is there a PCI-E sound card that can do the things that an EMU10K1 could do?

[BirdDad]

I mean a sound blaster Live! card.
I remember all I had to do is plug in my guitar to the mic jack and could take advantage of real time effects like distortion and reverb and phaser.
I called Creative and it seems that the only effect that their top of the line card can do is reverb.
I want either a card or better yet free software that can do these things, every piece of software I have tried makes it sound like screeching trains before I even play a note.
I have tried Amplitube and it was the same way.
Thanks

 

[JeffMD]

Freeamp?

 

[MongGrel]

Perhaps go to a pawn/music store and look for a used real amp ?

Just a suggestion.

Could probably pick up a small amp pretty cheap and start playing around with real pedals etc.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Any sound card with a mic level input should be able to do that, with the right software. (There's a crapton of them.)

If you don't have a mic level input, you might need a preamp. But that's a hardware problem and a fairly easy one to fix, at that.

If you're getting screeching just plugging it in, you probably either have feedback because you're monitoring the wrong sound input (do you have a microphone/headset?), bad cabling, ground loop, software misconfig, or defective hardware.

Start with the basics - see if you can just get a clean, no-added-effects recording of the guitar using Audacity or something simple.

Edit: I guess I'd also point out that your guitar might have a built-in preamp, in which case you might want to try plugging it into line-in instead. Plugging a line in into a mic in would be... unwise.