Crystal clear 24/96 sound with just about absent noise and distortion. What else can I say?

Clearly the best card in it's price range and for another $200 or so above it for that matter. I had done quite a bit of shopping before I bought this one. Digital and analog sources can be used at the same time. It has basic features, but those features are well-designed and practical.

I'm not one to care about the looks of an audio card so I just won't comment on that. The product appears to be made well and is packaged well for transit. I expect it will work well for years to come.

Hands-down best value for the price in my book. In my exhaustive search for the best card for my application, I found nothing coming close with regards to specs, price, and quality.

I have not had to use support per se. I just downloaded the newest drivers. I did have to manually pick the drivers instead of windows finding them automatically for some reason, but they did load fine after that.

This is not a ground-breaking product with regards to features. It's a very well-designed "workhorse". Not alot of bells-and-whistles. You can find features like this in many other cards, but the appeal certainly lies in the value for your money and ease of use.

Progressive rock and Jazz

Obviously not the best sound out there, but quite probably the best sound for its price. It's hard to tell, because it's good enough that my speakers are holding it back. o_O

This soundcard doesn't have many fancy features, but what it does do, it does perfectly. For the vast majority of people, your sounds' limiting factor will be your other equipment, not this card. I've never gotten better sound out of my stereo. Mind you, you can only have two input channels, and two output channels, which almost always ends up being stereo. Still, amazing for its price.

I triple boot Ubuntu Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows Vista. This soundcard works perfectly for me in all three- no fiddling around in menus, not even in the notoriously finicky Linux. I've had more trouble with setting up (shudder) integrated soundcards than with this one.

Looks nice, sounds nice. Rugged for a sound card.

Easy to use, Sounds great. Definitely worth your $107.

I haven't needed this card repaired, but I've dealt with M-Audio's customer service before and they are quite nice.

Ah... is blue. Is nice. Come on! It's a sound card. Even if this one is plain, everything ever made by Soundblaster is still like the hunchback of Notre Dame or something. For a sound card, it's lovely.

Hobbyist, I guess. Active Musician too.

Everything but Country. :-/

Good quality sound. Recorded sound was quite faithful to the original, except the low frequencies. I have no way of telling whether that has to do with filter roll-off in the card or the monitor I am using.

Not too many features. Just about enough to be very useful, and keep the learning curve short and sweet.

Seems to be well made.

For an amateur enthusiast like me, it's a great value for money.

Outstanding support for the set of problems I faced.

Classic rock, blues

When the music plays, it sounds great. When the music stops, it is very quiet. If silence is golden, this card is Fort Knox.

SPDIF and MIDI Ins/Outs, and they work as expected. But that's all.

So far, very reliable. (I don't give any product a "10" until I have owned it for many years.)

The card is priced well below what it is worth, and you can buy it for even less if you shop around.

I had questions, and they had answers. They even had answers to questions that I hadn't asked yet.

It's not pretty, but it works beautifully.

Rock, Blues, Country

This is where it falls a little short.. it's got great sound but it has a lot of problems with IRQ's and pops and such. I still get pops in my recordings and when I listen and I've had it for like 6 months.. been trying to figure it out, but it's not solveable on my system. Kinda sucks in this respect.. I wish I'd shelled out the extra cash for a better card just to stop these pops.

Great Midi setup, it's pretty much got it all here.. if there's no conflicts

Wonderful look and feel, actually feels sturdy for a PCI card.

Would be great if it would work, sounds wonderful other than the pops.

They're pretty much the worst support *I* have ever encountered.. they didn't know how to solve my specific problem so they just stopped responding to my emails, I've sent *34*.. yes *34* unanswered emails now.

Very "desireable"... I wanted one so bad =D

Home Studio

Weird Pop

When producing music thru any program (Cakewalk,Sonar,EmagicPlatinum,Cubase)After the 2nd track, i get very bad cracking and distortion. Track 1 always sound fine. Track 2 sometimes will sometimes record with no distortion.

Yes the features seem ok. I see it comes with s/pdif inputs. I just wish the sound would not distort.

