9 Jul
2010
9 Jul
'10
2:02 a.m.
Hello all,
I recently have started having some issues with my current computer,
an old Mac OSX laptop, so I want to build a computer (desktop or
otherwise) to replace this older system. I pretty much have a list of
some specs that I would like in this machine, but in starting a search
for these things online, I feel I am getting nowhere fast.
I am looking to building around some Linux distro, but I am not
"married" to any particular system. My only hardware requirements are
the ability to connect up my USB midi interface. I would also like to
be able to capture digital audio from my external synths.
If anyone could possibly give me a handle on some direction of where
to start looking, it would be greatly appreciated. It just seems that
there is so much information out there, and Google doesn't seem to be
helping sort out the things I would need.
Thanks,
Mike
10 Jul
10 Jul
9:26 p.m.
In continuing my search for information on building a computer, I
found this website ( http://www.build-gaming-computers.com/ ). While
this site says it is about building a gaming system, I would imagine
that the information is applicable to building a system for using as a
Digital Audio Workstation, too.
I guess I should move on to other questions that are more related to
specifics about a DAW system. Things such as how the software would
take advantage of a multiple processor machine. Would something like
that require a custom compile for that particular machine? Or are
there builds that already exist? How about the system kernel? Would
that require a custom build for these things to be advantageous?
I would be interested in hearing anyone's experiences in putting
together their own systems, and how they decided what things to
include, AND exclude, and why?
Thanks,
Mike
On Thu, Jul 8, 2010 at 8:02 PM, Mike McGonagle <mjmogo(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Hello all,
I recently have started having some issues with my current computer,
an old Mac OSX laptop, so I want to build a computer (desktop or
otherwise) to replace this older system. I pretty much have a list of
some specs that I would like in this machine, but in starting a search
for these things online, I feel I am getting nowhere fast.
I am looking to building around some Linux distro, but I am not
"married" to any particular system. My only hardware requirements are
the ability to connect up my USB midi interface. I would also like to
be able to capture digital audio from my external synths.
If anyone could possibly give me a handle on some direction of where
to start looking, it would be greatly appreciated. It just seems that
there is so much information out there, and Google doesn't seem to be
helping sort out the things I would need.
Thanks,
Mike
10:22 p.m.
My personal PC is my live musical instrument and DAW; perhaps my
thus-fars will help.
1. I was pondering laptop, but I don't like the heat-sensitivity,
price-point, repairability, upgradeability, nor tweakability. I do lots
of high-CPU software synthesis using Yoshimi, so heat would be a terror
on a laptop. I am using an all-black tower with a GearGrip.com harness,
and a black screen onstage. If I do more stage work I'll eventually get
a 9" LCD, but for now I'm fine using a very old 14" CRT. It gets lots
of startled looks, and Yoshimi produces such profound tones to match.
2. The tower (AMD64 9950 quad, 2.6GHz, 4G midrange RAM) cost me $350
from directron.com , those people have done much good for me. I added
the GearGrip separately, and also later added two laptop SATA hard
drives from Hitachi, the laptop hard drives are far more resistant to
vibration. The latter has been a just-in-case so far, my very old 110M
IDE is still running in the box as a backup. I am probably going to do
RAID-1 eventually, but am also probably going to wait for BTRFS for
this.
3. I don't do graphics beyond the occasional personal YouTube or mpeg
or whatnot, so I am using the motherboard (nVidia chipset) graphics. I
have to disable the nouveau driver manually in some distros, but Fedora
13 went right in.
4. Sound card. This was a very difficult decision for me. But the
decision was helped a lot by mechanics, pricepoints, and recent industry
impressions.
a. I started out using my motherboard audio. Worked great,
2.something ms latency. But as I thought would happen, the 1/8"
stereo output jack wore out on the front within six weeks. So
while using the back jack, I hunted for something better.
b. I spoke about it with our sound guy (I do run sound at need,
but he has the dedication and the muscles), running through
options, and he suggested RCA jacks. I was shocked, I had never
heard of RCA jacks on the back of a PC, but I had to admit it
made sense. They are mechanically far stronger than anything
else appropriate in size, they are spring-held and so don't
create jiggle-static, and are extremely reliable in general.
c. But I had never ever seen an RCA jack on a PC sound card
before, and a great many Google searches weren't getting me
anything. After a large amount of Googling I found just one or
two PC casemod suppliers who could (at amazing expense) supply
me with difficult do-it-myself parts to use my motherboard audio
or a header off a PCI sound card, with new external RCA jacks;
but I didn't want a complex and possibly fragile build; I wanted
something built of stock replaceable parts.
d. I found RCA jacks on USB and Firewire devices first.
