Rather than going with a Consumer card. Head to a Audio/Music store. What you are looking for is a USB - Audio interface; they generally have much better Signal to Noise ration, hardware mixers and Ballanced XLR outputs and Inputs. Something like the focusrite scarlet.Alternatively if you are just after a simple DAC/AMP without Inputs - then I throughly recommend The Cheap FIio E1 - Which can be had for around 50$ and have 96hkz/24bit DAC decoding I have several and they can be used as just a headphone amp as well as with android.Basically is it doesn't have an external power source or a built in battery - then avoid it - especially if you plan on attaching it to unbalanced speaker/desk amps. The only Consumer manufacturer dac I would consider in this class is the Creative E5 - but it's several hundred more than the above mentioned Fiio E1 and you only really would need it if you want bluetooth and input options.On 24 May 2016 at 11:27, Martin McCormick <martin.m@suddenlink.net> wrote:I went to a local electronics emporium and asked for a
USB sound card that might possibly work under Linux. I have been
messing with Linux and USB long enough to know that a number of
USB sound cards mostly work well enough for one to play and
record stereo but some special features may not work without
proprietary drivers available to Windows or Mac users. These
features are usually not show stoppers so there is no real
problem.
The only USB sound card they had was a SoundBlaster XG5
designed for the gaming market but, I thought, this is probably
pretty good and, if most everything on it works, how can you go
wrong?
Well, here's how. Firstly, I am not bashing Creative Labs
or the product itself but this is what happens when things become
overly specialized.
What I was looking for was a sound card which would
record stereo. They usually will play, also but recording two
line-level channels is a must.
This is a really neat little device in that it has
optical line input and output ports and a stereo headphone output
but there is only a microphone input--(game over.)
I did power it up and ran amixer on it to see if maybe
there is more to that Mic input than originally meets the eye but there
is actually less. There are several PCM inputs and maybe one is
the microphone but it isn't clear what each PCM channel does.
Again, if there are not two discrete analog line-level audio
inputs, it can not be used as a normal sound card.
I rarely need to return products to a store, but I am
glad this one has a reasonable return policy because the device
is so highly specialized that there is no way to use it for
anything but playback only or as, in a game, good sound with a
Mic for one to talk over.
Basically, are there any good new USB sound cards these
days that record and play stereo under Linux?
Thanks for any suggestions.
Martin McCormick