I have to give this no more than a seven. A seven because i understand the potential of this card, but it has yet to meet those expectations.

Not yet. Too much distortion.

Technical support was real cool. I was on the phone with those guys troubleshooting for almost an hour. We concluded that my motherboard is not good to use with this card even though my mboard exceeds the minimum requirements.. Shuttle fsb 133mhz 900mhz Athalon Processor. I will go ahead and upgrade to a top-of-the line Aseus mboard. I will write another review after i make this MAJOR upggrade to my system.

Yes, this product and features is very appealing. Especially when you read the specs.

Hiphop. R&B. Rock. Reggae. Lean more towards hiphop but cant be put in a genre

I used it to record an album over the summer and when I connected my Roland Hard Disk Recorder into it, it basically transferred all the music on it digital and it sounds badass.

I like the way it can be used as a primary or secondary soundcard. For any house computer this thing really gets the job done.

Just plug in load software and you're ready to go.

Pretty good, it hasn't broken or even failed to do what it's supposed to do yet.

Reall cheap, with overnight shipping. .......Metal!!!

none. Didn't need any

For a 100 dollars. C'mon

Producer, Hobbyis, Recording Engineer, Active Musician,

Hip Hop/R&B, Heavy Metal, Rock, country, Smooth jazz

The unit is very quiet

I cant stand the fact that the imputs are rca's. Should be 1/4 inch.

Product seems pretty sturdy to me

I bought it for 150. I think it now sells for 100. Its definitely a straight product for the price.

i have dealt with the customer support. They are pretty responsive.

eh? its a soundcard. Theres nothing sexy about a flowchart, is there? actually...

recording engineer and active musician

every goddamn thing

Sound Great and Clean. I had a Pentium 4 2Ghz running on Windows 2000, Sonar 2 and played the some softsynth from the included Ableton live lite and also Cakewalk's Project5. Always sound good to me. No Complain.

Not much in terms of features. But at this price you can't really expect much. I had use the the included midi port. But I bought this for is sound quality and midi.

Piece of cake. Installed the card and driver. It works without any problem. I had two minor complains. One, the 2496 cannot coexiest with my soundblaster card. But, I don't think that's M-audio fault. But it would nice to warned the customers first. Second, I had to plug in/out the audio cables only when computer is off. Otherwise doing so would crashed my computer.

I am very happy with the product. It did what it was designed to do very well.

It is the least expensive pro audio soundcard in market. Great value for my money. There other product in similar priced ranged would be Cakewalk's UA1g but it is USB based and had no MIDI port.

No idea. Hope I will never need it.

It's a soundcard inside your computer. I don't think most musician/producer would based their buying decision on the looks of the card.

Music teacher/ Compuser

Piano, Instrumental,

Sound is far better than expected for the price. If you use a tube output driver stage to feed the analog in, be advised that the input impedance is lower than avedtised. If used in a tape loop, make sure it is buffered or may load down your source.

Use this in the shop for testing DACS and CD Transports. Also great for vinyl transfers and editing. (No latency issues)

Use a good pre or mixer as source buffer and you don't wear out the bogy rca jacks.

Can't beat it for the price. I use the firewire version on a regular basis, and guess what- I don't seem to have all the problems that other complain about!

Did not have issues with the 2496 Audiophile, but did have compatibility problems with some software (non-pro) seeing this card. Definately not M-Audios fault here as Sound Forge and Adobe Audition/ work well.

Musican/ designer/ technican

A semi professional 2 channel card for 100$, with spidf I/O for future upgradablity. Not much to complain with as good as any other audio interface (motu, EMU,) for conversion quality.

Basic expected for the price. Software bundling a bit lacking compared to its biggest competitor the EMU0404, over all good choice.

As easy as any other audio interface

Drivers in development for 7 years, rock solid.

theres nothing cheaper that usable.

never dealt so i'm giving them a 5

Oh yeah! green silocon, what nonsense a sex apeal question...

Guitar Player 4 years

Punk Rock

I got the AP2496 maybe a year ago and initially was delighted with the sound, which was, expectedly, vastly superior to the sound coming from the back of my G3.