Firewire was just too expensive. The reports I received about
USB 2 seemed to indicate kludginess and compatibility issues,
and a Windows setup job I had done two years before tended to
agree. PCI-E was new and expensive in sound cards then. So I
decided to look for PCI.
e. I did a large number of Google searches. Found zero. This
didn't make sense to me, because I had just visited a local
gamer-oriented PC store, and had seen an under-the-TV PC box
shaped like a thick VCR which had RCA jacks for audio. So I
decided that I had to go beyond Google. I first checked the
Creative Labs web site's full line, and although RCA jacks
weren't in any description (!), they were visible (!!!!) in two
of the pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. So I knew they existed. As
with most things Creative Labs which are not cheapies, the ones
I found there were rather expensive. So I did some research
using past reports on Linux Audio lists, found a make appearing
to do very well (AudioTrak), found a model with RCA jacks using
the photographs of cards, found a very good supplier
(floridamusicco.com) of my chosen card (AudioTrak Prodigy HD2),
put it in, and found that it works beautifully. Not only does
it work beautifully, but the quality of its electronics are
visibly extraordinary. I have been working off and on in
hardware since 1981, and this card reminds me of some of the
real beauties made years ago. DIP sockets for op-amps. Thick
sturdy board, white in color to expose any issues. Big strong
capacitors, no cheapies. And the price is very good considering
its capability. The card can do 192 kbps :-) I don't use it at
more than 96 kbps, and usually 48 kbps, because more takes up
CPU!
4. The CCRMA RT kernel registers crash errors on my F13 a lot. (I
imagine it's just one of the four CPUs crashing.) I don't use it
anymore. I'm using the just-updated stock F13 kernel, with Jack2 in
realtime+soft mode. This combination used to not work at all, but under
F13 on this hardware it runs rather nicely.
5. Jack2. I find that jack2 (the optional jackd package at version
1.9.5 in F13 right now) in synchronous mode (-S on its command line in
qjackctl) gives by far the best results on this hardware.
On Sat, 2010-07-10 at 15:25 -0400, Mike McGonagle wrote:
In continuing my search for information on building a
computer, I
found this website ( http://www.build-gaming-computers.com/ ). While
this site says it is about building a gaming system, I would imagine
that the information is applicable to building a system for using as a
Digital Audio Workstation, too.
I guess I should move on to other questions that are more related to
specifics about a DAW system. Things such as how the software would
take advantage of a multiple processor machine. Would something like
that require a custom compile for that particular machine? Or are
there builds that already exist? How about the system kernel? Would
that require a custom build for these things to be advantageous?
I would be interested in hearing anyone's experiences in putting
together their own systems, and how they decided what things to
include, AND exclude, and why?
Thanks,
Mike
On Thu, Jul 8, 2010 at 8:02 PM, Mike McGonagle <mjmogo(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Hello all,
I recently have started having some issues with my current computer,
an old Mac OSX laptop, so I want to build a computer (desktop or
otherwise) to replace this older system. I pretty much have a list of
some specs that I would like in this machine, but in starting a search
for these things online, I feel I am getting nowhere fast.
I am looking to building around some Linux distro, but I am not
"married" to any particular system. My only hardware requirements are
the ability to connect up my USB midi interface. I would also like to
be able to capture digital audio from my external synths.
If anyone could possibly give me a handle on some direction of where
to start looking, it would be greatly appreciated. It just seems that
there is so much information out there, and Google doesn't seem to be
helping sort out the things I would need.
Thanks,
Mike
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-user 
11 Jul
11 Jul
1:07 a.m.
AudioPhile 2496 has RCA jacks, works very very well with Linux.
Jonathan E. Brickman wrote:
e. I did a large number of Google searches.
