[shuurajou]

Hiya folks!

Just recently I purchased a Corda HA-I MKII amp for myself from Meier audio & have been very pleased with the results. I also bought some Audio-Technica ATH-A900's to compliment my Sennheiser HD-600's in my headphone collection.

Now, currently the source of my music is (don't hurt me), an Audigy 2. I do play quite alot of games, but Music is something that is also very important to me. It's to my understanding that the Audigy 2 is seriously quite crap.

So, I'm about to upgrade my soundcard. I hear the E-mu 1212m is a great sound card to purchase. I do have the money for it, so that's not a problem.

Being somebody who's new to this type of card, I was wondering if you kind folks could answer a few querys and educate me a little on this.

I see that the card comes in two pieces? Are both of these pieces essential to installation, do they have any benefit? Just more inputs/outputs? Considering all I would be doing is running it into my amp. Then from amp to headphones.

Saying that, I've seen a few people with 'Mogami Balance Cables' in their computer-source'd rigs. I'm unsure what these are, or what their purpose is. It would be great to have a link to a place to purchase/find out a bit about them.

I've heard a few people say it is possible to run two sound cards in a system at a time. This would be great for me, if I could set my Audigy 2 to 'primary' (if that's possible?) and then manually select the E-mu 1212m as sound card in winamp. So, all music would be from E-mu, everything else from the Audigy.

My desire, is a good computer based rig, but, do computer based rigs, compair to the regular rigs with stand-alone cdplayers etc in the end?

Sorry about the pig of a post guys, quite a few querys I know, thanks for anybody that has the patients to give me a responce

.

 

[Jasper994]

Quote:

Originally Posted by shuurajou Hiya folks! Just recently I purchased a Corda HA-I MKII amp for myself from Meier audio & have been very pleased with the results. I also bought some Audio-Technica ATH-A900's to compliment my Sennheiser HD-600's in my headphone collection.

Very nice...

Quote:

Now, currently the source of my music is (don't hurt me), an Audigy 2. I do play quite alot of games, but Music is something that is also very important to me. It's to my understanding that the Audigy 2 is seriously quite crap.

Yup, CRAP!!!

...but good for games...

Quote:

So, I'm about to upgrade my soundcard. I hear the E-mu 1212m is a great sound card to purchase. I do have the money for it, so that's not a problem.

shhhhh or we'll help you spend it faster than you can earn it...

Quote:

Being somebody who's new to this type of card, I was wondering if you kind folks could answer a few querys and educate me a little on this.

Sure, see above re: spending money

Quote:

I see that the card comes in two pieces? Are both of these pieces essential to installation, do they have any benefit? Just more inputs/outputs? Considering all I would be doing is running it into my amp. Then from amp to headphones.

Both pieces are not essential, though I don't know anyone who has installed the card without the daughter card. Yes, it is just more inputs and outputs, but you'll need the specific outputs that can be found only on the daughter card for your setup.


Quote:

Saying that, I've seen a few people with 'Mogami Balance Cables' in their computer-source'd rigs. I'm unsure what these are, or what their purpose is. It would be great to have a link to a place to purchase/find out a bit about them.

Really? I thought I was the only one whith Mogami cables... maybe I just post a lot...

A balanced cable offers better shielding and is good for long cable runs. Aparently it also allows for a lower noise floor in general and you can run the card "hotter," meaning higher output level. I don't think the Corda is balanced though so these aren't going to do you any good. You would just use standard interconnects with a RCA to 1/4" adapter so you can plug into the card itself. Otherwise, you can use a 1/4" to RCA cable but those aren't as easy to find, at least not if you want to go above Mogami or Monster's pro audio gear level in terms of cabling.

Quote:

I've heard a few people say it is possible to run two sound cards in a system at a time. This would be great for me, if I could set my Audigy 2 to 'primary' (if that's possible?) and then manually select the E-mu 1212m as sound card in winamp. So, all music would be from E-mu, everything else from the Audigy.

Has anyone actually gotten this setup to work? In theory it will work, and Creative seems to think it will...

If you do try this (assuming no one can give you a positive or negative answer to whether it works or not) make sure to carefully read the instructions in the box for doing this. BTW, the E-MU cards do require Win2k or XP.

Quote:

My desire, is a good computer based rig, but, do computer based rigs, compair to the regular rigs with stand-alone cdplayers etc in the end? Sorry about the pig of a post guys, quite a few querys I know, thanks for anybody that has the patients to give me a responce .

There is a very large discussion on this in the dedicated source thread. You will find arguments going both ways. In terms of the E-MU, however, it should at least outclass all common consumer level CDP's and surpass some of the lower end audiophile stuff. It has yet to be determined where it truely ranks though (so take this statement with a grain of salt). I can say from personal experience that it easily outclasses my DVD-A player in redbook but the DVD-A player is a budget player and not a high-end one by any stretch of the imagination.

Some things to think about:

If you believe in power conditioning, computers are a fairly noisy environment.

The E-MU's specs are very high, even when compared against most audiophile CDP's.

There is a lot of convenience in using a computer audio source since you can build and store playlists, and don't have to fuss with changing CD's.

Stand alone player's are often much quieter than computer sources, you may/will notice the noise from the computer (especially with your HD600's) if you have not taken special care to have a quiet PC.


Anyway, good luck in making your decision.

 

[cadobhuk]

I have both,and I change the system soundcard all the time.Because I use EMU not only for music,but for movies as well.Even in some games (those that dont support EAX or binaural headphone mode) I prefer EMU to au2.
EMU 1212m comes in two pieces,the daughter card provides analog inputs/outputs,so it is necessary.For me,with my windows XP,installing both EMU and Au2 was a little tricky.Whenever I had au2 installed,and tried to install EMU and start windows,windows automatically found the new hardware and installed EMU as audigy before I could do anything.I had to uninstall Au2 completely and delete all the driver dlls and then install EMU first,and then Au2 again.