Good Card For Powerbook? Options

[nsps]

Hello,

I'm used to recording on a PC with Sonar, but have recently purchased a new 15" Powerbook and would like to have something easy to take around with more versatility than my four-track Portastudio. I'm not familiar with Mac compatible recording software and hardware, but would love to have a decent interface with two to four inputs. The 15" has Firewire 300 and 800, USB and a "PC Card" slot, are there any decent sound cards that can be used with this? Any suggestions or warnings would be greatly appreciated.

My system is a 1 GHz PowerPC processor and 256 MB DDR SDRAM memory. I can upgrade the memory if necessary.

Thanks!

Jeremy
www.nsps.net

[iscralatchtical]

hello,

I recently made a similar move as you. I hopped on the mac lines after having been a pc user all my life. I've never operated on my own sequencer, but I used to work with Pro Tools LE (digi001) owned by a friend.

My rig is...
Powerbook G4 1.25 ghz 15in 1.25 gigram
MOTU 896 firewire interface
Emagic amt-8 midi interface
LaCie D2 extreme 250 gb external hard drive
M-audio Ozone 32 key midi controller
Audio-technica m40fs headphones
Logic Pro 6 sequencer

I was originally going to go for the M-audio Firewire 410, but then i got a great deal on the MOTU 896 so i went all out (same price as the m-audio almost!). My MOTU audio is connected by firewire 400, whilst my hard drive occupies the 800 port. Then logic occupies one USB port because the dongle XSKey must be plugged in to use it. The other USB port is used for the midi interface. So for me, all ends seemed to be closed.

But for you, the M-audio sounds like a good bet. I have heard some issues with it about not being able to turn it off while it's plugged in (the computer loses the interface's identity or something)...but i believe they've patched that up. Check it out yourself. It is a great piece of hardware for the price. And if it does indeed have midi on it as well...then you'd have all your needs connected to one firewire port. I wouldn't use USB anymore these days because firewire 400 runs faster than USB 2.0 which is rated at (412 mbps). But two firewire ports will allow you to put a HD and hardware on firewire. Stick with firewire, it's best in terms of performance. You will need your USB ports for many a peripherals (mouse, XSKeys, midi controller...etc, etc). My MOTU is fucking awesome. My amt-8 has 8 midi ins/outs which is overwhelming and unnecessary. I should've just spent less for a midiman. But i am overall very happy with my gear.

willie

This post has been edited by iscralatchtical: Sun 4 Jul 2004, 17:44