from Blue Jeans Audio. No snake oil or pseudo science, just very well-made cables for a reasonable price. If you go to their website, you need the 'Stereo Audio' cables.

Which driver are you talking about? I assume you do not have the soundcard yet, so you mean the driver of the keyboard.
 Whether it works on its own now, I'm not sure. I do not have experience with a MIDI keyboard, but most of the times you can select the type of driver to use in the preferences of the appropriate application. Check there first. This is also true for the soundcard. Perhaps your application is still using a standard Microsoft driver. You can also select an input driver under 'sound' in the configuration screen, but ASIO will not be listed (I think) because it is designed to circumvent Windows as much as possible. The idea is, after all, to route the signal from application to the device directly, or the other way around.