[linux-audio-user] Looking for an external sound card for 'nix -- recommendations?

I've been lurking on LAU for a few months now and I've finally managed to
come up with something worth asking:
I'm looking for an affordable external sound card for music production. What
are your recommendations?
Being a novice, I'm having trouble finding what I "need" (and I'm growing
wary of google's pagerank system...) so I thought I'd query the real
experts. ;-)

I try to keep my options open, but there are some things I prefer:
-It should be a hell of a lot better than the crapy onboard AC'97 sound I
use right now (SNAP-CRACKLE-POP)
-It should be external: USB or Firewire or otherwise are all OK (I'll be
using it with my desktop now, but I plan on setting up a laptop for music
some time)
-It should be affordable: I can always make exceptions here (especially
since I'm not very familiar with this type of hardware), but I'd prefer if
it were around $200 USD or less.
-It should be *exceptionally* functional with Linux and JACK. (Naturally,
this is best proven through experience)
-Although the above should cover this, it ought to work with my Novation
X-Station synthesizer (which already works great through USB with JACK)

I'd really appreciate any recommendations -- or blacklists (although ALSA's
soundcard matrix usually faithful enough) -- of hardware to be used by a
novice electronic musician.

I try to be brief, so if I'm being too ambiguous just ask me for details!

Thanks,
  -Lou
Received on Tue Mar 6 12:15:03 2007