Hi Folks My laptop runs Gentoo Linux. It is primarily a work tool - I write web applications. As I use my own self-compiled Apache HTTPd, MySQL and Perl (as well as a whole load of other tools), wiping the machine and starting from scratch isn't something that I can undertake lightly. In the past, it has taken about a week to do this when changing machines. "What's that got to do with audio?" I hear you ask. What it has to do with audio is that fact that I can't use Ardour (won't compile), Rosegarden (crashes) or Qtractor (crashes unless run as root). I've tried Muse but the graphics are so squashed and awful that it is unusable. Now, all the above issues appear to be down to the underlying GUI toolkits (re-installation/upgrading of QT, KDE, GTK doesn't fix anything - given up even trying). As I'm not really that big a fan of GUI applications anyway, I wonder if I'm taking the wrong approach - should I not be using a console application instead? Having a look around, I have stumbled on Ecasound - sounds good to me apart from the fact that I can't see any mention about being able to sync to MIDI. I don't need a sequencer - I have one in my Kawai K5000W that is just SO easy to use that I wouldn't bother using one on the computer. I do, however, need that synchronisation - MIDI start/stop, clock in the recording application. Suggestions? Cheers M -- Matthew Smith Smiffytech - Technology Consulting & Web Application Development Business: http://www.smiffytech.com/ Personal: http://www.smiffysplace.com/ LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/smiffy