semi-pro PCI snd crd for linux

[Lennart Sorensen]

On Tue, Sep 04, 2007 at 06:15:52PM -0400, Chris Aitken wrote:
> Okay, I downloaded the manual and looked up your two references. I 
> finally get it. TRS is always the same as balanced. These terms, 
> however, are not synonymous with stereo. You can tell just by looking at 
> a cable if it is balanced/TRS but you can't tell by looking (externally) 
> at a port if it balanced or unbalanced - you need to read the specs. So, 
> the "speaker" output of a consumer card is "stereo" (1/8" TRS takes left 
> and right signals down one cable to be separated by the PC speaker 
> system to left and right speakers). But the INs and OUTs on my EMU 1212M 
> are balanced, meaning each TRS carries a (relatively) noise-free left or 
> right signal on it's way to or from the card.

Well TRS literally just means Tip Ring Sleeve.  A stereo jack is a TRS
jack, but it is not a balanced signal.  It seems often TRS is used to
refer to balanced, and TS (Tip Sleeve (no ring)) is used to refer to
unbalanced [both mono of course].

And yes you got it right.  All you can visibly see is that it is a 1/4"
jack.  You need to know by the specs if it is a stereo jack, or a
balanced or unbalanced mono jack.

> Just thinking in ink to see if I have this right. Do I? And, thanks, 
> Lennart for you effort and patience teaching Physical Connectivity 101.

Well hopefully you manage to get the card to do something useful for
you soon.  At least it is an expandable card since you can buy the
external microdock as an upgrade that just plugs in (assuming alsa
supports it know, which I think it might or at least will soon since the
1.0.15 drivers are adding the 1616 and 0404 emu models in addition to
the 1212 and 1820 that 1.0.14 added), which gives another 3 pairs of
inputs and two pairs of outputs as far as I remember (I would have to
check the specs again to be sure).

--
Len Sorensen
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