[sms@Serenity ~]$ aconnect -o client 14: 'Midi Through' [type=kernel] 0 'Midi Through Port-0' client 16: 'SB Audigy 2 ZS [SB0350]' [type=kernel] 0 'Audigy MPU-401 (UART)' 32 'Audigy MPU-401 #2' client 17: 'Emu10k1 WaveTable' [type=kernel] 0 'Emu10k1 Port 0 ' 1 'Emu10k1 Port 1 ' 2 'Emu10k1 Port 2 ' 3 'Emu10k1 Port 3 ' [sms@Serenity ~]$ My Audigy 2 ZS is recognized. I've used the 0-3 ports through 'arecord' with success. (I disabled the motherboard sound chip through the BIOS.) I'm using Fedora 12. But the Audigy 2 should work with any distro. Get everything related to AWE, Emu10k1, Sound Blaster, and whatever else that your package manager will show you. Then get everything ALSA related, with the exception of the ALSA to PulseAudio backend. In Fedora 12, PulseAudio wasn't playing nice with ALSA, or at least I always had trouble getting them to play nice. Finally, and most critically, get ALSAMIXER installed. Press the F5 key so that you see all the settings. Make Absolutely Certain the Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack setting is set to OFF. If this setting is set ON, you will not hear any audio output through the Audigy 2. I suspect this has been your problem with the Audigy 2. It was also the critical setting for my prior SBLive! card. The Audigy 2 does in fact work perfectly well with Linux. I've been doing it since the Audigy 2 first came out, however many years that's been. And if you have the time to learn them, use the Linux apps. I run Gnome desktop with KDE also installed. Good Luck, Stephen.

On 14/03/11 20:40, Batz wrote: Yep, that's a fair point -- if you just want something that will let you play GM MIDI in to and get sound out of, the Audigy's synth is a definite option. As you rightly point out, it's not a rompler, but a sample playback engine, and there are no samples physically stored in ROM on the card. It loads SoundFonts, so as others have suggested, you just need to use the "asfxload" tool to load an appropriate SoundFont in to the card. The Windows drivers do exactly the same thing -- they just automatically load a SoundFont to the card on boot. If you look on your Windows install, or your driver CD, you'll probably find a .sf2 file -- this is the SoundFont file that the Windows drivers would be loading at boot. Take a copy of this, use asfxload to send it to your card, and the synth should sound just like it does under Windows. If you don't have asfxload available, just install it -- on Debian/Ubuntu and derivatives (like KXStudio) it's in the "awesfx" package. FWIW, I'd be perfectly comfortable using JACK and a software synth like Qsynth/FluidSynth in a live environment. I haven't actually performed with it yet, but I have a setup in testing here where I have seq24 controlling various software synths (Hydrogen and PHASEX in my case) and a hardware synth (a Waldorf Blofeld), using Ardour to mix the synths and apply realtime effects, all via JACK. It's been quite solid in my testing so far. AFAIK, KXStudio runs everything, including Pulseaudio, via JACK, so having Pulseaudio running shouldn't be of any concern for music-making. This connection of Pulseaudio to JACK could be causing some of your xrun issues, though. Personally, I use Ubuntu (standard, not Studio), and install the audio packages I need on top of that. I can't say whether it'll work for you, but I can tell you that it works for me. LinuxSampler is a sampler more in line with Kontakt or GigaStudio -- it's for loading large, sophisticated instruments that usually cover just one sound (the 2GB Salamander Grand Piano, which is an SFZ instrument for use in LinuxSampler, is a good example). If you want a GM set, the best option for a synth would be Fluidsynth (a command-line tool) or Qsynth (a GUI frontend for Fluidsynth); like your Audigy it runs SoundFont files, which can be single instruments or complete GM sets. There's an excellent (large-ish) GM set called Fluid -- it's packaged in most distributions (in the "fluid-soundfont-gm" package in Debian/Ubuntu and derivatives). Otherwise, you could load the SoundFont file that shipped with your Audigy. Thanks Leigh