Found zero. This
didn't make sense to me, because I had just visited a local
gamer-oriented PC store, and had seen an under-the-TV PC box shaped
like a thick VCR which had RCA jacks for audio. So I decided that I
had to go beyond Google. I first checked the Creative Labs web
site's full line, and although RCA jacks weren't in any description
(!), they were visible (!!!!) in two of the
pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. So I knew they existed. As with most
things Creative Labs which are not cheapies, the ones I found there
were rather expensive. So I did some research using past reports on
Linux Audio lists, found a make appearing to do very well
(AudioTrak), found a model with RCA jacks using the photographs of
cards, found a very good supplier (floridamusicco.com) of my chosen
card (AudioTrak Prodigy HD2), put it in, and found that it works
beautifully. Not only does it work beautifully, but the quality of
its electronics are visibly extraordinary. I have been working off
and on in hardware since 1981, and this card reminds me of some of
the real beauties made years ago. DIP sockets for op-amps. Thick
sturdy board, white in color to expose any issues. Big strong
capacitors, no cheapies. And the price is very good considering its
capability. The card can do 192 kbps :-) I don't use it at more
than 96 kbps, and usually 48 kbps, because more takes up CPU!
--
David
gnome(a)hawaii.rr.com
authenticity, honesty, community
1:24 a.m.
Hey all,
Just to be dead clear: The RCA jack is NOT a balanced connection, and is
therefore
more susceptible to Radio Frequence interference. I'm not sure how serious
the OP
is about audio recording, but it is something to keep in mind.
Cheers, -Harry
PS: Info on differences of balanced / unbalanced stuff (from Sound on
Sound):
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jan02/articles/faq0102.asp#Anchor-11022
On Sun, Jul 11, 2010 at 12:07 AM, david <gnome(a)hawaii.rr.com> wrote:
AudioPhile 2496 has RCA jacks, works very very well
with Linux.
Jonathan E. Brickman wrote:
e. I did a large number of Google searches. Found zero. This
didn't make sense to me, because I had
just visited a local
gamer-oriented PC store, and had seen an under-the-TV PC box shaped
like a thick VCR which had RCA jacks for audio. So I decided that I
had to go beyond Google. I first checked the Creative Labs web
site's full line, and although RCA jacks weren't in any description
(!), they were visible (!!!!) in two of the
pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. So I knew they existed. As with most
things Creative Labs which are not cheapies, the ones I found there
were rather expensive. So I did some research using past reports on
Linux Audio lists, found a make appearing to do very well
(AudioTrak), found a model with RCA jacks using the photographs of
cards, found a very good supplier (floridamusicco.com) of my chosen
card (AudioTrak Prodigy HD2), put it in, and found that it works
beautifully. Not only does it work beautifully, but the quality of
its electronics are visibly extraordinary. I have been working off
and on in hardware since 1981, and this card reminds me of some of
the real beauties made years ago. DIP sockets for op-amps. Thick
sturdy board, white in color to expose any issues. Big strong
capacitors, no cheapies. And the price is very good considering its
capability. The card can do 192 kbps :-) I don't use it at more
than 96 kbps, and usually 48 kbps, because more takes up CPU!
--
David
gnome(a)hawaii.rr.com
authenticity, honesty, community
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-user
2:10 a.m.
Yah, didn't say they were. I think the OP was talking about a system to
use performing live, not recording.
Harry Van Haaren wrote:
Hey all,
Just to be dead clear: The RCA jack is NOT a balanced connection, and is
therefore
more susceptible to Radio Frequence interference. I'm not sure how
serious the OP
is about audio recording, but it is something to keep in mind.
Cheers, -Harry
PS: Info on differences of balanced / unbalanced stuff (from Sound on
Sound):
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jan02/articles/faq0102.asp#Anchor-11022
On Sun, Jul 11, 2010 at 12:07 AM, david <gnome(a)hawaii.rr.com
<mailto:gnome@hawaii.rr.com>> wrote:
AudioPhile 2496 has RCA jacks, works very very well with Linux.
