USB guitar lead. Only for recording?

[davrip]

Hi all,
I have been using a usb link through "Guitar Rig".

The style is the Behringer type with headphone out.

I have now seen a guitar lead with a usb connection.

This appears to be for recording, but I was wondering
a couple of things.

1. How do you hear as you play? If you plug headphones into
the computer are you relying on the soundcard for sound quality?

2. Can the lead be used just for playing and not recording?

It's no biggie as I just thought it may be a slightly less messy
alternative to the plastic box usb of the Behringer.

Any tips most appreciated...

 

[bluestarbass]

1. In this instance the cable is the sound card. It will either have it's own drivers, or use asio generic drivers. You basically tell your computer one sound card is for in, and ones for out. You can configure this in any audio program.

2. It "could" be used for either. I think it would be almost impossible to play live. I've never use that particular audio interface, but USB in General has pretty bad latency. I would stick to just recording with it.

This isn't a real high quality solution, but I'm guessing it's at least as good as your behringer interface.

 

[davrip]

Hi there, and thanks for the advice.

I only bought it on a whim and both it and the Behringer are purely
for using with my laptop for practice.

Actually the Behringer and "Guitar Rig" I found better sounding than
a small practice amp for home use.

Using computers in a"live" situation would be a bit nerve racking I suspect .

 

[BioWeapon]

1. In this instance the cable is the sound card. It will either have it's own drivers, or use asio generic drivers. You basically tell your computer one sound card is for in, and ones for out. You can configure this in any audio program.

2. It "could" be used for either. I think it would be almost impossible to play live. I've never use that particular audio interface, but USB in General has pretty bad latency. I would stick to just recording with it.

This isn't a real high quality solution, but I'm guessing it's at least as good as your behringer interface.

It's definitely not worthy of a live situation, but when recording guitar my setup goes as such:
Guitar -> Fender Mustang -> Usb -> Ableton live lite Fender edtn.
The sound still comes through on the amp but even off the lag is really minimal.