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 21:19:10 +1030 Batz <batzman-lau(a)all-electric.com> wrote: hi, just a general consideration: from my experience every distro will have something that's not working right out of the box. But rather than trashing the distro and trying another one on the first problem, you'll be much better off (in terms of time) to choose a distro with a good community, and ask on forums or mailing lists advice for the specific problems you encounter. I know it does seem overwhelming when you've got many things to track down but you can make a list, and one by one solve the problems (and by so doing learn how all the system/apps work) - I just think you'll be up faster than if you just "try" another distro. For the distro to choose, personally I wouldn't know... I use Archlinux but that probably requires a bit too much setup for your purposes... I'd probably suggest an ubuntu-derivative, only because that's what most people use and it will probably be easier to find help for your problems. Ah, also, I guess KXstudio uses KDE? If that's the case, I'm not surprised to hear it's slow, as it's *the* most bloated DE... Personally all I use is openbox,pcmanfm, tint2 and conky - I have all the essential GUI features and it's way faster than any DE. cheers renato

Leigh Dyer wrote: Hi Baz, And with Leigh's note I'll jump and suggest you simply move on. It's obvious you've made a game attempt at working with Linux, and you have my respect for that. But at my age I don't have the patience either, so I sincerely suggest you use what gets your work done most efficiently. I'm sorry Linux audio isn't working out for you - unfortunately that's an all too-common experience, and I certainly don't blame the interested user. The plain fact is, as your experience tells, that there is no perfect Linux audio distro. OTOH, Windows, for its users, is just that - a perfect audio distro. You don't try umpteen of them to find which one works, you don't have to compile anything, and all your apps have a single dedicated distribution target. Sweet. I don't need to rehearse the Microsoft negatives here - I'm sure you've already found some, which I assume was at least one motivating factor for your Linux trials - but unfortunately you've also discovered a bunch of the negative aspects of the Linux audio world. I can't stress enough how much it matters to me that I get my work done. At 60 I'm feeling the pinch of years, and I have no time to muck around with excursions into another operating system. Had I the time and inclination I'd prep a Windows box for the fun of it, but I have no need. I'm getting my work done with Linux. I currently run two distros under normal use here - the ancient, super-stable and increasingly irritating 64 Studio 2.1 and a more modern Ubuntu 10.04 - and I occasionally run AVLinux, which is the distro I now recommend to beginners. Perhaps a best idea would be for you - assuming you're still interested in all this stuff - to set up a "sandbox" machine or a drive partition for your Linux ventures. Take a more leisurely path, learn more about the system itself, and maybe you'll end up using Linux for something anyway. Whatever you decide, feel free to ask more questions here and elsewheres in the general community. We'll be glad to help as we're able. Good luck, dp Some examples of my music made with Linux audio software: http://linux-sound.org/ardour-music.html

Y-ellow Dave, Leigh 'n' all. Thanks once again. I'm not entirely ready to give up it would seem I'll try the fedora 14 CCRMA mix. I never really considered a fedora based system because I cut my linux teeth as it were, on redhat. And I pretty much hated it at the time. My weapon of choice for many years has been slackware but it really doesn't lend it self well to this kind of thing. There is an RT variant of slackware but it's far from ready. I'm sorry to all that I'm not asking the right questions here. I'm just not sure at this point what those questions should be. And I'm obviously not making my point clear either. This is probably neither here nor there at this point but I feel the need to point out that there is good reason for this. I need to see Linux sampler/fluid synth, etc, working. It doesn't matter to me upon what distro. The reason is that I need to know that they are going to work in this situation. There's not much point pouring time and resource into something only to find that it's design philosophy is anathema to the limitations of my methodology. On the other hand, I might find a workaround. Or even a better way of doing things. I just don't know till I can see it working. And then I'd know if it's worth putting in the hard work of nailing a system down. That's all I'm saying. From what I'd been reading there seems to be a couple of big flaws in the design of both fluid and LSP. But I can't tell from just reading about it. On the other hand they seem tantalizingly comprehensive. I really need to see that for myself. That's really the only point I'm making about that. It's actually a small point and I'm sorry to have had to labor it so. What I was asking is if there was any sure fire way I can get to that point so I can audition