OK - it handled analog in and MIDI in/out very well. I had some struggles figuring out how to get the S/PDIF inputs to work but eventually did.

I can't answer this.

I was in e-mail contact with an M-Audio tech person - - back & forth for weeks. It seemed to me the guy, responding to my questions, was doing a lot of guessing. When I told him that the original specs (& the specs in the enclosed manual) quite clearly stated that my setup was perfectly adequate, he hemmed & hawed well, we've had some "feedback" (read "complaints") and now we've upped the system requirements.. Truth is - they don't know why this card is not working with my system. All their suggestions - new drivers, old drivers, install OS 9.2.2 (which I've read in many places is somewhat unstable compared to 9.1), etc etc - I spent many many days rebooting from crash after crash. The tech guy has totally ignored my latest letters. I think he's getting tired of my problems. He did, though, give me the phone # of someone who "may" be able to get me a refund or credit towards something else - after all, the original specs and the manual state clearly that my setup is fine for the 2496. Now, I'm considering the Delta 44 - which has 4 1/4" INs & 4 OUTs but no MIDI. (I'd use a MIDI interface via a port which is what I'm doing at this time anyway) I'm a bit burned out with this entire business.

Professional jazz musician, pro sound designer/composer

jazz, electronic/ambient/techno/tribal/modern classical

I've had no pops, hiss, or other artifacts from this card. It has delivered perfectly in recording (via analog and digital inputs) and playback.

I expected three things from this card: quality recording, quality playback, and straightforward routing of the audio signal via the software. It pretty much does all three well. Recording has been flawless. For some reason, I never could get it to playback via the digital output into the digital input of the sampler I owned. The software was a little tricky to figure out at first, but I was new to PC DAW when I got this card, so there was a lot I couldn't initially grasp in all of the equipment I was using.

Have had for 3 years now (and I obtained it second-hand!) with no problems whatsoever. Has been pulled and installed in different PCs five or six times without incident.

For the price you acnnot beat this. Anyone suggesting SB over this cannot possibly have any clue. Compatability may be an issue for MAC users. I run Win 2000 and have never had a problem with it. The signal to noise ratio outclasses many more expensive cards.

FOR THE PRICE again you can't beat it. The breakout cables work fine for anyone since you will need to have a mixer or preamp anyway to make the most use out of it.

Tough as nails so far. Over 2 Years

You won't find a better card at this price.

Never had to use them.

Recorjding engineer. / Active Musician

Jazz/Blues/ Rock /Metal/ Classical /World/ Folk

Could never get it to work. It is not certified to work with XP. Tried all the drivers etc that M-Audio recommended but no work. Bottom line is that dont have a proper driver for XP. Dont buy unitl they advertise it works with XP

weak. really only 1 audio input (stereo) they like you to think 4. but not really

you cant even read the audio connector markings once its installed in hte computer. extremely weak.

consider the time it takes you to get it to work. it might be the most expensive 1 audio input card in the world.

well. When I tried to get help they said even their email system would take emails unitl after the holidays. Thats great...wonderful support ehhhh!

barebones as it gets. comes with nothing......and you get out of it...nothing

hobby

blues/rock

The quality is near perfect. Rule one.. Know what your doing... I use it not by itself. I use it alongside other pieces of hard ware equipment. The sound card is just a way I can route my sound from my mixer to my computer for further engineering.

You get what you pay for. I do not use this card as the only piece of hardware to record, and if you do, you need help.

Nice...

Didn't have to use them

Recording Engineer

Hip Hop, Rap

Can't use it with Vista 64. They've been working on drivers for over 18 months with no . This is unacceptable. I am looking to purchase a different brand of soundcard from a company. Shame on you M-Audio!

very accurate and precise. what comes in definitely comes out the same as to your DAW and to your monitor speakers. if you want a better sound, then you should get a good pre-amp or mixer. ;)

all your personal pc-recording needs can be answered by this item. you should have a vacant pci slot in your pc though. can do up to 4 tracks of simultaneous inputs with the spdif in stereo operation. latency is really low or negligible even within additional sends/loops.

i had a hard time installing this one. probably because im working on windows vista. if sometimes your pc can't detect its installation, just get the newest drivers available to solve those kinds of problem.

looks well made. good circuit board and gold plated jocks. nice.

probably, one of the best recording soundcards in the market, in terms of money and features.

if you have any problems just visit m-audio website or read the manual. these stuff needs some familiarization for it to work perfectly.

