USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Still new to all of this? Feel free to post in any of the subforums on this site, but in this subforum newbie questions are especially encouraged!

Moderators: MattKingUSA, khz

Post Reply
blockflute
Established Member
Posts: 41
Joined: Thu Apr 01, 2021 8:58 am
Has thanked: 6 times
Been thanked: 2 times

USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by blockflute »

My laptop just has the basic on-board sound chip. Would quality of recording via a microphone be any better with a better soundcard, or would it make relatively little difference? I am a total beginner at this and am still feeling my way around. I don't have much in the way of audio equipment. I have an "okay" usb mic, but am unable to use it if I choose the onboard sound as output. I gather this is a fairly standard thing and the easiest solution for me is to get a mic that would work via the same sound device as the output. (I'm using Ardour btw, just the basic one in the Debian repo, which I know is fairly out of date.) Good quality sound cards for desktop machines are common enough, but I think it would be useful to be able to use the laptop for recording; if I have a USB sound card, I could use it with either machine. A quick look on Amazon, say, reveals several cards costing around €10, so probably no better than what's on the motherboard. I've seen USB "audio interface" boxes by eg Behringer or Focusrite but I'm not sure if these handle both input and output, or are just designed to work with microphones. If the latter, I'd still have the problem I have now with the USB mic. Some of these audio interfaces are also pretty cheap, so hard to believe they would be that much better than the built-in sound, but maybe I'm wrong about that. I'm not planning to get a condenser mic so won't need power for it.
User avatar
Michael Willis
Established Member
Posts: 1451
Joined: Mon Oct 03, 2016 3:27 pm
Location: Rocky Mountains, North America
Has thanked: 68 times
Been thanked: 162 times
Contact:

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by Michael Willis »

Please read through a recent thread about this very topic.

The short story is that if you want to record, then yes, get a decent XLR microphone and an audio interface. Even an inexpensive audio interface will likely be much better than your onboard sound.
blockflute
Established Member
Posts: 41
Joined: Thu Apr 01, 2021 8:58 am
Has thanked: 6 times
Been thanked: 2 times

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by blockflute »

Thanks - I had in fact read through that thread but still felt a bit confused about it. If I got something like this https://www.amazon.de/-/en/UMC22-Behrin ... 182&sr=8-1 which is pretty cheap at €43, would it give me better quality, and also be seen by Ardour as a single unified input and output device? If so, it seems well worth having. I've noticed also that the basic volume control isn't very good wrt the mic - a tiny adjustment moves it from almost inaudible to overpowering - so presumably this would also address that issue?
User avatar
milo
Established Member
Posts: 1242
Joined: Wed Sep 06, 2017 2:55 am
Location: Southern Utah, USA
Has thanked: 275 times
Been thanked: 218 times
Contact:

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by milo »

Yes, that Behringer model is a particularly good choice for an entry level Linux audio interface. I have a similar model made by Focusrite, and buying that thing changed my life forever. In a good way.
User avatar
bluzee
Established Member
Posts: 338
Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2020 11:43 pm
Has thanked: 18 times
Been thanked: 88 times

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by bluzee »

The Behringer UMC HD audio interfaces are an excellent value. Don't let the low price dissuade you.

With a USB audio interface your USB microphone will not be of much use though. As mentioned a regular XLR microphone is what you'll want. USB microphones have an inherit problem of having a high noise floor due to the added electronics.

Plain old SM 57 and SM 58 Shure dynamic mics are not that expensive, durable and sound good.

Moving into Large condenser mics a good value mic is the Rode NT1. I picked up one used on ebay years ago for about $75. New I think they are about $300ish now. Another commonly recommend one is MXL 990. They are about $100 new. I listened to a shoot out between the two and you can definitely hear the higher noise floor on the MXL but it wasn't totally unacceptable for the price. There are shoot out videos on youtube.
blockflute
Established Member
Posts: 41
Joined: Thu Apr 01, 2021 8:58 am
Has thanked: 6 times
Been thanked: 2 times

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by blockflute »

Thanks. It was the Shure dynamic that I was thinking of getting, as it seems to be widely recommended as good quality and value. Likewise, the Behringer seems particularly good value. I have no expectation of using the current USB mic.

So, sorry to be slow, but to be crystal clear: I could plug mic and headphones into the Behringer, and Ardour would see them as a single i/o device, and I would be able to record via the mic while listening to a pre-recorded track that I had been imported into Ardour? I see some AIs offer direct monitoring of the mic on the headphones, but I can't think of any reason why I would want to do that.
User avatar
milo
Established Member
Posts: 1242
Joined: Wed Sep 06, 2017 2:55 am
Location: Southern Utah, USA
Has thanked: 275 times
Been thanked: 218 times
Contact:

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by milo »

Yes. The Behrinher becomes your sound card. You plug your inputs, headphones, and monitors into it and don't bother with your built-in soundcard while using the USB sound card.

