A soundcard is what lets your computer play music. It also lets it understand sounds. In music production a soundcard is what lets you record and play back sound. There are many, many, many soundcards on the market, and most are not meant to do much more than playback music and movie audio. Even most of the top-line cards are meant for high quality playback for games.
There is another device called an audio-interface. Used in recording this device does the same basic things as a soundcard when it comes to recording, but it also includes a pre-amp that boosts the signal. That signal boost helps get rid of the problem of low and bad quality recordings.
Another important difference is that an audio-interface generally has connection ports for real microphones and instruments. Most soundcards can only support the small mics used for chatting, although better quality ones can support audio connections that might let you hook up other mics and instruments. However you will have to use adapters, and an important thing to remember is that the more times a signal has to move through an adapter, the worse the quality gets.
So now we know that a soundcard is best for playing music and basic recording functions, like speaking. If you want to record singing, or someone playing an instrument properly, you need to invest in an audio-interface.
An even better investment for a serious home producer is a USB mixer. A USB mixer offers the same ability to interface real instruments as a USB audio interface, but also gives you the ability to mix your recordings just like they do in a larger studio.
A mixer board lets you adjust the volume that a signal is recorded at. This helps you get a fine tuned recording, making it much easier to sync your volume levels in a song. More important is the fact you can record more than one signal at a time. Depending on the number of inputs, a whole band can record a song in real time. This is good for a band wanting to record a live track, or album. With a good enough quality laptop, a USB mixer board, and some extra recording gear, you can record a whole performance.
Another important thing a mixer can do is split a signal out to other sources. This can be used for basic things like using headphones, or for hooking up an effect, or effects for the signal. Sometimes you want to record with effects already in place, a mixer lets you do that.
A mixer board also has built in EQ, or equalization. This lets you adjust how your signal is recorded. It can be used to shave out unwanted sounds, to boost the frequency ranges of what you are recording, and/or to generally get a fine tune on your recording.
Many USB mixers have some built in effects. Most often compression is included. Compression is used to control the volume of the signal automatically. It can be used as simply as making sure that your levels don't go outside of a certain range, or for very specific sculpting of what is being recorded.
So now you know the differences between a soundcard, an audio-interface and a USB mixer. There is a large amount of price overlap with these devices. Using this information, with what you know about your computer and most importantly your needs in recording, you can make an educated decision for what you need to buy.
About Soundcards, Audio-Interface and USB Mixers For Computer Based Home Music ProductionMy name is Ryan Murphy and My love in life is music. Listening to it, making it and exploring it.
Music really is my drive in life.
I got into online marketing, graphic design, sales, and creative writing to help me in my dreams.
I write stories, have a book on online marketing out on Amazon's Kindle, sell t-shirts, and of course music.
Visit me at my home site http://ryan-c-murphy.com/
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