30 May
2012
30 May
'12
5:58 p.m.
On 05/30/2012 03:09 PM, Sciss wrote:
hi,
I don't know if this is the best place to ask, as it's more of a hardware
question...
I will need to get a good + cheap + reliable machine to sound installations. I can invest
_max_ £400 (EUR 500) and I need to get hold of the machine latest by August. Unless a
miracle happens and a new Mac Mini model is announced, dropping the prices of current
models by at least £150, I am looking for something comparable of the i5 2.3 GHz Mac Min,
Linux based.
It can't be desktop size, it really should be a portable thing, size factor/ weight
not much larger than first gen Mac Mini.
The nettops seem all underpowered for computation expensive realtime apps. I came across
this : http://www.zotacusa.com/zbox-giga-id72-plus.html -- but seems like a new model or
so, can't find any retailers or pricing info, at least not in the UK.
Minimum specs would be i3 2 GHz, 4 GB RAM, 100 GB HD. Will be audio only, so I guess
graphics card doesn't matter. And of course, it needs to run Linux audio -- my stuff
will use SuperCollider and various things on the Java VM.
ASUS EEEbox comes to mind.
If you like bare-bones: search for "Advantech Single Board Computers".
They come without HDD, w/o power-supply and w/o case (it's not a "box"
per se), but there are powerful models available that meet your specs
and even with PS, HDD and case will be within in your budget.
http://buy.advantech.eu/Embedded+computer+embedded+pc+bo/3+5+Single+Board+C…
I'm just setting up an installation using a PCM-9363D-S8A1E (Atom CPU
64bit, 1.8GHz, 2 cores [4 w/hyperthreading], 4 GB RAM) + USB2-Audio
Presonus 1818VSL: 8 channel audio I/O -- jackd runs stable at "-p64
-r48000 -n2" ~6ms round-trip latency with debian/wheezy's RT-kernel.
How about audio interfaces? I guess there is no chance
I can connect a MOTU 828 Mk II to any of these boxes?
Firewire is rare these days. Besides: "MOTU is hostile towards Linux"
[http://www.ffado.org/?q=node/63] :)
How many channels do you need?
The Z-Box looks interesting saying that it has
8-channels digital audio output via HDMI. I have no clue how to get that to 8 analog line
signals, but maybe there is a cheap way? Will there be a problem getting Jack to talk to
this kind of interface?
Thanks for your suggestions, I hope it's not off topic!
Best,
.h.h.