Hardware Review: The Echo Indigo Mobile Sound Card

06/25/03

Pity the laptop gamers, for they must suffer the indignity of low-grade audio. While video cards, processors and memory are keeping pace with market trends, sound is always relegated to a minor role in laptop design. The team at Echo Digital Audio has decided to put an end to our suffering by introducing the Indigo, a PCMCIA (PC Card) sound card that's a mobile gamer's dream come true. It may sound to you like I might be laying it on a bit heavy, calling the Indigo a ?dream come true,? but believe me, if you try out this card, you'll be impressed. This little card has a lot going for it, especially when it comes to quality of sound and ease of use. As is the norm with driver installers, the installation process is a quick and painless endeavor, just drop in the CD and let 'er rip. The Indigo drivers are supported under Windows ME/XP/2000 and Macintosh OS 10.1, which means it should work with most modern laptops. Once the drivers are loaded, you need to power off your laptop, insert the card into an open PC Card slot, then power it back up. After that, the Operating System will finish up the installation. I tested the installation procedure on four different laptops, with consistently flawless results on all of them. echo indigo PC sound card After installation, the Indigo will take over as your preferred audio device for all functions within Windows. While I'm no audio expert, I do know the difference between high quality sound and stuff that makes dogs howl, and the Indigo produces some great sound. For starters, there's no hissing or popping that's all too common with laptop audio. The bass is rich, and the high end is crisp without any ?tinny? feel to it. Music sounds like it should, clean and clear with lots of definition between the instruments and the vocals, there's none of that mixed ?mushy? sound you get with a lot of laptops. Along with making a the Indigo sound great, Echo was wise enough to include two headphone jacks and an analog volume control right on the card. The dual jacks are especially handy should you want to watch a DVD on your laptop with a friend. For long flights, this can be a godsend. The analog volume wheel is a nice touch, saving you from having to use the Windows volume control applet, which is not as precise as an analog control So, are there any weaknesses to the Echo Indigo? Just two, and you can't really blame Echo for them. First off, since it's a PCMCIA card, your laptop will need a free slot, and since most new laptops have only one free slot, you might find yourself performing frequent card swaps. Most of the laptops I tested the Indigo with had only one slot, which was in use by wireless LAN cards. So any time I wanted to use the Indigo, I had to live pull the Wi-Fi card and go network-less while listening to my tunes. The second problem with the Indigo? It's going to force you to re-rip a lot of your mp3's at higher bit rates. Since the Indigo sounds so crystal clear, you?re going to notice every little flaw in the music (or game sounds) you're listening to, and thus, those low-bitrate mp3's just aren't going to cut it any more. To wrap it up, the Echo Indigo is a well-spent $99 for any gamer who's tired of the static-ridden monaural nightmare that is laptop audio. DailyGame's never given an Editor's Choice award to hardware until now. From the first time I fired up my H?D?ection, through countless listenings of Ani Difranco, Timo Maas and Barenaked ladies, I was completely amazed with the quality of this little device. It's nice to hear the bass-lines in ?Brian Wilson? again.
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