S4 Sound Quality
Just curious if anyone has foundthe sound quality to be on par with the Audio 4 or not.
I read in another forum that one user found the sound quality lacking when compared with a Serato SSL-3 box. And from what I have heard Audio 4 is > Serato SSL3. So is the S4 really lacking?
I recorded this yesterday while experimenting with the sample decks. It’s the straight wave file that Traktor spits out, I didn’t do anything to it at all post processing wise. It should give you an idea on sound quality.
If thats an internal recording, its not going to give a reflection on the quality of the audio interface is it? 
You have a point. I can do an external recording in wav, but then I would question the quality of my cables and recording device. I sold my Audio 4 so I can’t go from one to the other and compare any way which I think would be the best way to answer the OPs question. I guess the best way to tell is to hook it up to your system and try it out.
I’ve always had better sound quality from an analogue mixer. So if the SL3 is going into a DJM-800 and the S4 is going straight to a speaker then I would think the DJM800/SL3 may have better sound. In a club chances are your gonna plug into a line in the house mixer. At that point I think the sound would be pretty even.
I hope the sound is as good as the audio 4 units, since it is essentially billed as such. i was discussing this with a friend of mine who has the DX. we were wondering if the S4’s soundcard will compare with the DX’s. I guess only time will tell.
I know Karlos has done 30+ gigs with his pre-production S4 and he hasn’t complained about the sound quality.
i dont think hes allowed to complain 
I dno! Karlos?
You do understand that recording in Traktor is direct to disk and has nothing to do with -or- no reflection on the audio interface you are using right? (Unless you are recording an analog input to a thru ch.)
Answer to the poster:
I did some brief testing, I found the S4 to be the same of not better than the ADJ8. It seems hotter and offers balanced outputs. No complaints.
Yep, realized pretty quick after I posted it.
BTW, Yul has the DX and I think he now got the S4 too.
if someone could bring Yul to say his finding, it’d be interesting …
I’ve still got an A4 so will compare the sound quality when I get home and try out the s4.
just a related question… isn’t the sound quality of these soundcards way higher than a 320k mp3 can go anyway? Most of my music is now in 320k mp3s, 44khz, 16 bit rate. Is there any sound quality improvement to playing these tunes on a sound card that goes up to 96khz with 24bit rate?
After playing around with S4 tonight, sound quality is on a par with audio4, maybe better…
basically it sounds beautiful 
now if i could just get a faster laptop and get rid of the occasional pops! or NI make traktor use less cpu?
afaik it’s the source audio that defines the max sq you get. running it higher in the sound card won’t help it.
Again afaik… you’r basically just duping the frames and letting the khz float. So the sound card might be trying to output 24bit 96khz but if the source audio is 16bit 44khz so the bits just get repeated and the khz sends at 44khz max.
All this may be wrong my sound theory is a bit rough.
Today i made my first gig with it, before this i always used akai apc 40 and Scratchamp 2, of final scratch 2.
I dont know why, but i think this sounds a bit worse, dunno why, maybe i need to switch off the limit and autogain, because i think they not working good, the autogain dont at least.
The basses sounds very good, but the kicks dont are strong as they were in ableton with the other sound card, and the mix of tracks i think dont sound good like with other setup.
Another thing is that when you cue you listen some stupid flanger coming out from the headphones.
Well i wish all this get a fix.
Hey,
Been using the S4 onboard for the last ten days and was pretty happy with it but decided yesterday to try my echo audiofire2.
I definitely find the audiofire 2 has better sound quality and is a lot louder.
Does anyone know if it’s possible to get the main levels indicators to work work an external soundcard, I’d kind of gotten used to them.
Im very disapointed with the S4, i bought it because they sell it as profesional, well, dont know how AUDI8 DJ sounds, but my FinalScratch 2 sound card, sounds better also… this sucks.
What you say is very interesting.
Could it be driver related? What OS is this?
Hmm it’s interesting a few people are knocking the sound from the S4.
Mine’s got put back till next week so I can’t comment but I find it hard to believe the company that makes the Audio 2 /4 /8 would put a sub-standard audio interface in their flagship product.