What decent audio recording interfaces are well supported in Windows 7 64bit?

I currently have an Audigy 2 ZS Platinum. It permits me to insert a 1/4" jack line from bass guitar and play along with pre-recorded piano music. This worked fine under Windows XP.

I am moving to Windows 7 64 bit (dual boot for now), and Creative may not develop fully working drivers for this component. Looking around, I don't see Windows 7 support mentioned at product web sites from E-MU, Roland, M-Audio, etc. Even at Creative, the posting of available drivers for Windows 7 is deceptive, as they do not adequately support recording (latency, distortion). My local music store shrugs and says to stay with Win XP. In some cases, the Vista drivers will work in Win 7. So I need real world feedback on this.

I should also mention I'm not impressed with available USB interfaces - they have too low of a signal to noise ratio for my purposes. That leaves PCI, or possibly firewire devices (never tried one yet).

labradort

Posted 2009-10-29T13:20:30.967

Reputation: 171

The current stance with Creative seems to be that they don't fully support older sound cards on Vista and 7. The changes in the inner workings of audio drivers in Vista forced major rewrites of the drivers and at least for some older models they have stated already that you're out of luck. Might well be with yours as well. – Joey – 2009-10-29T13:45:30.847

Yes, exactly. This is why I'm asking for advice on something that will do the job and is supported in Windows 7. It isn't as straightforward as it seems. The next generation of Soundblaster product, X-Fi, has a platinum version, but it is hard to see anyone selling it, and Creative have removed it from their Products page. On top of that, the forums show driver support in Win 7 for X-Fi currently sucks. – labradort – 2009-10-29T15:35:53.467

Answers

Creative now have 64 bit drivers that work for recording purposes on Audigy 2 ZS Platinum. The previous drivers had bugs with ASIO, and these are overcome to the point this hardware now works OK in Windows 7 64 bit. I forget when the drivers were released, but it was something like April 2010, several months after Windows 7 came out, and after a lot of bashing of the brand on the Creative support forums.

labradort

Posted 2009-10-29T13:20:30.967

Reputation: 171

You mentioned M-Audio. They have Windows 7, including 64 bit, drivers announced for most of their products.

http://www.m-audio.com/index.php?do=support.faq&ID=14229394d3b14228e47c782542cb29c0

I'm sure something of theirs should work for you.

Ben

Beno

Posted 2009-10-29T13:20:30.967

Reputation: 86

I'm sorry but I was looking for something real world based. Creative had drivers released for Win 7 as well, but they were not fully functional. – labradort – 2010-08-13T13:58:46.610

I am using the Realtek HD Audio driver with 64bit Windows 7 and it is working with a 3 year old motherboard. The only problem I had was initially the sound didn't work because it's jack detection assumed my speakers were rear speakers, and I had to reconfigure them as front speakers.

I'm not sure if realtek makes any pci cards.

AaronLS

Posted 2009-10-29T13:20:30.967

Reputation: 2 074

I require something with audio inputs, ASIO support and low latency. HD audio is more about output. – labradort – 2009-10-29T14:44:20.953

I've had no trouble recording audio from my guitar and mic preamps into Fruity Loops. Guess I missed the "is more about output" memo :) – AaronLS – 2009-10-29T16:00:15.197

I've also been using the ASIO driver that came with Fruity Loops as well. – AaronLS – 2009-10-29T16:00:53.527

Exactly what is your sound card? I would like to check out the details on this model. Does it have some sort of breakout box? If not, how do you put a 1/4" mono jack into your sound card? Perhaps I misunderstood that Realtek HD was one of those output ports for HD audio to support stuff like BluRay video disks. – labradort – 2009-10-31T02:24:13.733