USB interface opinions

i have SONAR 3 on my computer; ive used it extensively on another computer for recording solo stuff as well as with a few bands at my dads, but i dont go over there anymore and unfortunately i cant just rob his house. i used a simplistic Tascam-US-122 to record track by track and such. however, the Tascam products are more user-friendly with Cubase, or so ive heard. i would like to ask what is anyones opinions on the interface that would be most effective to use with SONAR, or if Cubase is a better program and i should just get a Tascam and use it with Cubase. the inteface device worked fine with SONAR of course, but I know it supports Roland and a few other devices more interactively.

okay, to cut a long story short, should i continue to use SONAR, and if so, what input device? or should i just buy an input device that comes with Cubase and use that? opinions from the experienced, possibly?

Couple of things

1) how much do you want to spend
2) exactly what do you want to do (is lots of simultaneous I/Os important for recording say a live drum kit)

as far as the software is concerned I think it is pretty much a matter of preference. I know a lot of people (including myself) who have been very happy with Sonar however by the time you have bought a bunch of plugins it can get very $$.

As far as an I/O goes, what sort of sound card do you have ?

Can it except S/PDIF ?

If all you want to do is record guitar what about a pod xt (which can act as a USB interface / sound card) ?

Another thing to look at might be a line6.com tone-port

It may well be that the sound card will do as far as an I/O device goes with out the need for a USB interface.

1) cheap-o, 200-300 dollar price range.

2) although i realize recording a live drumset or the like nearly impossible with one of these babies, i have a few friends with mixers if i needed to do that. i really just need it for plugging in a guitar or two, track by track usually. im not sure what kindof sound card i have. do i check that in hardware preferences? the problem ive had with SONAR (on my computer, not others) is that it says i have no MIDI outputs when i start up the program, and it doenst allow me to hear MIDI or any kind of sound effects. i was under the impression that an interface deals with that issue (at least it did at my dads house, his said that too until he got the Tascam)

i probably need a new soundcard or something, i just dont know. nobody that knows about computers that i know knows anything about recording, and vice versa.

Midi and audio are very different and, to record guitar you don't need midi at all.

why not use a second hand pod xt ?

This will plug into your computer via a USB interface and allow you to track guitars.

If you want more you can upgrade later.

well the MIDI was just a bonus becuase if you dont use MIDI, youre really not getting half of what you could get out of a recording program. im not talking about making techno, just adding **** in, or effects, or experimental stuff. i dunno. i can get really into MIDI.