Here's a little ditty I wrote about my Focusrite device when I had figured out the answers to your questions by brute force experimentation and RTM methods. https://sanderson.band/2017/09/04/focus ... me-studio/

(Note that the qjacktl config issue I had on that machine is no longer an issue for me. Not sure what that was about, and I haven't seen it on any other systems.)
blockflute
Established Member
Posts: 41
Joined: Thu Apr 01, 2021 8:58 am
Has thanked: 6 times
Been thanked: 2 times

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by blockflute »

Great, thank you - just what I needed to know.
User avatar
Fmajor7add9
Established Member
Posts: 218
Joined: Sun Dec 31, 2017 3:56 am
Location: Might be moving to Montana soon
Has thanked: 48 times
Been thanked: 27 times
Contact:

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by Fmajor7add9 »

blockflute wrote: Fri Apr 02, 2021 4:37 pm I have an "okay" usb mic, but am unable to use it if I choose the onboard sound as output. I gather this is a fairly standard thing and the easiest solution for me is to get a mic that would work via the same sound device as the output. (I'm using Ardour btw, just the basic one in the Debian repo, which I know is fairly out of date.) Good quality sound cards for desktop machines are common enough, but I think it would be useful to be able to use the laptop for recording; if I have a USB sound card, I could use it with either machine.
If the question is how to use the USB mic as input and onboard sound as output this is possible both when using Pulse or Jack. Probably ALSA as well, I just haven't tried that. If using jack you need a bridge into its main interface. There's one called zita that's baked into Ubuntu Studio that works for me.
...USB "audio interface" boxes by eg Behringer or Focusrite but I'm not sure if these handle both input and output, or are just designed to work with microphones. If the latter, I'd still have the problem I have now with the USB mic. Some of these audio interfaces are also pretty cheap, so hard to believe they would be that much better than the built-in sound, but maybe I'm wrong about that. I'm not planning to get a condenser mic so won't need power for it.
Dynamic mics are easiest to handle as your room sound doesn't come into play nor the sound of anything else in the house or out on the street so it's simpler because shielding and room treatment isn't as critical.

An interface makes sense for anything tethered to the desk where your rig is set up. In particular if you want to plug in instruments as well as mics.

If you want to do anything that involves recording a lot of voices and acoustic instruments elsewhere, performances, jam and demo sessions, musical friends you know, choirs, sound for video and so on - or you're interested in sampling and creating your own libraries of real world sounds to split into sonic pieces in your sample editor, I'd recommend a portable recorder with built-in mics and USB interface as well. Zoom H4n or Tascam's (can't recall specific model) f.ex.
blockflute
Established Member
Posts: 41
Joined: Thu Apr 01, 2021 8:58 am
Has thanked: 6 times
Been thanked: 2 times

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by blockflute »

Fmajor7add9 wrote: Sun Apr 04, 2021 2:41 pm If the question is how to use the USB mic as input and onboard sound as output this is possible both when using Pulse or Jack. Probably ALSA as well, I just haven't tried that. If using jack you need a bridge into its main interface. There's one called zita that's baked into Ubuntu Studio that works for me.
Thank you for all the additional information, I'm most grateful. I suppose using the USB mic with the onboard sound is the fundamental question, but I've pretty much decided to skip it, on the basis that if I'm getting a better mic anyway, I might as well just get one that works as is. At the moment, I can run Ardour without bothering with Jack. I can see that Jack could be a very useful tool, but at the same time it looks like something that needs time to sort out. This whole business is just a bit of fun, something my brother and I can have a go at during the current lockdown situation (and beyond as we live in different countries). I've got LibraZiK running on an old laptop at the moment and I can see that there is something there called zita, but I haven't got even the most basic idea of how to use it, and at the moment I don't have a great deal of time to play about with things like that to try to get them to work.
User avatar
Fmajor7add9
Established Member
Posts: 218
Joined: Sun Dec 31, 2017 3:56 am
Location: Might be moving to Montana soon
Has thanked: 48 times
Been thanked: 27 times
Contact:

Re: USB soundcard: is a decent one available and useful?

Post by Fmajor7add9 »

blockflute wrote: Mon Apr 05, 2021 12:00 pm ....At the moment, I can run Ardour without bothering with Jack. I can see that Jack could be a very useful tool, but at the same time it looks like something that needs time to sort out. This whole business is just a bit of fun, something my brother and I can have a go at during the current lockdown situation (and beyond as we live in different countries). I've got LibraZiK running on an old laptop at the moment and I can see that there is something there called zita, but I haven't got even the most basic idea of how to use it, and at the moment I don't have a great deal of time to play about with things like that to try to get them to work.
if you want input from the USB mic only and output from the Behringer only Ardour can mix them using alsa (as Robin G X42 mentions here https://discourse.ardour.org/t/using-tw ... r/105727/4)

if zita is setup like in Ubuntu Studio you will automatically see your USB mic pop up on the Jack canvas or patchbay when it's plugged in

in any case go for Ardour, good plan, and use https://discourse.ardour.org where the main devs and power users are bang on every topic raised it seems.

consensus I've sensed around here is that if you're doing a lot of synthy and MIDI sequenced stuff you'll end up using Qtractor or NON (https://non.tuxfamily.org/wiki/Documentation) or something else. Then you're gonna need Jack to hook and sync up MIDI and audio (in Ardour) but it really is quite straight-forward after the first hour or so.
Best of luck, hope you're making dope beats soon soon soon.
Post Reply