Need help with M-Audio 24 bit sound card set up

Just inserted a new M-Audio Revolution 7.1 sound card into my PC.
Windows 2000 Professional SP3
AMD Athlon 2000+ GB
256 MB RAM

How the heck do I record with this sound card? First off, Cool Edit Pro is STILL only giving me the options of recording in 8, 16, or 32 bit (float). No 24 bit. Secondly, when I patch in my turntable thru my amp to the sound card input, I get nothing.

When I patch the same configuration into my old 16 bit Sound Blaster card, the audio comes through fine.

With my M-Audio card, I'm only getting 4 audio controls through the standard Windows Audio dialog box: Master Volume, Wave, SW Synth, CD Player.

With my old Sound Blaster card, I get a gazillion audio controls: Play Control, Wave Direct, SPDIF-In, Midi, CD Audio, Line In, Microphone, PC Speaker, Auxillary, etc.

Where are the Line In, Auxillary, etc., on the M-Audio card?

I'd like to get going on my pile of needle drops, including Die Beatles and the "Please Please Me" U.K. 45, I recently acquired.



Thanks.

 

Spent 40 minutes + on the phone (my dime) with an M-Audio "tech suppport" person. This guy didn't know his a** from a hole in the ground. Eventually I was told to upgrade to the latest driver. To cut a long story short, that fixed the problem. I can now record vinyl into Cool Edit Pro.

As far as the 24 bit thing is concerned, guess I'll have to upgrade to the latest and greatest Cool Edit Pro.

 

Miike, there has never been a 24-bit option for CEP, but that's okay. What you want is 32-bit. Note that 32-bit here is not linear 32-bit, but 24-bit plus 8 bits for range (this is so that if your transforms go over 0db, you can normalize back down and get zero clipping). So you will now actually get 24 bits of depth when recording in 32, instead of the fake 16 that you would with the soundblaster (not to mention much better sound, but anyway). I think CEP 1.x is limited to 16-bit playback on NT-based systems though (it is on my XP box; although I have 2.1, I still use CE2K for manual declicking as I find it is much easier to navigate for this purpose).

One thing to be careful about updating drivers: the last time I did, it set the latency to the lowest possible setting. This was way below what my PC could handle. Result: instant crash upon opening any audio file.

You still need to tell CE which input(s) to record from, as well as making sure that said inputs are enabled in the Windows mixer... and it's a good idea to mute all others, especially the CD player... although if you're like me, you wouldn't even bother hooking that cheesy little cable from the CD-R drive's terrible analog out to the soundblaster. The 2496 doesn't even have an input for those horrid things, but I'm not sure about the Revolution.

 

Oh yeah... getting back on track...

If you want to save as 24-bit, just use the "Save As..." option and select it there. So long as your 32-bit file does not go above 0db, nothing will be lost. However, 32-bit is more or less CE's native format for processing, so leave it at that if you plan to do any EQ or such. Of course, if you want to make audio CDs or MP3s, you'll need to dither down to 16-bit first.

 

Thanks Graham...I think.

I downloaded the Cool Edit Pro V 2 demo version. You are correct sir. I also does not have a 24 bit recording option.

SO, if I record in 32 bit, it's actually recording in 24 bit? Umm, OK. Guess I didn't need to install the Cool Edit Pro V 2 demo, which I see has now wiped out my old Cool Edit Pro 1.2.

Don't know if I still have the old install disc.

 

Yes, the 32-bit option is actually 24-bit, with another 8 for range (these would be all 0s when you first record, and only come into use when doing digital transforms). I'm surprised the demo of CEP 2 is still around; Adobe is very quickly pulling the plug on all things Syntrillium. Barring another blackout, I'll soon download Audition 1.0 -- hopefully they've fixed that scrolling bug that bothers me so much.

Version 2.x does have much better support for Windows NT/2K/XP though...

 

I had the demo from a while back. Adobe has already pulled the plug. But it's something in the range of $250. U.S. to buy the new Adobe 1.0 version.

 

Isn't there a cheaper upgrade for 1.x users though? I think it's cheaper now than before -- I bit the bullet when 2.1 came out with the better NR algorithm, and I think I could've had it for a lot less if I'd waited.

 

When I'm recording in 32 bit with Cool Edit Pro, what sample rate should I be selecting?

Thanks.

 

Assuming that you want to make audio CDs, 44.1kHz.

 

I'd like to make audio CDs, 44.1kHz, Yes, but also I'd like to try burning some 24 bit files to a CD and see if they'll play in my DVD player. Kind of a homemade DVD audio disc. I've been told you can do that.

 

Perhaps you can, but that is an area beyond my expertise...