Jonathan E. Brickman wrote:
e. I did a large number of Google searches. Found zero. This
didn't make sense to me, because I had just visited a local
gamer-oriented PC store, and had seen an under-the-TV PC box
shaped
like a thick VCR which had RCA jacks for audio. So I decided
that I
had to go beyond Google. I first checked the Creative Labs web
site's full line, and although RCA jacks weren't in any
description
(!), they were visible (!!!!) in two of the
pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. So I knew they existed. As with most
things Creative Labs which are not cheapies, the ones I found
there
were rather expensive. So I did some research using past
reports on
Linux Audio lists, found a make appearing to do very well
(AudioTrak), found a model with RCA jacks using the
photographs of
cards, found a very good supplier (floridamusicco.com
<http://floridamusicco.com>) of my chosen
card (AudioTrak Prodigy HD2), put it in, and found that it works
beautifully. Not only does it work beautifully, but the
quality of
its electronics are visibly extraordinary. I have been
working off
and on in hardware since 1981, and this card reminds me of
some of
the real beauties made years ago. DIP sockets for op-amps.
Thick
sturdy board, white in color to expose any issues. Big strong
capacitors, no cheapies. And the price is very good
considering its
capability. The card can do 192 kbps :-) I don't use it at more
than 96 kbps, and usually 48 kbps, because more takes up CPU!
--
David
gnome(a)hawaii.rr.com
authenticity, honesty, community
2:44 a.m.
Not sure about OP. My purposes are live performance and
playing-to-hard-drive. Recording of outside sources in studio quality
at a low budget, as far as I know, does not exist in stock parts. But
if I had to try, I would probably use a sound card with RCAs and a box
(bought or built) to convert two RCAs to two XLRs with careful
protection. RCAs are coax in design and were originally designed for
coax cables, which gives interesting possibilities.
Obviously, if my budget weren't that low, and knowing what I know now, I
would probably do Firewire, or USB3 if it exists, or X factor.
One product I have been hoping for for a while now, is microphones with
wireless-N built in, and related, simple audio-to-wifi boxes. The
thought is that these mikes and a2wifi devices would function as
streaming audio servers, which any PC on the wifi network could latch
onto and use as an audio channel. By doing this, we could build a
zero-wire input mix! The only catch is latency, I'm not sure if that
could be done.
J.E.B.
On Sat, 2010-07-10 at 14:10 -1000, david wrote:
Yah, didn't say they were. I think the OP was
talking about a system to
use performing live, not recording.
Harry Van Haaren wrote:
Hey all,
Just to be dead clear: The RCA jack is NOT a balanced connection, and is
therefore
more susceptible to Radio Frequence interference. I'm not sure how
serious the OP
is about audio recording, but it is something to keep in mind.
Cheers, -Harry
PS: Info on differences of balanced / unbalanced stuff (from Sound on
Sound):
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jan02/articles/faq0102.asp#Anchor-11022
On Sun, Jul 11, 2010 at 12:07 AM, david <gnome(a)hawaii.rr.com
<mailto:gnome@hawaii.rr.com>> wrote:
AudioPhile 2496 has RCA jacks, works very very well with Linux.
Jonathan E. Brickman wrote:
e. I did a large number of Google searches. Found zero. This
didn't make sense to me, because I had just visited a local
gamer-oriented PC store, and had seen an under-the-TV PC box
shaped
like a thick VCR which had RCA jacks for audio. So I decided
that I
had to go beyond Google. I first checked the Creative Labs web
site's full line, and although RCA jacks weren't in any
description
(!), they were visible (!!!!) in two of the
pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. So I knew they existed. As with most
things Creative Labs which are not cheapies, the ones I found
there
were rather expensive. So I did some research using past
reports on
Linux Audio lists, found a make appearing to do very well
(AudioTrak), found a model with RCA jacks using the
photographs of
cards, found a very good supplier (floridamusicco.com
<http://floridamusicco.com>) of my chosen
card (AudioTrak Prodigy HD2), put it in, and found that it works
beautifully. Not only does it work beautifully, but the
quality of
its electronics are visibly extraordinary. I have been
working off
and on in hardware since 1981, and this card reminds me of
some of
the real beauties made years ago. DIP sockets for op-amps.
Thick
sturdy board, white in color to expose any issues. Big strong
capacitors, no cheapies. And the price is very good
considering its
capability. The card can do 192 kbps :-) I don't use it at more
than 96 kbps, and usually 48 kbps, because more takes up CPU!
3:29 a.m.
