m-audio confusion posted by fortymile

hey all

i finally bought my new system so that means its soundcard time. but unfortunately i have more confusion with soundcards than with most anything else.

i've decided that m-audio products look great. everyone here says great things about them. so i want to buy from that company. although i have somewhere around $200 to spend, i'd like to save as much as i can, because i'd like to use whats left over to buy a cheap outboard compressor or parametric EQ or something. so, i'm looking to buy a soundcard that i'll be happy with...nothing that is more than i need, but nothing that's inadequate, either. forgive me for typing all of the following out, but i need to see if my own thought processes are making sense.

as some of you know, part of what i work on is industrial/grunge stuff, by myself. i have a korg triton synth which i use for drum tracks, backing instruments, and ear candy. i'm accustomed to having my triton synced up--through midi time clock--to my current 8-track digital studio, and i work on songs by letting the studio trigger the pre-recorded things i have on the triton--which themselves change from time to time. i dont commit the triton tracks to my studio until they're finalized, so what i'm saying is that i work for days at a time listening to the triton through the 8-track, while not recording it on the 8-track. in this way i build guitar and bass, muting the keyboard tracks and playing along to a click track when i record so that i just get the guitar/bass and not the triton stuff--till that stuff is ready. then i commit the keyboard tracks to thier own tracks in the studio.

i think what this means is that i need a soundcard with two sets of stereo in's. that way i can listen to an incoming device as i listen to myself play along with it. is this correct?

i think it also means that i need a soundcard that has midi in/out built into it, so that i can control the triton from my sequencing program. i guess it also means that i don't require a card that has midi sounds built in, because i dont work with such things. on the other hand, i dont care if the card does have built in sounds, if it suits my needs and isnt too expensive.

so i'm looking for advice. maybe m-audio isn't right for me. from the recommendations i see, the only one that will work with my system is the audiophile 2496. but this has one set of stereo in's and one set of coaxial s/pdif in's--and i dont even know what those are. does this mean that the only card--from among the recommended m-audio cards from dbmasters--is the $229 delta 44?

thanks for any clarity you can impart. i wouldnt be opposed to buying a sixty dollar behringer mixer and using a soundcard with 2 stereo in's...if it will save me money.