Not want. Its my practical need.

Hobbyist, Active Musician

Rock, Instrumental, Acoustic

for the price .. there isnt another sound card that can match it !

i guess

yeah .. plug n play .. never had an issue

once again .. u really cant beat this card for the price ... if this is your first time buying a nicer sound card ... this is the one you want !!!!

see above

never needed it

come on now .. how sexy can a sound card be ,,,,

The sound is fantastic for the price.

It has all the features of the Delta series minus wordclock BNC connections, but cam use it's SPDIF to sync to a master clcok.

Quite easy. the patchbay router is a bit confusing but overall very simple to use.

Excellent quality for this price range.

The card is hands down the best soundcard for the price anywhere. Period.

Driver support is excellent, that is why i bought it. M audio keeps their drivers up to date and ASIO drivers are very stable.

It's just a pci card.

Sound is fine except for the annoying crackle. Crackle isn't level based but appears at times and not at others. Will not be able to continue use if unable to resolve crackle. Set control to output Monitor/Mixer crackle less prominent but is still there. Fairly usable at this setting. No change with variation in sampling rate and buffers.

What features? It's pretty much a bare bones sound card. Use other hardware and software for features.

Seems to be ok but needs 1/4" i/o or XLRs.

Would rate it higher on value if it didn't have the crackle. 100 bucks isn't bad for 24/96

None or haphazard at best

pretty bland. Not much sex in a sound card

Really is superb for the price! have been blown away by the quality and accuracy of the reproduction of highs and lows from this card. After using alot of the modern sb cards i didnt really expect much of an improvement as far as play back was concerned, as the card was bought for recording. However i was shocked! playback is clean and crisp, recording is as impressive

It seems to be well made and havent had any problems, have been very impressed especially considering the price!!

Its so cheap! For something of this quailty and specification, i certainly am not going to complain!

Great crisp clear sound...Both recording and listening....and its very silent when is idle, u will forget u had on your monitors lol...if ur upgrading from a onboard card, u will be blown away, if upgrading from a audigy or one of those u will also be cause they can't record clear as this charm...9, well its not perfect, show me a card that is

Good everything u need if u doing 1 or 2 tracks at a time, got good midi...never used the s/pdif

Nice gold plated rca's all connectors look classy and not cheap

GREAT VALUE....this quality at 99 dollars.....anyone can have it at their palms even poor people like me lol....i remember when it was close to $200 (yes i was looking at it since then lol)

never called yet, never had to

i got it

Active Musician

Reggae, hip hop, blues, calypso

paid $250 and I have it for 4 years now, it had few problems when changing my computers system, but again it was fixed by getting the right driver. Sound is very good, clean! well i dont know how much clearer we need, its a simple card, but proffesional, again it never gave me any headaches.a after upgrading to XP pro.

not many, but again i only use it to get clean sound. never used spdf nor midi !

no doubt!! great card, i like the RCA inputs, because they last forever!

best value for beginner producer now that is only $99 its a sheep with a wolf heart!

e-mailed m-audio when i had a problem they responded in 2 days with good advice. well maybe i was lucky!

FOR IT"S VALUE! I will dafenately say good bye to it when I get its bigger sister with few tears too.

DOES NOT WORK ON WINDOWS XP IF YOU HAVE AN AGP GRAPHICS CARD. Found this out the VERY HARD WAY after HOURS upon HOURS of troubleshooting....by the way, I work on PCs for a living, and I've never seen something so INcompatible with windows since WINDOWS 95. DO NOT BUY THIS.

Wouldn't know, can't use it

Wouldn't know, doesn't work

$100 for a sound card that doesn't work

based on reviews from SEVERAL forums rating this card, it's not even worth the time to try, just return it

I want a soundcard that works, not this piece o cr@p