Regarding balanced versus "RCA" : consider that for computer-djing, or
performing on a computer in a place where DJ's might normally play
records... the mixer inputs that are at easy reach have RCA jacks (and
you may not have time to go spelunking for other inputs if you've got
a strict timeslot and a list of performers or DJs.). In such
situations, balanced outs not emanating from case-mounted XLR jacks
might just be extra one-of-a-kind donglage to break. Maybe other
situations in "stage" or studio presents with balanced options -- but
it's probably a good idea to have an easy and reliable nonbalanced
output available as well (and a ground-lifting power cord for the
computer). The one thing I don't like about RCA is if you have any
tight fitting jacks on your high-end cables, then the RCA connector on
your gear might end up coming loose after a while and/or many
connections and disconnections. Ultimatley, nothing beats a nice 3-pin
XLR output jack for durability and reliable connection. And easy
enough to just hookup one side of the circuit into an RCA or 1/4"
phone jack for unbalanced "house" connections.
And i'd second the recommendation of the 24/96: lets' not forget the
fast MIDI port, digital i/o, and the the built-in digital mixer and
it's "zero latency monitoring" provided by the ice1712 chip, all
controlled by ability to control ALSA's envy24control and not
alsamixer. (or higher end equivalents of this card:
Module for Envy24 (ICE1712) based PCI sound cards.
* MidiMan M Audio Delta 1010
* MidiMan M Audio Delta 1010LT
* MidiMan M Audio Delta DiO 2496
* MidiMan M Audio Delta 66
* MidiMan M Audio Delta 44
* MidiMan M Audio Delta 410
* MidiMan M Audio Audiophile 2496
* TerraTec EWS 88MT
* TerraTec EWS 88D
* TerraTec EWX 24/96
* TerraTec DMX 6Fire
* TerraTec Phase 88
* Hoontech SoundTrack DSP 24
* Hoontech SoundTrack DSP 24 Value
* Hoontech SoundTrack DSP 24 Media 7.1
* Event Electronics, EZ8
* Digigram VX442
* Lionstracs, Mediastaton
* Terrasoniq TS 88
)
It's too bad the "high end" 1724HT (
http://alsa.cybermirror.org/manuals/icensemble/Envy24HT091DS.pdf )
solutions such as the AudioTrak Prodigy HD2, fine and beautiful as it
is, is missing the built-in digital mixer. Last seen in the
pre-Via-acquisition 1712 series whose design was in the hands of
people more into music than consumer audio:
http://alsa.cybermirror.org/manuals/icensemble/envy24.pdf
PS: Info on differences of balanced / unbalanced stuff
(from Sound on Sound):
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jan02/articles/faq0102.asp#Anchor-11022
My understanding is that the M Audio Delta 1010 is actually the
highest fidelity of the 1712-based lot, in that its rack-mount
breakout box actually carries the i2s digital signal between the 1712
sitting on the PCI bus and the mostly analog rackmount box. Within
that box the i2s is converted to analog via higher end converters
such as AKM AK4393 (
http://www.audioforums.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-1896.html ). And
probably, quasi-balanced outs, or did they spring for the extra op amp
per output?
Oh, and one more thing. Quasi-balanced outs like M-audio does is
better from one standpoint -- one less op-amp to color the signal path
.... and an assumption that it's a very short cables length from the
mixer/monitor destination of those outputs. Balanced audio out means
two buffer op-amps whose outputs might be slew-rate limited, twice the
noise, and potentially, twice-as many coupling capacitors that respond
differently based on signal magnitude, frequency, etc. -- and lets not
forget microphonics ( http://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=14630
http://www.kyocera.co.jp/prdct/electro/pdf/technical/highcv.pdf
http://www.analog.com/library/analogDialogue/Anniversary/21.html ).
Only in truly high quality, expensive gear do they do a good job on
the balanced outputs: to get the equivalent to consumer/audiophile
performance you have to have each op amp with half the noise, twice
the slew-rate, many times the bandwidth, significantly more output
current (600 ohm load -- potentially all capacitive if it's a long
cable). And unfortunately, it's more likely that a compromise w/
true-balanced outs means they'll use two consumer op-amps, two
consumer coupling capacitors of the same size, and end up
significantly degrading the sound over the equivalent unbalanced
"audiophile" gear. At which point you're better off scrapping the
other output and going quasi-balanced....
