[linux-audio-dev] Re: Setting up linux computer

[Robert Epprecht]

martin rumori <lists at rumori.de> writes:

> On Wed, Aug 25, 2004 at 05:06:53PM +0200, ChristianH wrote:
>> Why is it so important to load the firmware?
>> 
>> Do they put in an extra light firmware at the factory, in order to keep
>> shipping weights low? <gr>
>
> to keep shipping weights rather low, they put in NO firmware in some
> hardware (just a loader).  firmware is included with the driver and
> required to be uploaded to the device on every initialization or at
> least after every power on.

Which can be very problematic, as some people do take it *very* serious
with free software and refuse to include firmware which is not under GPL
or a similar free licence in their distribution...

In my case it was the firmware of a RME Hammerfall card which (some)
Debian people do not want to distribute... The case made me switch
from AGNULA/DeMuDi to Planet CCRMA (Which are both excellent audio
distributions BTW)

Robert Epprecht