E-MU Audio Production Studio (APS)

This card is easy to use with WinXP or Win2000 with the fantastic kxproject drivers. With any complex and powerful piece of equipment there will be a learning curve.

This card is a bargain, going very cheap on E-bay now that the 0404 can be had for less than $100. As previous reviewers have noted, the APS is a 16-bit card. But what you might not realize is that the ADC and DAC converters are very high quality 20-bit converters, nothing like what you get on a SBLive! card. The ADCs convert at 20 bits (that's a 117 dB dynamic range) and dither to 16 bits before the signal enters the DSP. All DSP routing, mixing, and processing is done at 32-bit resolution internally. What this means is that you can record extremely high-quality 16-bit tracks, AND when you mix them and add effects (in the DSP) you are doing so at 32-bits, not 16, so you don't "flatten" the sound. Then, since the digital out is set to 20 bits (yes, it's true, and your reverb decays will contain info down to -117 dB) and since the DAC is 20 bits, you can get very high quality masters out of this card.

In sum, don't be deterred by the "out of date" 16-bit spec on this card. It sounds absolutely great.

In 2003 Emu finally came out with WinXP/2000 drivers for this card. I've used them, and they are inferior to the kx drivers. They are not only buggier but also less flexible in terms of routing and effects. Regarding flexibility, for example, using the Emu drivers there is no way to put a DSP compressor on an analog input channel and record the compressed signal in cubase. The drivers simply don't allow it. You can record the dry effect only. That's fine for reverb, but I wanted to stop using my Alesis 3630 and use the power of the DSP instead.

So I switched to the kxproject drivers. Flexability galore. I can set up a compressor and (for example) 10-band EQ in line on a pair of analog inputs, while running a silky-smooth reverb on an fx bus (that can be accessed as an effects bus in cubase). This is all in hardware. Zero hit on my CPU. Sweet.

And here's something else, which you can't do on the newer E-mu cards. The geniuses at kxproject have figured out how to write "soft-synths" for the 10k01! Yes, you read that right. In other words, the kx driver now allows the user to use the DSP horsepower not only for routing and effects but also to run soft synths on the DSP hardware. There's a drum synth, an analog synth, and a Hammond organ simulation. All free. All running on the APS and using zero CPU bandwidth. Amazing.

Moreover, if you buy an E-mu 0404 or 1212M you have to give up the hardware sampling / soundfonts. The APS can do all the above while simultaneously serving as a hardware sampler, playing large soundfonts. With the 0404 or 1212M you have to rely on VSTi hosts to play soundfonts (or other sample sets). Now you're eating into your CPU bandwidth, when you could be saving it for more VSTis.

One other thing worth mentioning. Unlike the cheap SBLives with which the APS shares its DSP chip (but not much else), the APS allows you to record simultaneously from all of its inputs. There are two analog inputs on the card, and two on the E-drive. So right there you are recording 4 tracks simultaneously. But there's more. There is stereo SPDIF I/O on the card, and another on the E-drive. Get yourself a pair of ART DI/Os to handle the ADC and you're now recording EIGHT discrete channels simultaneously. Not bad for an "obsolete" card that you can buy for peanuts.

Rock solid and I've had it in a succession of different computers over a 5 year period.

Nonexistent as others have mentioned. But the kx drivers are well-supported. I've gotten answers to questions on the kx forum that helped me figure out what I was doing.

This is a fantastic value if you can get one cheap on E-bay. With this card and a couple of decent preamps you can make very professional recordings.

easy to use, good user interface. Although there is no driver available from win ME and up. Users had to write their own drivers (www.kxproject.com), because of Emu's sad sad customer support..

The sound is generally ok, although the 16 bit technology is a bit outdated nowadays. The EMU 10k1 chip has the potentiality for much more power. Check out www.kxproject.com.
Headphones are a bit noisy, seems the cable that runs through the computer leaks alittle. Don't know if this is the same with all APS's.
The onboard effects are good, especially the reverb & delay.

Has never failed on me. Good, solid design. Reliable drivers. Shame they only work with win98 and down. Shame customers had to design their own drivers to keep using this product (and use the advantages of NT based OS's at the same time.)

Worst ever. Right after I bought this card a few years ago, Emu stopped development on it, leaving its customers forever at the mercy of windows 98. I know for a fact that they had the 2.0 drivers with WDM support almost ready for release, but then creative took over and forgot all about the APS, since they are only interested in the game market. Their policy is: when you want windows XP drivers, just buy a new card! Nobody gives you a serious answer when you mail them, you just get a standard copy & paste note informing you they unfortunately 'suspended all development on the APS until further notice'. Right. Got a new card now (echo layla), and will never buy anything from EMU ever again...

Good card for the price it cost back then, bit outdated now, LOUSY customer support. Don't buy this card if you want anything else than win98 (although the KX drivers are quite good, but that's not thanks to EMU)..

I think that EMU had done a good job of with their manual and website to get the word out on how to record digital audio and make use of the onboard synths sampler and sound card

It is 16bit Digital audio recording, comes with a ton of sounds and sounds very good to my ear. I don't want 26bit/96hz because of the storage requirments necessitating the purchase of yet another high end computer. The effects sound very good. This has just about everything one needs to record and it is all contained on a audio card inside the computer

I have had no problem with it so far, like any piece of computer software/hardware much of the problem is getting it to work on your system. With the help of emu's website I have learned to make it work

They have the worst customer support I have seen in 30yrs of buying music equipment. 11 emails, 3 letters, 2 hours on hold have not produced any results. They included a defective install CD. Now they bar me from the Website. I think it is a shame since they have a winning product that the attention in design was not carried over to customer service. Expect no help should you get in trouble

The APS system I think is fantastic for the person recording alone at home and contains great sounds with more available at incrediably low prices. It is disheartning that such a great product is saddled with such poor customer service. Definately try before you buy. It is a complete low cost solution for someone entering Digital recording at home if you can live with 16 bit recording (I can) The availability of additional low cost sounds is staggering. If they improve their customer service I would give it a top rating