-- Niels
http://nielsmayer.com
PS: I want my next soundcard to be a gigabit ethernet port. Seriously
-- what's the point of firewire, USB etc when we have gigabit ethernet
and we can use that to hookup audio gear with cheap ethernet-to-RCA
dongles anywhere you need a pair of audio channels.. i know ... crazy
idea using an old standard that's been used for decades for delivery
of realtime information, guaranteed quality of service connections,
etc.
PPS: likewise, i want my next MIDI port to be an ethernet port with
some MIDI jacks that talks ipMIDI and then use
http://qmidinet.sourceforge.net to talk to your ethernet-connected
midi devices via alsa).
10:20 p.m.
On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 06:29:06PM -0700, Niels Mayer wrote:
PS: I want my next soundcard to be a gigabit ethernet port. Seriously
-- what's the point of firewire, USB etc when we have gigabit ethernet
and we can use that to hookup audio gear with cheap ethernet-to-RCA
dongles anywhere you need a pair of audio channels.. i know ... crazy
idea using an old standard that's been used for decades for delivery
of realtime information, guaranteed quality of service connections,
etc.
I just am not sure where you are getting that gig-e is an old standard
that's been used for decades to deliver realtime information with
guaranteed quality of service connections.
If you see GigE doing that, it is probably because it is in controlled
circumstances, or the application has large enough tolerances, and still
some luck may be involved.
It isn't a terrible idea, but I think it would only be really reliable
if you used a dedicated gige port and spoke raw ethernet instead of
tcp/ip.
Still, a fast E device that plays 8 or 16 channels may be quiet
reasonable, and under the right circumstances both reliable and easier
to build than a USB2 device.
PPS: likewise, i want my next MIDI port to be an
ethernet port with
some MIDI jacks that talks ipMIDI and then use
http://qmidinet.sourceforge.net to talk to your ethernet-connected
midi devices via alsa).
Sounds like it is time for someone to get a MCU ethernet dev board...
12 Jul
12 Jul
6:31 p.m.
On Sun, Jul 11, 2010 at 1:17 PM, Joshua Boyd <jdboyd(a)jdboyd.net> wrote:
I just am not sure where you are getting that gig-e is
an old standard
that's been used for decades to deliver realtime information with
guaranteed quality of service connections.
Ethernet probably got it's official start in 1976 with the publication of
Metcalfe and Boggs "Ethernet: Distributed Packet-Switching For Local
Computer Networks." They'd been working with 2.9M/s networks for
several years prior to the publication of the paper.... Since then,
speeds have increased, network topologies have changed from a shared
carrier to point-to-point, and it has been used for a variety of
protocol-and-higher-level work in using it for multimedia or
guaranteed data delivery:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avionics_Full-Duplex_Switched_Ethernet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_service
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_multicast
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP-TV
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_telephony
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice_over_IP
If you see GigE doing that, it is probably because it
is in controlled
circumstances, or the application has large enough tolerances, and still
some luck may be involved.
Gig-E is a cable running at a given datarate. Obviously, it's
controlled circumstances: one uses things like AFDX, QOS, Multicasting
or whatever other techniques one has at ones disposal in order to give
the needed data capabilities. Given that this is data-transfer that
(potentially) people's lives depend on, it's based on solid
engineering and not "luck." The concepts, the software, the protocols,
etc on this are often decades old, as I stated initially.
It isn't a terrible idea, but I think it would
only be really reliable
if you used a dedicated gige port and spoke raw ethernet instead of
tcp/ip.
The point of mentioning "Gig E" as opposed to 10Base-T running over a
coax is there's enough bandwidth available that you could easily have
general traffic and your "realtime-needing" audio or video on the same
cable. Protocols to do this have been around for decades, as I was
saying. It is well-understood engineering.
You just have to setup the "controlled circumstances" so that you can
guarantee a certain amount of bandwidth to your video or audio feeds.
How do you think companies with digital phone service share that
network with it's general internet access? Or for that matter, on a
different kind of network, how do cable providers manage to keep the
digital TV signals going uninterrupted while at the same time having
bandwidth allocated for home phone service, and home internet service
as well?
