Sound Card Help?

[alphastew]

I have searched the internet for a very long time in research of sound cards. Nobody seems to give definite answers on what they do. I have a general idea but I need another answer.

I recently bought a Macbook to make music on, and it doesn't have the best specs in the world. When working in a DAW, the music seems to take up a lot of the CPU, sometimes leading to the song getting choppy and not playing when there is a lot of processing. Will an external sound card eliminate that problem? Will it take over controlling sound so that I can play it clear without overworking the CPU? Everywhere I have searched nobody has a solid answer for that.

Any help you have would be fantastic!
Thank you!

 

[ssddx]

in 30 seconds on google it is easy to find not only "what is a soundcard" but also "why use a soundcard with a DAW" as well as "is a DAW cpu intensive". if you search for the right terms, there is a whole bunch of good information to read.

what is a soundcard?
basically a digital to analog converter and an amplifier. it converts the digital signal (from the software on your pc) into an analog signal that devices can use. the amplifier boosts the power output so that speakers and headphones can be driven by them. your motherboard has one built in however more expensive options often have better quality and stronger amps for powering better equipment.

are daws cpu intensive?
they can be. certain plugins and effects can be very demanding on the cpu and if you're using a slow processor it could certainly bog down and get choppy. you might want to look into a more efficient daw with minimal cpu usage.

do you need a soundcard with a daw?
if you are looking for clean distortion free sound output or a stronger amplifier then yes, many people use them or dedicated amplifiers or audio interface devices. however, a soundcard is not likely to fix your issue as it appears to be cpu bottlenecking or something similar.