The 0404 has a lot potential with lots of i/o options for a cheap price. Spdif both coax and optical, midi, xlr etc. It's an old card though and newer technology is better.
It DID get rave reviews a few years ago but for the money now, get an apogee one. Newer tech, better specs. That's the pro's. The cons are 1: it doesn't work with any new computer. 2: wish it has some output metering.
RE the drivers they keep promising 'next week'. I have many emails from EMU directly saying, it will be out in a few days and this is from months ago so don't hold your breath! A lot of emu customers feel shunted both on the mac and windows side. RE latency - it's impossibly to tell as it distorts and crackles so you can't record or play any music through the card. I literally can't even use the card for any recording because of the pops crackles.
Aug 03, 2016 Install the latest drivers for EMU 0404 Of course this is not considered safe, it's your own risk. This is the same method developers use to test and develop their own kernel extensions before they are actually signed.
- Jul 31, 2011 - My quad core i7 macbook pro did not work with the 0202-usb driver until i did. ASIO playback mode works fine and the player (J River Media. I have found a way to run the E-MU 0202 in OSX Lion (works for 0404 as well).
- I just installed the windows 7 and i hit some major problem. I got a E-mu 0404 PCI soundcard (aside from the built-in reltek). The problem i am having is this: sounds works fine for a while, then from unknown reasons, i start hearing extremly distorted sounds on the output.
I can barely play music though it without it popping and crackling after a couple of mins. I'm not using it as you can't. What do you want to do?
Why not go for the apogee one? If your looking at the 0404 you may as well go for the one. Simple to use, good drivers, good DAC and to bonus it has a sketch mic which is not too bad. It integrates with logic/GB well with in app menus.
Emu 0404 Asio Drivers For Mac Download
For £3 on ebay you can get a midi to usb lead so what gives? If you have a mac, take advantage of the apogee range. I'm not a salesman but i've seen it work and it's just smooth and easy to setup. Less headache with tech more time for music making. Not sure why you want to know about hardware as you're only good as your software unless you want to use the card as a doorstop.which this card is at the moment. It's fine unless you take a hammer to it! It's good for travelling (needs psu though) but then again, so are most sound cards these days (note the one you can bus power!).
Who knows, even if the drivers are released, they may never fix the problems with this card working with osx as they changed a lot of the core audio in the os and it just might never work. Remember this advice - it's only good as your drivers. Sorry to revive this old thread but I just got my new Mavericks retina MBP and was too excited to see there IS a 10.6 driver available.
I saw some have trouble with it on 10.8 but I tried anyway. So I installed it on Mavericks 10.9.4 and it works like a charm. The playback works perfect.
Cracked matlab for mac. Volume control directly from volume button in the finder. The recording also works great.
Better in fact than before, I also tried 192kHz which was never available before on OSX and it seems to work without any trouble. I tested that with audacity. (I did not try any MIDI, I have no midi stuff here).