Still, a fast E device that plays 8 or 16 channels may
be quiet
reasonable, and under the right circumstances both reliable and easier
to build than a USB2 device.
The "pros" have been doing this all along:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MADI
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EtherSound
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AES47
http://www.qscaudio.com/products/network/QSys/Q-LAN_WhitePaper_2009-10.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_over_Ethernet
> PPS: likewise, i want my next MIDI port to be an
ethernet port with
> some MIDI jacks that talks ipMIDI and then use
> http://qmidinet.sourceforge.net to talk to your ethernet-connected
> midi devices via alsa).
Sounds like it is time for someone to get a MCU
ethernet dev board...
Only if financial remuneration is involved, alongside a business plan
that involves getting these into people's hands at a reasonable cost.
-- Niels
http://nielsmayer.com
15 Jul
15 Jul
4:26 p.m.
Thanks, Jonathan, the description of your system sounds nice...
It also appears that I should give a bit more of a background
description on what I am trying to put together. While I would like to
be able to use this machine live, I am mostly thinking of it as a
production system. Most of the things I am interested in seem to
require too much synthesis for my Mac to handle in realtime (doing
some granular synthesis with about 64 grains going at one time). I am
also interested in Computer Generated music for real musicians.
Currently, I am using PD as a "gui" building system, while I am doing
the audio stuff in other programs linked up to PD. I tried to use PD
for the audio stuff, but it requires static objects for each "voice"
(and the 64 grains I mentioned, really bogs down my Mac). While I have
not tried PD on a Linux machine, I have heard that it runs much faster
than it does on a Mac.
I am also looking to build a controller interface using Arduino and a
multi-touch tablet of some sort, but that is down the road. The first
thing that I need to do is get an idea of what I want for the computer
hardware, and what software I am going to run. I am planning on some
version of Linux, and most likely it will be Ubuntu. But, that is also
part of the things that I am looking for some advice on.
I did find an interesting site that allows you to put together your
own system, and it gives you an idea of what those things will cost,
but I also imagine that those prices are what THEY would charge if
they put the system together for you. At least it could be used to fit
all the things together, and then you can price them else where... The
website is http://www.pugetsystems.com/
Mike
On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 4:22 PM, Jonathan E. Brickman
<jeb(a)joshuacorps.org> wrote:
My personal PC is my live musical instrument and DAW;
perhaps my thus-fars
will help.
1. I was pondering laptop, but I don't like the heat-sensitivity,
price-point, repairability, upgradeability, nor tweakability. I do lots of
high-CPU software synthesis using Yoshimi, so heat would be a terror on a
laptop. I am using an all-black tower with a GearGrip.com harness, and a
black screen onstage. If I do more stage work I'll eventually get a 9" LCD,
but for now I'm fine using a very old 14" CRT. It gets lots of startled
looks, and Yoshimi produces such profound tones to match.
2. The tower (AMD64 9950 quad, 2.6GHz, 4G midrange RAM) cost me $350 from
directron.com , those people have done much good for me. I added the
GearGrip separately, and also later added two laptop SATA hard drives from
Hitachi, the laptop hard drives are far more resistant to vibration. The
latter has been a just-in-case so far, my very old 110M IDE is still running
in the box as a backup. I am probably going to do RAID-1 eventually, but am
also probably going to wait for BTRFS for this.
3. I don't do graphics beyond the occasional personal YouTube or mpeg or
whatnot, so I am using the motherboard (nVidia chipset) graphics. I have to
disable the nouveau driver manually in some distros, but Fedora 13 went
right in.
4. Sound card. This was a very difficult decision for me. But the
decision was helped a lot by mechanics, pricepoints, and recent industry
impressions.
a. I started out using my motherboard audio. Worked great, 2.something ms
latency. But as I thought would happen, the 1/8" stereo output jack wore
out on the front within six weeks. So while using the back jack, I hunted
for something better.
b. I spoke about it with our sound guy (I do run sound at need, but he has
the dedication and the muscles), running through options, and he suggested
RCA jacks. I was shocked, I had never heard of RCA jacks on the back of a
PC, but I had to admit it made sense. They are mechanically far stronger
than anything else appropriate in size, they are spring-held and so don't
create jiggle-static, and are extremely reliable in general.
