I bought a PreSonus AudioBox USB*96 and the instructions tell me to go to their website and install their software so that they can update it. It plugs into my computer, guitar plugged into the device, headphones into the device, and presumably I can play in silence while following a u-tube backing track.

Made in China. It was recommended by another guitar player so I'm sure it's safe. But, have any of you guitarists done such?

I have and use several similar interfaces from different manufacturers. Presonus is good stuff. You shouldn't need anything new on your computer to send/receive audio data, except possibly a driver if you are on Windows. Or maybe they want to update the firmware on the device?

In either case I believe you would be totally safe to do so.

To send audio to the device you select it in your computer settings as the output device.

It should be pretty easy to get working.

Presonus is a solid professional audio company and they are trustworthy and make a quality product. Agree with Fly-Sig, should go pretty easy. You just may need to ensure the input is activated, but it will likely be plug n play, or close to it.

Thanks guys. That's a great help.