is this a good sound card?

newbiesforever · 10-24-2008, 11:15 PM

Since my audio won't stop making scratching and crackling sounds, I want to buy a new sound card, having no other explanation for the problem. (I don't think it's a Linux problem, because I'm sure I heard it in Windows, back when I ran non-virtualbox Windows XP. My virtualbox Windows XP produces no audio at all, saying "Host Audio Not Responding" no matter which driver I try; but that's another problem.) I looked at eBay, and this was the first one I was interested in: http://cgi.ebay.com/4-CH-C-MEDIA-AUD...1%7C240%3A1308 . It sounds nice, but I'm supposing it must be a piece of junk, because why would a decent sound card be less than US$10? (If I'm right, the seller is lying through his/her teeth in claiming it's good.) What do you think? (If I were sure it worked, I'd bid on it, because I haven't proved that the sound card (or whatever you call the motherboard's audio mechanism) is bad--I just haven't got any other ideas--and with this card, I wouldn't be risking very much money on my theory.

Quakeboy02 · 10-24-2008, 11:18 PM

You're looking at one of a lot of probably 1000 cheap soundcards from a dealer who has over 25,000 sales. The price looks right for a new, cheap, working soundcard, and no it's not a top-level soundcard.

H_TeXMeX_H · 10-25-2008, 03:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by newbiesforever

the first one I was interested in: http://cgi.ebay.com/4-CH-C-MEDIA-AUD...1%7C240%3A1308 . It sounds nice, but I'm supposing it must be a piece of junk, because why would a decent sound card be less than US$10?

The one there is a good one I think, it's a C-Media one, I've used some before and they worked well. I was surprised because it was much cheaper and better than the crappy creative ones that came with my pre-made desktop. It will use the following kernel alsa driver:

Code:

  ┌──────────────────── C-Media 8338, 8738, 8768, 8770 ─────────────────────┐
  │ CONFIG_SND_CMIPCI:                                                      │  
  │                                                                         │  
  │ If you want to use soundcards based on C-Media CMI8338, CMI8738,        │  
  │ CMI8768 or CMI8770 chips, say Y here and read                           │  
  │ <file:Documentation/sound/alsa/CMIPCI.txt>.                             │  
  │                                                                         │  
  │ To compile this driver as a module, choose M here: the module           │  
  │ will be called snd-cmipci.                                              │  
  │                                                                         │  
  │ Symbol: SND_CMIPCI [=m]                                                 │  
  │ Prompt: C-Media 8338, 8738, 8768, 8770                                  │  
  │   Defined at sound/pci/Kconfig:172                                      │  
  │   Depends on: HAS_IOMEM && !M68K && SOUND!=n && PCI && SND              │  
  │   Location:                                                             │  
  │     -> Device Drivers                                                   │  
  │       -> Sound                                                          │  
  │         -> Advanced Linux Sound Architecture                            │  
  │           -> PCI devices                                                │  
  │   Selects: SND_OPL3_LIB && SND_MPU401_UART && SND_PCM                   │

oskar · 10-25-2008, 05:39 PM

With many distributions switching to pulseaudio you might want one that is compatible. Couldn't find anything on this card that says there is a conflict, so I don't think there will be a problem.

It is very likely not a good soundcard in terms of quality. I bought a behringer uca-202 for my laptop which goes for around 30$ and is fully compatible with pulseaudio. This is probably the bottom end if you want something that sounds decent. If you're just going to hook it up to a pair of pc speakers, then it doesn't matter anyway.