[love_my_grados]

Hello. Did someone try the external Behringer u-CONTROL UCA202 sound card? How does it compare to cheap Creative or other cheap sound cards? I'm interested in budget external sound card to sound better than creative live (with 48kHz software upsampling). How does it compare with that?

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/produ...ace?sku=702540

 

[vcoheda]

Bump for any responses to this.

Thanks.

 

[bigwormie]

i have one and it works if ALL you want is an optical connection between computer and another device but overrides your sound card. Rca connections sound terrible with it.

 

[EnOYiN]

You do want any other soundcard instead of this. This is not meant to be used and you can notice that the moment you plug in a headphone. This thing is mainly about recording. (something like recording LPs and tapes etc.) It doesn't work well as an external soundcard. For the recording part it works really well for the price. Most people who reviewed it on the Behringer site are happy with it. As am I.

I'd say the TBAAM works a lot better for what you want. (depending on what creative you have got)

http://www.turtlebeach.com/site/prod...udioadv/micro/

(a lot more expensive):
http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Transit-main.html

It really depends on what you want to use it for. If you want to use it just to drive cans you might want to buy an USB-DAC/amp. If you want to use it to drive your 7.1 Hifi Creative Soundsystem you might want to buy something else.

 

[Banach]

I use it to get the digital signal through usb and sent it via toslink to an external dac. I am happy with it. I wonder if someone has compared it with some more known stuff like the edirol ua-1ex.

 

[sejarzo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by EnOYiN /img/forum/go_quote.gif ........... (a lot more expensive): http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Transit-main.html It really depends on what you want to use it for. If you want to use it just to drive cans you might want to buy an USB-DAC/amp. If you want to use it to drive your 7.1 Hifi Creative Soundsystem you might want to buy something else.

I saw this some time ago and thought it was a mistake or wouldn't last long, but it's still shown as an active item:

http://www.pssl.com/bitemdetail.tpl?...97&source=FROO

Transit for only $55 plus shipping and you get a headset to use with Skype or some other low-rez app........

 

[Amarok]

I use one with my Mac PB. I had an M-Audio USB Transit and it would hang 43.279% of the time when I plugged it in.
The 202 works perfectly and needs no driver.

My CIAudio VDA.1 would not lock onto the signal put out by the TB.
I also had TONS of problems getting the TB installed on my Windwoes box.

I have m@d skillz in these areas, so don't even think that could possible have
done anythign wrong!!1!! Musta been the devises.

But, as with almost everything, I'm sure others have had much success and happiness with these products.

A

 

[jrbdmb]

I want to record into my laptop from a phono / stereo output. I have no interest at this point in the line out / headphone out of the 202, but it sounds like for recording old albums this should work OK?

(If I was recording live music or other reference material I might be put off by the 16-bit DACs on this, but for what I want to do you can't beat the price.)

 

[Musiq]

Made mainly for recording on a laptop, it has a headphone output, as well as multiple ins and outs. There's one on Eb@y now.

 

[systema]

Here's the good bits: UCA202 is based on a Burr-Brown (yes, it's a burr brown) PCM2902, which is not a bad usb dac chip, considering its internal architecture can bypass src and operate at 44.1khz.

Now the bad news: the UCA202 is littered with cheap opamps (for line out) and very cheap opamps (guess what, for headphone out). the headphone out is a 4560, which is slow and doesn't offer transient that we usually expect from a decent source. Line output is slightly better with the jrc21xx(can't read the rest of the model number).

With some mods, e.g. changing the line output coupling caps to something decent, it may not sound exactly "high end" but it has good enough sound to cover the needs of someone who wants to hear a couple of songs with decent sound quality.

 

[D_4_Dog]

or check out echo indigo io

 

[Amarok]

Quote:

Originally Posted by systema /img/forum/go_quote.gif Here's the good bits: UCA202 is based on a Burr-Brown (yes, it's a burr brown) PCM2902, which is not a bad usb dac chip, considering its internal architecture can bypass src and operate at 44.1khz. Now the bad news: the UCA202 is littered with cheap opamps (for line out) and very cheap opamps (guess what, for headphone out). the headphone out is a 4560, which is slow and doesn't offer transient that we usually expect from a decent source. Line output is slightly better with the jrc21xx(can't read the rest of the model number). With some mods, e.g. changing the line output coupling caps to something decent, it may not sound exactly "high end" but it has good enough sound to cover the needs of someone who wants to hear a couple of songs with decent sound quality.

Does it mangle the bits twixt the USB and TOSLINK?

 

[x99]

Cheap opamps or not, I'm 90% certain I've seen this thing Rightmark's before, and IIRC, it was pushing .04-.05% THD levels, and pretty bad S/N. In absolute terms, that isn't awful, but it is an order of magnitude worse than many other devices like the the Transit.

Then again, maybe all that distortion is because they made this thing single ended, and it thus sounds sooper-dooper awwwwsuuumm..

Quote:

Originally Posted by systema /img/forum/go_quote.gif Here's the good bits: UCA202 is based on a Burr-Brown (yes, it's a burr brown) PCM2902, which is not a bad usb dac chip, considering its internal architecture can bypass src and operate at 44.1khz. Now the bad news: the UCA202 is littered with cheap opamps (for line out) and very cheap opamps (guess what, for headphone out). the headphone out is a 4560, which is slow and doesn't offer transient that we usually expect from a decent source. Line output is slightly better with the jrc21xx(can't read the rest of the model number). With some mods, e.g. changing the line output coupling caps to something decent, it may not sound exactly "high end" but it has good enough sound to cover the needs of someone who wants to hear a couple of songs with decent sound quality.

 

[mgiammarco]

Hello,
I have seen this interesting thread.
I need infact a low cost dac and uca202 seems to fit my needs.
I have (a lot) of questions:

- is it bit perfect? (so I can use it as a usb/spdif converter if it is a bad dac)
- does it run under linux?
- is it so bad? I mean you see that transit or edirol are better. But transit has not rca out ( i need it), edirol UA1EX costs more but I have read it uses the same dac. It seems also that edirol UA-1X and uca202 are very "similar".
- is there an alternative at a so low price point?

Thanks in advance for your replies!

Mario

 

[abs@nilenet.com]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mgiammarco /img/forum/go_quote.gif Hello, I have seen this interesting thread. I need infact a low cost dac and uca202 seems to fit my needs. I have (a lot) of questions: - is it bit perfect? (so I can use it as a usb/spdif converter if it is a bad dac) Thanks in advance for your replies! Mario

Sorry, I don't know the answer to your other questions but in regard to being bit perfect, it is in fact bit perfect with Windows XP. I am not sure with other operating systems, however.

Happy Listening!