[linux-audio-user] Which kernel for low latency?

[Eric Dantan Rzewnicki]

I think much (most? all?) of the lowlatency patch set was merged into 
the 2.6.1 release. I'm not entirely sure of that now, looking through 
the changelog -- but, there seem to be a number of things mentioning 
lock-break patches or fixes to general locking type stuff. If I 
understand correctly the lowlatency patches were/are mainly about 
breaking up locks that the kernel sometimes holds too long. (I don't 
really know what any of that means ... :-\ ) I think the -mm tree has 
become the official testing/holding ground (for now at least) for 
patches between releases of the 2.6.x series

As far as annectdotal evidence, I'm running jack and ecasound right now 
  with jack started this way:
jackstart -v -R -d alsa -d ice1712 -r 44100 -p 128 -n 2

using linux 2.6.2 and alsa-drivers-1.0.2c. Seems to be working fairly 
well here. no dropouts or xruns while browsing, writing this mail, 
switching desktops, or switching out of X to the console.

-Eric Rz.