Sound Card?

Hi I was going to download a program that creates the "real time" effect, and it said for me to plug in my guitar to the input of my sound card. My question is
1.What is a soundcard?
2.Where can I get one?
and 3. How much do they cost?

thank you all for your help.

A sound card is a peice of hardware that plugs into an empty PCI or in some cases ISA slot in the back of your computer. They can be purchased from any computer store, and range in prices from about $50-400, depending on the quality. Right now the best one out there is Creative Labs Live Plus, which is about $300-400 I believe. Wish I had that one...

They aren't hard to install, but if you some kind of phobia about opening up your computer and doing some tinkering, you can get the computer store to install it for you... for a moderate fee of course.

I dont have that kind of money to spend on a soundcard! Is there any other way I can use the "real time" effect without pluging into a sound card?

well, if you have sound coming out of your computer, you have some sort of sound card.

in order to plug a guitar into a computer, you just need a jack to plug it into. that place is usually on your soundcard, which is usually on the back of the computer. do you see any mini headphone jacks on the back of your computer?

this kinda explains what your sound card is and looks like. http://www.guitarwar.com/help1a.php

Yeah i see one but isnt the guitar cord to big to plug in there?

And that's why adapters are such marveles things...you can pick them up for a couple of pence (or cents) and just stick it on the end of your cable and into your computer....
Good luck

you need an 1/4 to 1/8 converter, this adapter turns like a Guitat cable type output to a walkman type output. you can buy em from radio shack or store, like target, walmart, k mart or whatever.

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And that's the bottomline............

ok thanx I'll pick one up today and tell yall if it works.Thank you all for your help.

if we already talking about recording...
why i cant hear anysound while playing via the line-in?? i used a guitar conected to zoom connected to the computer and there was no sound...