them. What's the quickest path? However you want to phrase that. Once I can see it's efficacy, once I can evaluate the behavior, then I can invest time in the nuts and bolts. With a view to honing it into a semi-embedded system perhaps. The thing is that everybody seems to be concerned with recording. And to a slightly lesser extent, sequencing. Sampling and soft-synths are seen as add-ons and plug-ins to those things. This philosophy presents us with a conundrum. Those solutions work well in the short term. However in the long term they are redundant. I need an instrument that is independent of those things and yet completely controllable. Future proof to an extent. Because once I start composing with this instrument, there's no going back. If I want to play the same song in 10 years time, I have to know that the instrument that makes the sounds is going to be there. Even if everything else changes around it. And that's just one issue. That's enough orthodoxy for one evening I'm sure. Except to thank everyone once again for your advice. And move right along. At 11:37 PM 3/16/2011 -1000, david <gnome(a)hawaii.rr.com> wrote: This is why we use linux isn't it? In actual fact, windows can be nailed down pretty well these days. Use TinyXP or now, Tiny7. These "unofficial" versions allow you to pre-install windows (AKA BOSH AKA Bastard Operating System from Hell) without all the M$-centric crap. IE, Outlook, WiMP and DotNet. Once you get rid of all the virus magnets, it's actually half decent and runs about 3 times faster. Since these things are where 99% of all the hooks for malicious code reside, you have to purposefully install something to get stung. Replace IE with FireFox. Or better yet, Opera. Replace WiMP with VLC. Who needs WiMP when you've got VLC anyway? And Outlook, What can I say. Virus anyone? And anything that requires DotNet Framework or VB script shouldn't be in your system anyway. No matter how tantalizingly bling it may appear. It's not enough to just disable these things. You have to rip their still beating hearts out from the system. The beauty is that Tiny does it all for you from the get go. The sad irony of all this is that I tend to learn far more about fixing and butchering BOSH systems simply because the bloody things break so readily. I don't get those kinds of opportunities with linux because the damn things never die. I've got a SlackServer here that ran for 5 years, 24/7. And even then all we did was jack it up and put another Mo-Bo under it. That was 2 years ago. But having said that, every system I've run up with TinyXP seems to be getting the same kind of mileage. Except for the guy who blamed his kids for installing a firefox tool bar which eventually snagged his machine. Was a bit embarrassing when I discovered that it was a porn toolbar and he, himself had installed it. You think your friend is dumb as a rock? Then there's ReactOS. http://www.reactos.org An open source version of windows which seems to be coming along quite nicely these days. I'll likely use that if I have to install this CreatiFlabs card under Windows. That's not been an issue since the days of WinModems. Perhaps there's no driver but even BIOS shouldn't be an issue with linux because once the kernel takes over, the BIOS becomes irrelevant. Heh. This maybe true. Though I have one big limitation. Whilst I can program in machine code on embedded systems, I completely missed the boat with bloatware. I have a vague understanding of TinyC on embedded systems but that's about my limit. There is a threshold I reach with large complex OSes that just gives me a headache. But I'm sure I'm not alone and there's probably clinics all across the globe that treat the condition. I had some issues with Musix but I can't remember what they were now. I'll go back and investigate. Hadn't come across Aptosid. So thanks for that. I've now got fedora down and I'll see if I can get CCRMA working. Never really got along with ubuntu but I'm slowly making peace with it. I agree about KDE. It use to be just fine in slackware for some reason. But I'm assuming that the systems in question must be still running KDE3. I'm not sure if I ever bothered upgrading any of these local slackware boxes. You know how it is. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Once again thanks. I have much to go on. I would rather prefer to have a linux based system at the end of the day but I'll hedge my bets. As long as I don't end up running something like PropellerHeads Reason, I can live with running the CreatiFlabs card under BOSH I guess. And it just dawned on me that I can still transfer the SF2 files over to Fluid or LSP at some later stage should I get either working. Thanks again. Most appreciated. Be absolutely icebox. _ __ _ | "_ \ | | batzman-lau(a)all-electric.com | |_)/ __ _| |_ ____ _-_|\ | _ \ / _` | __|___ | / \ | |_) | (_| | |_ / / \_.-*_/ |_,__/ \__,_|\__|/ / v / ,__ Goodfortune |_____| http://all-electric.com

