If you're serious about using your computer to record serious audio you owe it to yourself to install a pro quality audio card. Whether running a PowerPC with built-in sound engine or a PC with a third party installation the Audiomedia III card, which uses the powerful Motorola 5600X Series DSP chip, will turn your PCI-based computer into a high performance multitrack audio workstation.

It took a little over three minutes to install the hardware and software into our G4. Shortly afterwards, after powering back up and launching Pro Tools we were soon recording.

Being cross platform compatible you are able to use it in conjunction with almost every audio production application available on the market with equally outstanding results.

We used the Audiomedia III to record audio while running Opcode's Studio Vision Pro, Peak (from Bias) and Steinberg's Cubase VST with no noticable differences in operation although we were required to make a few minor configuration adjustments before launching Cubase.

The RCA jacks on card are the first noticeable difference between the built-in interface and the Audiomedia III. Left and right analog inputs, left and right analog outputs and S/PDIF Digital I/O make it possible to hook it up directly to an outboard mixer without having to worry about adaptors and splitters.

Once you are all hooked up and ready to record you simply use the tools available in your audio editing application to route the incoming signal to the track you want to record on, and after setting levels you're ready to go. We connected the audio outs directly to our Mackie 1402-VLZ and were able to monitor the recording levels as they went in and the recorded audio once it was on the hard-drive.

Apart from the obvious advantages of being able to record high quality audio directly into your computer Digidesign have made it possible for you to avoid using external multitrack digital recorders, which have limited expansion capabilities, and instead install hardware that is expandable and allows you to increase the power of your systems as and when the need arises.

If you are recording from an analog source such as a tape recorder, record player or some other non-digital device you'll be pleased to know that the digital converters on Audiomedia III are the best quality you can get from an add-on card. By using the digital interface, for recording from DAT tape for instance, you can keep everything within the digital domain.

Features:

8 Track Playback and up to 4* Tracks Record
CD-Quality, 16-bit Digital Audio
High Quality Analog and Digital I/O
Integration with Leading MIDI Sequencers
Supports Multiple Sample Rates: 48 kHz, 44.1 kHz, 22.05 kHz and 11.025 kHz

*using analog and digital inputs simultaneously

Specifications:

Two Analog Inputs: (-10dBV, unbalanced RCA connections)
Two Analog Outputs: (-10dBV, unbalanced RCA connections)
Stereo Digital Input and Output: (S/PDIF, RCA connections, 24-bit I/O)
Analog-to-Digital Converter: 1-bit Delta-Sigma; 128x Oversampling;
18-bit output**
Digital-to Analog Converter: 1-bit Delta-Sigma; 18-bit output**
THD: 0.008% @ 1 kHz
Signal-to-Noise Ratio (A/D/A): 88 dB, unweighted, band-limited (22 Hz - 22 kHz); 90dB, A weighted
Frequency Response: 20 Hz to 20 kHz

**current DAE-based software write 16-bit files to disk.

System requirements:

Slot requirements: 7" PCI card, slot independent
Recommended clock speed of computer: 75 MHz or greater

Rating - 878,343 (out of a possible 1,000,000)

To contact Digidesign check out their entry in our Manufacturers department

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