""Parts left off cost nothing and cause no service problems"" -Henry Ford

Have you looked at the M-Audio Audiophile 2496? I use it for transferring vinyl to digital and I'm very pleased with the results. I don't think there are drivers for Vista though.

The specs sound pretty good.. What's the signal/noise ratio? And the dynamic range?

http://www.akihabaranews.com/en/news...ound+card.html

Hmm.. If you buy something you don't like then it's no loss? Good thing it ain't your money.

To the OP, Did you take the distortion test I pointed you to? If so, what were your results?

A bit "eccentric" eh? More like full on bat guano crazy.. Communication breakdown, Its always the same, I'm having a nervous breakdown, Drive me insane! To the OP, be careful dude. That 350Z ain't no Toyota Corolla. As the former owner of many high performance cars from a '62...

My take on things is somewhat different than many here. Do you think someone's first car should be a 350Z? Do you think that a new driver could properly appreciate such a car? Developing an "ear" as an audiophile is not an instantaneous process, it takes time and practice to hear the...

Make absolutely sure that your power supply has sufficient amperage to run your mobo. I've smoked a mobo before from not having enough amperage capacity in the power supply. If you're going to run Vista, get plenty of ram, Vista is a memory hog and also wants a fairly power processor to run...

Probably not a whole lot smaller. Six channels of heavy duty amplification take up some room, if only for the heatsinks.

Check out this Harman Kardon receiver.. http://www.amazon.com/Kardon-AVR-140...898368&sr=8-33

Headphone adapters from 1/4 to 3.5mm are readily available and very cheap. Your mobo has 7.1 built in so that shouldn't be a problem. The 1212 has excellent specs on the analog outs, 120 db of dynamic range an 20hz to 20khz +/- .05 db. It also has both coaxial and optical ins and outs...

You may wish to try the AndrewLabs plugin for WinAmp. It is slightly more adjustable than the Dolby Headphone plugin http://www.andrewlabs.com/

Quote: Originally Posted by nadavnaz How'd it compete with creative products (x-fi at different prices, when I said not overpriced I didn't necessarily mean under 100$... I'm not that limited. for my cause? (Which would be better for line in/spdif recording and which would eventually...

For a starter setup how about a Turtle Beach Montego? It has everything you asked for and can be had for fairly cheap. Look it over and get the specs here: http://www.turtlebeach.com/products/.../indetail.aspx You can get Vista drivers from the Turtle Beach website. Buy it here...