Re: why open source drivers [was Re: [linux-audio-user] Re: [linux-audio-dev] RME is no more] - Linux-audio-dev

28 Nov 2004

On Mon, 2004-11-29 at 00:58, Mark Knecht wrote:
...
  On Mon, 29 Nov 2004 02:25:09 +0100, Marek Peteraj
&lt;marpet(a)naex.sk&gt; wrote:
  On Sun, 2004-11-28 at 21:31, Mark Knecht wrote:

 One nice example. Korg 1212 i/o, worked under win98, doesn't under winXP
 because korg does not provide support for it. There is an alsa driver
 for it now(and specs), so basically the life of that card is extended to
 eternity.

 There are more such damn good reasons for open source drivers. People
 just don't shout too loud. :)  
 Fair enough. There are companies here in Silicon Valley that take over
 'end of life' chip designs and manufacturer them for a while to help
 customers, but there isn't much money in it most of the time, just as
 there is probably no financial reason for Korg to support that card. I
 didn't like it when DigiDesign said they weren't going to continue to
 support the 001 forever and I was forced into buying an 002 or going
 away from Windows. Unortunately there was no other platform that
 maintained my music investment as well so I stuck with Digi.

 That's the nature of technology. It gets outdated. Not too many
 companies making buggy whips anymore either...

   However
how did Marek end up being an RME customer when
 there was (as far as I know) never any support for this device under
 Linux, nor anyone even really saying there would be?  
 Actually not quite, it seemed as if there would be support, Thomas
 wanted to do the driver. I just invested too much trust in RME. My
 fault.  
 And I am very sorry about that.  
You don't have to be. 

...
  It is a disappointment I'm sure.
 You're a long ways away. If it was more practical I'd probably buy the
 unit from you. I have uses. I'm sure others will too. You'll sell it
 and get good money. Chalk the loss up to learning and
 remember..."Trust, but verify". 
Agreed. It was a lesson to learn. Thanks for your 'heads up' :)

...

  In my case I Was
 told that supporting the HDSP 9652 would be a non-issue based on the
 DigiFace working. It turned out to be true, but then again it took
 about a year to become really useful to me, and even today doesn't
 work as well as it does under Windows. How did he end up with this
 device and in this position?

 I somehow don't think this is RME's fault...  
 If RME did the drivers for your HDSP 9652 then you could directly
 contact them and ask them for support. I'm sure Thomas would help you
 aswell if he had the card, and that's the problem. In such case claiming
 that they do support alsa is just plain unfair.  
 ???? RME never 'supported' the card under Linux. The 'supported' the
 developers by providing technical info. I did not purchase the card
 because of RME telling me it would be OK to use the card under Linux.
 They never stated such things. 
Unfortunately they did. To quote a part of their response:
"> [linux-audio-dev] RME is no more

Complete BS. We have and will support Linux/Alsa as before. The only
excluded product is the Fireface."

Marek