Why is my guitar laggy through my PC?

[FishyBoy]

The route goes from my guitar to my amp to my PC. I have a pretty powerful quad core PC, the only thing is I'm using onboard sound, no sound card installed. I have a 3.5mm aux lead running from my headphone jack in my VOX VT30 amp going to my recording jack on my PC. Am I missing something obvious here?

[kent_eh]

Am I missing something obvious here?

Probably a low latency audio CODEC.
What operating system are you using?

[FishyBoy]

Windows 7 32 bit

[kent_eh]

I used http://www.asio4all.com/ back when I used Windows XP.
But I don't have any experience with the current Windows versions.

You might want to do some googling as there seem to be a couple of other options these days.

Of course, even with the most optimised system, there will always be some amount of delay, but it shouldn't be very noticeable.

[FishyBoy]

Downloaded what you suggested and it worked a treat. When I said lag, it was roughly over half a second!

[kent_eh]

Excellent.

So, now you know what you have to do, right?

Post something in the Hear Here forum!

[kpheard]

You would be better off using an audio interface via usb or even better firewire if you have one. You can pick up an audio interface for less than $100 and it usually comes bundled with recording software like Cubase or Protools too. This will pretty much eliminate any latency problems. Good brands would be M Audio or Lexicon something like that. Most have multiple inputs so you can plug in guitar/keyboards and a microphone. Some also have midi connections.

[Niklas]

You will get a much better sound if you connect an external soundcard with an USB/firewire interface with a XLR-port and use a microphone to record your guitar. This will eliminate any latency issues (or at least this will be unnoticeable).

Yes, it does cost a little, but it will be worth it. Or at least I think so.

[PEAVEYUSA]

You need to try the Asio 4 all driver, but with internal sound which is probably most of the problem I'm not sure how it will work. If you have no sound card, then get a usb guitar cable. I use the one from Target. Forgot what its called. I used to use the amp by doing the same routing you are doing, but I used Audacity to record and process the music. Then I found guitar rig and Amplitube. I don't even get my amp out of the closet anymore. There is so many amp and rack setups on the software I don't even bother with my amp. I'm using the demo version of guitar rig which works for 30 minutes then shuts down. So I make sure I record before it shuts down. I use the free version of Amplitube which has 24 free presets from blues to heavy metal. I like the pedal simulations better in amplitube but I love the sound from Guitar Rig. I've decided I'm going to purchase Guitar Rig after our vacation.

There are many different usb cables you can get and most of them have a small on board sound card inside. I paid 38 bucks for mine and it works fine with no latency