M-Audio Audiophile 2496 MIDI Digital Recording Interface

• The Audiophile 2496 PCI Audio Card from MIDIMAN provides wide range of applications for recording and playback, from stereo to home-theater
• 24-bit 96 kHz multitrack recording
• MIDI recording and playback
• Digital transfers and Digital mastering
• LP/cassette-to-CD transfers

This is TRULY an audiophile 2-channel card. I purchased it to transfer some music on vinyl to digital format from a high-end turntable, and it has done that remarkably well. Another pleasant surprise is the quality of playback on the computer the subwoofer really 'came to life'. Even my 128k i-tunes stuff sounds TOTALLY different even on my [high-end] computer speakers.

That being said, here's some tips:

1) Get & install latest drivers for your OS from the M-Audio website before doing ANYTHING else then shut down & unplug PC and install the card.

2) Feel free to ignore ALL software in the package I'm recording & playing back fine without it. Everyone should check out the free "Audacity" recording/editing package.

3) For best results, use good cables. I'm using Audioquest Mini-1 to go from card to computer speakers, and Audioquest G-Snake to go from turntable phono box to the card. These 2 cables (in 2-meter lengths) cost about the same as the card. :-(

4) Can probably co-exist with your previous sound setup just make sure you go through the various Windows Control Panel areas and define which to use for what. Same is true for most applications check the preferences to use the right card/audio system.

Also, I'd like to address some 'negative' comments I've seen here & elsewhere:

A) Comes with old manuals & drivers: TRUE but website is very complete & up-to-date they had all Windows variants covered pretty well, except maybe 64-bit Vista.

B) Takes over (removes) Windows volume controls: TRUE and good riddance! All playback apps have volume controls, plus theres the physical knob on most speakers who needs more of them interacting and complicating things?

C) No 1/8" (3.5mm) jacks: TRUE that connection is for "toys" this card has gold-plated stereo RCA connectors plus MIDI & S/PDIF connectors!

D) No surround/gaming modes: TRUE, but can co-exist with another consumer sound card or (as I'm doing) on-board audio (see my tip 4 above).

Bottom line if 2-channel stereo is your 1st priority check the website for the drivers you need and, if they have you covered, BUY THIS CARD!! :-)

Buy M-Audio Audiophile 2496 MIDI Digital Recording Interface Now

Like the name suggests, the m-audio audiophile 2496 is for true audiophiles. I have had this card for years and there still is few options that are on par with this card for the same money. The audiophile has a full dynamic range of crisp audio with little distortion. I connect my sound card via digital coaxial cable to my Harman Kardon avr 240 and the sound is amazingly clear.

The one drawback to this card is it may be difficult for some to learn to use at first. However, when quality is essential go with the Audiophile 2496.

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I bought my 2496 last week from a reputable mail order vendor. Installation was cumbersome. The "Driver CD" contained no 2496 drivers at all, for Windows or Mac! The manual still refers to a Macintosh installation where you "drag extensions" to the "extentions folder in the system folder." No mention is made of OSX X! Let's see, that would make the manual about 3 years old or more. Indeed, the modification date on the pdf version of the user Manual is November, 2001, yet M-Audio continues to ship this driverless Driver CD and outdated Manual with every 2496. They don't even include a slip of paper directing the purchaser to their Web site for the missing drivers.

I went to M-Audio's web site and was able to find and easily download the OSX driver (2.04) which was updated in August, 2005. After restarting I was able to get it running, however the standard Apple output volume control is not supported by the 2496 on a Mac. Actually you have NO global output volume control. Volume output is solely via application volume controls, such as the control within iTunes, or via your mixer knobs. This makes it difficult to use as a general purpose sound card.

After about two hours, the driver lost the ability to correctly play back music from iTunes, in mid song. It developed a bad stutter, apparently no longer using the correct bit/sample rate.

Technical support took 4 days, and a phone call from my vendor, to get a respones. The suggestion was to re-download the driver and reinstall it. This worked. But I found that whatever bit/sample rate I would record with in one application would become locked in for all other playback applications. For instance, if I recorded in 24/96 in Amadeus II it would later try to play back Garage Band or iTunes at 24/96 despite many attempts to reset it's control panel to 16/44.1. The only work around was to relaunch Amadeus, start a new recording at 16/44.1, quit, then relaunch Garage Band or iTunes.

On my Mac I found I also had to unplug an audio output cable from the mini-phone jack on the back of my computer to prevent a nasty electrical static that started whenever I activated the 2496.

When it works, the sound it great! A vast improvement over the built in sound. But it gets a 3 because of poor driver reliability, out of date manual, and Driver CD that contains no 2496 drivers.

It's going back to the store.

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Easy set up on my PC, I boot both Linux (Ubuntu) and Windows XP, works great in both Linux and XP. Set up was easy and the sound is incredible. Drivers are available on the manufacturers website. Excellent for recording, I use Sonar Professional 6 and get great sounding takes. Just remember, for people complaining about the sound, garbage in; garbage out. If everything in your signal flow isn't capable of conveying the depth of this card you may not hear that much difference. Use nearfield monitors and good cable. Use a decent, at least sm57 quality mic if your recording.

In my opinion this is the best card in it's price range and beats a few higher end cards as well.

The first thing that should stand out to you is the user manual's setup instructions for Windows 98 users. This was probably a great soundcard back in those days, but it just doesn't measure up today.

I bought this card for it's MIDI capabilities, which it performs exceptionally well, but the card is easily overloaded by heavy onscreen graphics resulting in stutters, skips, and pops. When I'm not using this card for MIDI, I have to disable it and use the integrated soundcard that came with my system.

This is a decent card for the price if you need MIDI ports, but if you're going to use this for gaming or even watching visualizations with Windows Media Player or Winamp, you should steer clear.

For the record, my system specs are:

Dell XPS 410

Windows Vista Home Premium 32bit

2.40GHz Dual Core

2 GB RAM