One of the reasons why this may be done is that the company doesn’t want to give you any guarantees of what the product’s current DAW compatibility is, especially when this can change over time or with more releases. Instead of making this information available under the description of the audio interface, it is mostly kept hidden away in some corner of the website - usually a frequently asked questions page. While you may expect this information to be available pretty easily, that isn’t always the case. The main reason for this is that 90% of the major DAWs are going to be compatible with any audio interface that you choose.įor those of you who want to stick to the DAW that you have been using till now, you will have to ensure that you check the compatibility of the audio interface with that particular DAW on the website of the company that is developing it. First and foremost, if you don’t really have a DAW that you stick to as of now, this shouldn’t be an area of concern for you. While most DAWs are compatible with most audio interfaces that are commonly chosen, there are some cases where this may not happen. DAW CompatibilityĪ DAW or digital audio workstation is a digital platform that is designed to record and edit digital sound. Some of the most important features to look out for in an audio interface are mentioned below. In such a situation, it can be very helpful if you have a shortlist of features that you should look out for so that you can pick an interface that sits well with your requirements and is able to accomplish all the tasks that you are going to use it for. There are many different audio interfaces that are available right now, but for a person who is new to the concept altogether - or even someone with some prior knowledge - the vast number of options can seem a little overwhelming.
If you want to record and monitor audio that is professional quality, aN audio interface will have to be brought in. There are tons of factors that come into play here - for example, electromagnetic interference, jitter or excessive latency - which end up affecting both the output and the input, causing the sound quality to degrade substantially.
In some cases, there may also be a consumer-grade stereo line-level output. Most of these sound cards either just have a consumer-grade stereo line-level input and a headphone output. In addition to this, the minimalistic input and output offered by sound cards are not ideal for recording the kind of audio that you may be looking at. When you talk in terms of technicalities, the sound card is a type of audio interface in the first place, but the quality of sound is severely limited. Under regular circumstances, the audio interface will come with line-level analog inputs and outputs, microphone preamplifiers (at least one), or even some digital inputs and outputs, for example, AES, S/PDIF or ADAT.Īll digital devices come with a built-in sound card so why do you need to spend the extra money and get your hands on an audio interface? The conversion isn’t just from analog to digital but also works the other way round - from the digital audio signals put out by your computer to the analog signals that will be audible from the headphones that you are using or the studio monitors that you have fixed. This sending of digital audio is facilitated through some sort of a connection - which can either be USB, Thunderbolt, FireWire or a specified PCI/PCIe card - which will be discussed in more detail as we move forward. Typically, an audio interface works by converting analog signals to digital audio information, which is the form that the computer will be able to process for results. You can think of an audio interface as a very efficient middleman that will be able to connect all of your audio gear - including microphones and so on - to the computer that you are working on. Audio Interfaces Disadvantages What Is an Audio Interface?