Digital Audio Interface

With an Digital Audio Interface,
you input and output sound,
into and out of the computer.

Most computer motherboards have a
microphone and speaker jack built into them.
Red is for input or microphone.
Green is for output or speaker/headphones.
They are very low quality.
So only use them if can't afford to buy
a dedicated soundcard.

Soundcards have what is called an
AD/DA converter
built into them.
They convert
Analog to Digital,
to get the sound into the computer,
And,
They convert
Digital to Analog,
to get the sound from the computer to the monitor.

The time it takes the AD/DA converter
to get the sound from the device to the computer,
and then back to the monitor,
is called
latency.
The shorter the time the better.
The best soundcard will have a short latency time.

Sound cards are available
with three types of connection method:

PCI

Firewire

USB

PCI

They are inserted into one of the PCI slots inside the computer.
You will need to install the soundcard drivers
with this type.

Firewire

The external soundcard plugs into a firewire port in the computer.

USB

They connect to a USB port in the computer.

Which is best soundcard?
The one with:
Low Latency
and
A Quality AD/DA converter.

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