Y-ellow S.M. 'n' all. At 07:10 PM 3/18/2011 -0400, S. Massy wrote: Yes that's pretty much exactly what I'm saying. And what I've been trying to do all along. But for one reason or another, this approach hasn't worked. I've never been able to get LSP working at all. I had fluid working at one stage but on a distro who's network was a notwork. Which meant I couldn't get anything into it. And so far, I've found nothing that can create or edit samples and banks from scratch. In SoundFont format or anything else for that matter. This is of course, as important, since I'm not about using pre-existing samples here. I have a bunch of Yamaha ROMplers if I wanted to do that. I need to be able to edit and audition samples and settings. Having said all that, I got Fedora 14 installed on the test-bed last night. That's as far as I've got but so far so good. I'm quite pleasantly surprised with Fedora. I've been avoiding it because I quickly grew to hate RedHat back in the bad-old-days. I went through the usual bunch of distros back then until I finally discovered slackware and it was a match made in heaven. I really took to it's BSD-like architecture. Although in more recent versions, they've conceded to including a replica of the convoluted rc.d structure that Debian and RedHat use. It's all SymLinks though so I can usually ignore it unless I need to try and load an RPM or something. That usually ends in tears but that's another story. I had some networking issues with Fedora. I thought... "Oh no. Here we go..." But actually it was just a firewall issue and everything is chugging along reasonably well. Though it's a bit slow and bumpy. I can live with that. Later today I'll try and get the CCRMA repo to work. Fingers crossed but I have a good feeling about this one. With any luck I'll get the test bed I need. So thanks to all for bearing with me. I'm most grateful. I'm really hopeful that I'll be able to nail down an entirely linux based studio at the end of all this and not have to look back for the rest of my life. And to be able to go out and play without having to worry about whether bloody windows will crash in the middle of a gig. Thanks again. Be absolutely icebox. _ __ _ | "_ \ | | batzman-lau(a)all-electric.com | |_)/ __ _| |_ ____ _-_|\ | _ \ / _` | __|___ | / \ | |_) | (_| | |_ / / \_.-*_/ |_,__/ \__,_|\__|/ / v / ,__ Goodfortune |_____| http://all-electric.com

Renato wrote: Aptosid 2011.1 with XFCE runs fine here. Full networking support, RT kernel, no need to futz around with permissions to make audio work, first distro I've tried that found and worked with my Audiophile 2496 card without problems. Has very current versions of audio software, since it's based on Debian Sid. Agreed: KDE4 is bloated, uses tons of resources, runs services that have negative impact on pro audio use (have its silly content indexing "semantic desktop" service kick off and start grinding away on the disk drive while you're recording something????). And I was a long time KDE user until recently. The GNOME desktop environment is cramped and limiting, old-fashioned, and seems to be regularly dumbing itself down even further. Plus the coming dustup over GNOME 3 is going to make the KDE community fights about KDE4 look like kindergarten stuff. I also like Fluxbox for a minimal-resource-consuming desktop. -- David gnome(a)hawaii.rr.com authenticity, honesty, community

Hello Batz, PlanetCCRMA is a music based system built on top of Fedora. I've included the mailing list link here so people can see some of your problems. It's the best 'works out of the box' music system I've found, but others will probably disagree. The system maintainer actively follows the PlanetCCRMA mailing list. Hope this helps, Stephen. ________________________________ From: Batz <batzman-lau(a)all-electric.com> To: linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org Sent: Wed, March 16, 2011 5:49:10 AM Subject: Re: [LAU] Audigy too Y-ellow Leigh 'n' all. At 10:14 PM 3/15/2011 +1100, Leigh Dyer wrote: Well, not quite. That's not my actual MO. GM/GS/Whatever, is just a convenient framework. A starting point as it were. I use mainly proprietary samples but it gives me a pallet to begin with. I have plenty of hardware synths. A few desirable classics even. But for example. for a drum rig, I'll often start with kick and snare. That interaction is important. It's