Hi I’m new and I just bought Cubase 8 Pro. I have an onboard sound card on a X58 ASUS motherboard. I have 2 options. Generic and ASIO4ALL. The former gives me 20ms and the latter 16ms. Can anyone help me on how I can attain under 9ms for my machine? I don’t really understand the ASIO and some driver tips as well as what sound card would be appropriate.
Thanks!
I have found that anything up to 16-20 or so to be responsive enough.
If you really want something quicker then you need a dedicated Audio device with proper ASIO drivers (ASIO4All is just a workaround driver designed for onboard, no ASIO soundcards)
A recommendation depends heavily on your budget, how many ins/outs you want, whether you need midi connections etc.
You can get decent enough audio devices with low latency ASIO starting from about 60GBP though.
You will not be able to realistically use the onboard sound card for music production, you’ll need a dedicated audio interface specifically for music and audio to get decent performance.
You need to first decide your budget, your I/O needs, your connection type (USB, Firewire, Thunderbolt, PCI, etc.). There is a lifetime worth if info to read on the net about this subject, read up for a few weeks, decide what might be a good fit, and go for it. Just make sure to get something with ASIO drivers.
Here’s a decent overview on audio interfaces
http://www.sweetwater.com/insync/audio-interface-buying-guide/