You may not get a gigantic improvement in your latency (or the sound quality), although you can expect some. With an M-Audio Delta 1010, I get reliable performance at 5-6 ms latency. Things will work at lower latencies of 3 or so, but with occasional disasters that make the improvement not worth the bother.

The 1010 LT is different from the standard 1010; the LT does not have a breakout box, but instead a great snarl of RCA cables out the back, like a plate of spaghetti. It sounds decent, and you can get good ones cheap off eBay, from people who have upgraded. As Fivehands says, the amount of I/O on a 1010 is huge. The 2496 is enough for a lot of people, especially if you get a little mixer.

WARNING: In previous years, there was widespread trouble with the MIDI I/O of the 1010 LT. That MIDI was often unusable, because it induced constant soft popping in the audio. MIDI in all other M-Audio PCI cards is excellent, although the Delta 44 and Delta 66 (with breakout boxes) do not provide MIDI at all.

PCI soundcards still remain less troublesome than external ones, if you have the choice.

Larry
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