[LAU] outfitting a computer for songwriting in linux?

[Len Ovens]

On Sun, 26 Jul 2015, Karen Lewellen wrote:

> Hi,
> I would much prefer the pci option than using USB for this, yes.
> second  I am going to put the computer together for this purpose, meaning 
> nothing has been chosen.  Laughs on  the soundblaster idea, but I am new to 
> this not realizing what good pci cards are supported by debian in general.

As you are only interested in MIDI, and audio is not needed. The 
old ensoniq audio pci cards are one of the best solutions (using the "game 
port") and they are known as one of the best quality 16bit cards. However, 
PCI is not a forward looking solution so this and the delta1010 really are 
obsolete. It is possible to find a computer with pci slots still, but it 
does take some work. Almost all newer keyboards come with a USB port as 
one of their outputs. Some are better than others I don't know if anyone 
on the list can point to one that is better than just having a hw midi to 
USB inside as a keyboard that is USB direct from CPU would be better.

The computer side: Use an Intel CPU. The person setting it up should be 
willing to find out which of the USB ports on the computer should be used 
for this (have their own irq) and which usb ports should therefore never 
be used for anything else (often two usb ports are on an internal hub).

I have assumed so far the keyboard has it's own audio section (creates 
sound) and the computer will not do so. But probably it may be nice to 
continue working on the computer even if the keyboard is not available. So 
the distro should be fitted with a lowlatency kernel. Your tech will have 
to find out which other things need to be turned off for glitch free sound 
(some wifi setups for example... many are just fine)

Probably any of the core series cpu will work just fine if you are using 
just a GM softsynth for the user to hear their work. For just listening, 
latency is not an issue, but you ever decide to play the keyboard and hear 
audio from the computer's softsynth, it is a must. As you do not want any 
external boxes... you are left with PCIe cards if the Intel internal audio 
is not satifactory (generally audio output is quite good, audio input is 
not good enough for anything other than skype).

--
Len Ovens
www.ovenwerks.net