handy therefore, to already have a complete GM kit with which to start butchering. I can create kick and snare noises and test them with pre-existing high-hats etc. By the end of the process an entirely new kit would be replaced. The point though is that I have a framework to begin with. Having said all that, this methodology isn't necessarily important in the long term. It's a convenience really and not all that important. All that's really important for the moment is that I have something to test. So far, I haven't even been able to get anything working so I can test it. With at least a dozen vaguely working distros, each taking maybe a week to write off, this is a particularly fruitless and mind numbing process. I'm no further than when I started. So what I'd like is for someone here to suggest a distro where all this stuff will work out the box as it were. So I can have a chance to evaluate it and get down to the business end. Everything I've tried so far has one major problem or another. KXstudio for example, works but won't talk to the envy24 based sound card. It probably talks to the on-board sound card (whatever that is) but I can't hear that. It runs up linux sampler but won't actually connect it using Jack. Since I can't talk to it I can't do anything with it. It might actually be the best distro to pursue, but how would I know? Other distros may work but have networking issues. One of the PureDyne distros won't network at all so it can't be fully installed because it needs to find the internet to do so. Other's have everything working except that linux sampler won't install. Etc Etc. ... Under these circumstances it's not possible for me to settle on a likely candidate to take anything further. I'm just wasting time here. So if anyone has a better suggestion, one that can nail this down so I can go forward, then I'm all ears. But so far I'm just chasing my tail. And after all this, I still don't know if I'm going to find a suitable work-flow in any of it. There WAS another imperative for using linux. I was introduced to the music lecturers at North Melbourne institute of TAFE. The whole campus has been conned by apple. They literally try to push the idea on their students that there IS nothing else. Apple does a job (If you'll excuse the pun) on education institutions. Where they offer them `special deals' if they promote apple products exclusively. So that if only apple products are taught, students may never question an alternative. To cut a long story short, I said. "I'd be happier to experiment with linux." To which the head of the department said. "What's that?" It was all I could do but to laugh. I would indeed like to use linux for this stuff just prove a point if nothing else. But in essence linux isn't doing it self any favors by being confusing, convoluted and a little out of step. I should be use to that by now but my time is limited. I'm at the other end of my life. I don't have time to waste. I cut my teeth in this business 40 years ago and I just need stuff that works. So not to use linux is a very big bit disappointing. On so many levels. But I'm running out of time and I have practical considerations. So if anyone wants to tell me how I can fast track this, I would very much appreciate it. Thanks in advance. Most appreciated. Be absolutely icebox. _ __ _ | "_ \ | | batzman-lau(a)all-electric.com | |_)/ __ _| |_ ____ _-_|\ | _ \ / _` | __|___ | / \ | |_) | (_| | |_ / / \_.-*_/ |_,__/ \__,_|\__|/ / v / ,__ Goodfortune |_____| http://all-electric.com _______________________________________________ Linux-audio-user mailing list Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-user

Hello Leigh Dyer, Am 2011-03-15 22:14:25, hacktest Du folgendes herunter: I have two Audigy 2 ZS but unfortunately not the CDs and the .sf2 files. Where can I get them? Or can someone send it to me? Note: I have only the need, to hear MID files and not more. OK Thanks, Greetings and nice Day/Evening Michelle Konzack -- ##################### Debian GNU/Linux Consultant ###################### Development of Intranet and Embedded Systems with Debian GNU/Linux itsystems@tdnet France EURL itsystems@tdnet UG (limited liability) Owner Michelle Konzack Owner Michelle Konzack Apt. 917 (homeoffice) 50, rue de Soultz Kinzigstraße 17 67100 Strasbourg/France 77694 Kehl/Germany Tel: +33-6-61925193 mobil Tel: +49-177-9351947 mobil Tel: +33-9-52705884 fix <http://www.itsystems.tamay-dogan.net/> <http://www.flexray4linux.org/> <http://www.debian.tamay-dogan.net/> <http://www.can4linux.org/> Jabber linux4michelle(a)jabber.ccc.de ICQ #328449886 Linux-User #280138 with the Linux Counter, http://counter.li.org/