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01 November 2002
Posted in
Hardware
| Review | |
Installation & Documentation
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Ease of use
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Value for money
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Price approx.
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$229 incl GST
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Operating System
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OS 9.2+
OS X 10.1+ |
Available from
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It's
all very well watching DVDs on your Mac, but when you haven't
got surround sound you're missing out - but help is
at hand.
M-audio's Sonica is essentially an external
USB soundcard to allow throughput of digital audio formats
like Dolby Digital and DTS as well as providing an effective
audio line out via USB. Then all you need is a digital-equipped
receiver or stereo.
Shelling out
A plastic shell has a USB plug at one end, with a minijack and optical output
at the other. It's small and light with a delightful blue LED that glows when
the device is connected.
The self-powered Sonica is utterly basic to configure for OS X - download the latest drivers, double click the installer and configure it all via the System Preferences panel that appears. Then tell the Sound panel that you want to output audio via the Sonica and you've got the perfect consumer-level 24-bit/96kHz portable audio out.
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SRS TruSurround support is an added bonus - allowing a surround sound from a stereo source. The quality isn't as flash as the DTS or DD formats, but there is enough ability to tweak the sound to markedly improve the majority of sources. It definitely adds a degree of realism to games when there's audio from behind you - and this will let you run multiple speaker systems quite easily.
Player upgrade
To enjoy the flash digital surround tricks, you do need to download a multi-channel
DVD player (there's a link from the Sonica section of www.m-audio.com). This
is a fairly basic player, but allows OS X users to get the full digital experience.
OS 9 users will have to suffer though, as the player was originally written
for Unix and ported across platforms but not 9, unfortunately.
Pros
- 5.1 surround for your Mac
Cons
- An RCA-out would be nice
© Parkside Media 2003
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a guest
said:
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Set up Just got one. Set it up to pass from quicksilver g4 to technics receiver running 5.1 wharfdales. prologic on technics works MUCH better if all the sonica stuff (truesound, dialog, enchancement and trubass) are all turned off. listening to salmonella dub and loving it. VLC media player works great for 5.1 dvd playback. Rock on  |
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