c. But I had never ever seen an RCA jack on a PC sound card before, and a
great many Google searches weren't getting me anything. After a large
amount of Googling I found just one or two PC casemod suppliers who could
(at amazing expense) supply me with difficult do-it-myself parts to use my
motherboard audio or a header off a PCI sound card, with new external RCA
jacks; but I didn't want a complex and possibly fragile build; I wanted
something built of stock replaceable parts.
d. I found RCA jacks on USB and Firewire devices first. Firewire was just
too expensive. The reports I received about USB 2 seemed to indicate
kludginess and compatibility issues, and a Windows setup job I had done two
years before tended to agree. PCI-E was new and expensive in sound cards
then. So I decided to look for PCI.
e. I did a large number of Google searches. Found zero. This didn't make
sense to me, because I had just visited a local gamer-oriented PC store, and
had seen an under-the-TV PC box shaped like a thick VCR which had RCA jacks
for audio. So I decided that I had to go beyond Google. I first checked
the Creative Labs web site's full line, and although RCA jacks weren't in
any description (!), they were visible (!!!!) in two of the
pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. So I knew they existed. As with most things
Creative Labs which are not cheapies, the ones I found there were rather
expensive. So I did some research using past reports on Linux Audio lists,
found a make appearing to do very well (AudioTrak), found a model with RCA
jacks using the photographs of cards, found a very good supplier
(floridamusicco.com) of my chosen card (AudioTrak Prodigy HD2), put it in,
and found that it works beautifully. Not only does it work beautifully, but
the quality of its electronics are visibly extraordinary. I have been
working off and on in hardware since 1981, and this card reminds me of some
of the real beauties made years ago. DIP sockets for op-amps. Thick sturdy
board, white in color to expose any issues. Big strong capacitors, no
cheapies. And the price is very good considering its capability. The card
can do 192 kbps :-) I don't use it at more than 96 kbps, and usually 48
kbps, because more takes up CPU!
4. The CCRMA RT kernel registers crash errors on my F13 a lot. (I imagine
it's just one of the four CPUs crashing.) I don't use it anymore. I'm
using the just-updated stock F13 kernel, with Jack2 in realtime+soft mode.
This combination used to not work at all, but under F13 on this hardware it
runs rather nicely.
5. Jack2. I find that jack2 (the optional jackd package at version 1.9.5
in F13 right now) in synchronous mode (-S on its command line in qjackctl)
gives by far the best results on this hardware.
On Sat, 2010-07-10 at 15:25 -0400, Mike McGonagle wrote:
In continuing my search for information on building a computer, I
found this website ( http://www.build-gaming-computers.com/ ). While
this site says it is about building a gaming system, I would imagine
that the information is applicable to building a system for using as a
Digital Audio Workstation, too.
I guess I should move on to other questions that are more related to
specifics about a DAW system. Things such as how the software would
take advantage of a multiple processor machine. Would something like
that require a custom compile for that particular machine? Or are
there builds that already exist? How about the system kernel? Would
that require a custom build for these things to be advantageous?
I would be interested in hearing anyone's experiences in putting
together their own systems, and how they decided what things to
include, AND exclude, and why?
Thanks,
Mike
On Thu, Jul 8, 2010 at 8:02 PM, Mike McGonagle <mjmogo(a)gmail.com
wrote:
Hello all,
I recently have started having some issues with my current computer,
an old Mac OSX laptop, so I want to build a computer (desktop or
otherwise) to replace this older system. I pretty much have a list of
some specs that I would like in this machine, but in starting a search
for these things online, I feel I am getting nowhere fast.
I am looking to building around some Linux distro, but I am not
"married" to any particular system. My only hardware requirements are
the ability to connect up my USB midi interface. I would also like to
be able to capture digital audio from my external synths.
If anyone could possibly give me a handle on some direction of where
to start looking, it would be greatly appreciated. It just seems that
there is so much information out there, and Google doesn't seem to be
helping sort out the things I would need.
Thanks,
Mike
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-user
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-user
5251
days inactive
5257
days old
linux-audio-user@lists.linuxaudio.org
10 comments
6 participants
participants (6)
-
david -
Harry Van Haaren -
Jonathan E. Brickman -
Joshua Boyd -
Mike McGonagle -
Niels Mayer