Anybody here using the E-Mu Emulator X?

Why does that trouble you? I've not noticed any problems
letting Windows use my audio card.

After my recent bout of Creative Bashing I went to Sam Ash and checked
out the EMU line, including the Emulator X.

I will say this...the drivers seem solid, the audio convertors are not
that bad, and the functionality/ease of use is pretty straight forward.
Much easier in concept than Kontakt or Giga 160 (last one I
owned)and it comes with a lot more too

The first kink for me was I noticed is that it imported/supprts almost
every sample format..except NI stuff. That bugged me a lot, since I have
loads of Kontakt samples. Now I could convert them with a utility
program...but you know...kind of a waste for me.

Another thing is the DSP, which at first glance appears to be a SB Live
Hold Over, but after digging in a little seems to be another useful tool
to reduce your CPU usage. Almost like a junior, errr...very junior UAD
card. It works, but I didn't critically test the limits when the sampler
and the sound card were being taxed. Still it is a gimme in a big
package of gimmies.

A very cool utility feature was the Network tracker thingy. Basically if
you have samples strewn across a bunch of hard drives through out a
network in your studio, Emu X keeps track of them for you for instant
recall. Not a deal breaker, but definitely a handy thing to have for
organization.

EMU X does comes with a boatload of samples, amoung them a sampled Grand
piano and loads of drum stuff. The drums though seemed to me to be
Proteus 1 drums junk and whatever else they relased since updated a
little. The Grand Piano was useable, although simliar to the Giga Grand
which didn't sit so well in the mix. I think someone who can really play
might like it more. The rest of the samples all seem to be made of the
*Ear Candy* type junk that sound really impressive in a demo, but end up
not serving much of a purpose. Not as bad as the ubiquous *Orchestra
Hit* that went around in the 80's...but kind of the same idea.

My conclusion is that if the drivers hold up, and the card doesn't
conflict it appears to be the *Studio Projects* type deal for samplers
and sound cards.

PapaNate

Well it's like this, my main card is my Layla24, which I use to record
ofcource, and at the moment I have a Revolution 7.1 in place for system use.
I'd be replacing it with the Emu card as that is pretty much my only option,
(not that I'd mind because I hate M-Audio's Revo drivers).

Window's is going to try to use one of these cards either way, I won't let
it touch my Layla24 and that leaves the Emu as the victim of being the
window's default card. I'm thinking that won't be a good thing either,
especially when trying to use the Proteus or Emulator.

...

I don't understand. You can tell Windows which device to
use. But what's wrong w/the E-Mu card?

My cousin has the Proteus X, hearing it has got me trying to find a way to
get one into my system. My only problem would be that Windows would try to
use the Emu card for a default sound device and I don't like that idea too
much. ;-(

Prince Lee

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