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Old 03-01-2010, 10:05 PM   #14
yep
Human being with feelings
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
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Is there some reason why you're not simply looking for a good interface, period? I.e., is there any reason why something like an RME or MOTU box with a hi-Z input is less desirable than a guitar-specific box?

One of the things about the Delta 1010 that's different than almost any of the guitar-specific interface boxes is that it's PCI, while most of the guitar boxes are USB. USB interfaces are intrinsically somewhat dependent upon the host machine for latency. Firewire is technically not as fast as max USB 2.0 speeds, if I understand correctly, but is more reliable and more fixed to hardware, so to speak. But I don't think there are any guitar-specific firewire boxes. And PCI is obviously fastest, but has its own problems, not the least of which is simply a shortage of good PCI cards. I.e., I'm not sure what the difference is between "low latency interface" and "low-latency interface for guitar", if there is one.

Bear in mind that nominal latency is different from actual round-trip latency, which is what matters. You say you can "feel" 10ms latency, without saying how you know it, or where you got that number from. A lot of boxes that promise "10ms latency" actually mean 10ms hardware latency IN EACH DIRECTION, PLUS SOFTWARE/DRIVER/COMPUTER latency.

The interface has no control over the internal latency of the computer. Total round-trip latency, from when you pluck the string to when you hear the effected note sound in your headphones, is something like: [Hardware input latency] + [driver latency] + [computer latency] + [software (REAPER) latency] + [hardware output latency].

So if your hardware claims 10ms "latency", that might actually mean 10ms in, plus 10ms out, plus whatever latency you have set internally in REAPER, plus whatever "hidden" or "buffer" latency is set in the hardware driver (sometimes this is adjustable, sometimes not). The point is, you might set your interface's control panel to, say, 2ms latency, and your actual round-trip latency might be something more like 11 or 15 ms. And an interface nominally set to 10ms latency might actually offer an achieved round-trip latency of something like 28 or 35 ms or more. You need something like the CEtrance (free) latency tester to determine actual round-trip latency in your system.

Most of the "debates" about whether 10ms is "audible" are between people who understand this distinction and people who do not.

If what you really need is a dedicated guitar interface that allows for effected guitar recording with extremely low latency, you might look into the line 6 interfaces, or the digidesign eleven, which host the guitar effects internally to the box, while allowing for straight-through recording of either the effected or unaffected signal. Now, even a hardware guitar effects box has its own latency, since it still has to convert to digital, process the audio, and then re-convert back to analog before you hear it, but if, say, a POD has low enough latency for you then either of these should be fine.

OTOH, if all you want is a low-latency interface, then RME is a very good bet, as is MOTU. But both of those, like any computer interface (even the Delta 1010) are hard-pressed to deliver much better than 10ms round-trip (although I frankly suspect that even a hardware POD or digital amp or effects pedal is probably 6~8ms round-trip).

If you truly need zero-latency recording, the best way is still to use all-analog processing, which happens at the speed of light.
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