Soundcard sample rates may not be what they claim.
I have been testing different brands of PC soundcards. 44100 and 22050 are two of the standard sample rates that most soundcards support. Of course all sample rates are only as accurate as the crystal oscillator on the soundcard, so when I found several soundcards with a 22050 sample rate that was high by 0.6%, I chalked it up to poor crystal accuracy, or maybe ceramic resonators. But then I checked the 44100 sample rate on those cards and found it to be right on. I was puzzled as to why the 44100 sample rate was not exactly double the 22050 sample rate. When I made more careful measurements, it appeared that the 22050 sample rates were really trying for 22200, which is a less common standard.
Does anyone know why they might do that (and not tell anyone!)
By the way, the soundcard sample rates were all tested by writing a custom program to generate an audio tone of a certain frequency based on the assumption that the sample rate was the nominal rate requested. The the audio frequencies were measured with NIST-traceable means.
Robert Scott Ypsilanti, Michigan