22 Feb
2009
22 Feb
'09
12:29 p.m.
I am currently running Ubuntu Hardy Heron and I am quite dissatisfied with
its audio performance. I find it a complete mess of settings that sometimes
work and sometimes dont. Skype does not work at all, neither does Second
Life Voice. Other audio applications sometimes work and sometimes dont. I
have tried a lot of recommendations on many forums. Reading those forums I
do get the impression that Ubuntu is not a good choice for audio at all. So
here is my question:
Which Linux distro is regarded as a good and reliable choice for audio?
Playing, recording, gaming, voip, etc.
Regards
Mikk
22 Feb
22 Feb
1:03 p.m.
On Sun, 22 Feb 2009 17:29:16 +0100
Michiel <michiel33(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Which Linux distro is regarded as a good and reliable
choice for audio?
Playing, recording, gaming, voip, etc.
I've been using Fedora with the PlanetCCRMA packages and kernel for a
long time now and have had very good results. I'm currently on Fedora 9
with the 2.6.26.8-1.rt15.1.fc9.ccrma.i686.rt kernel, and have not had
issues other than having to disable PulseAudio(*).
http://ccrma.stanford.edu/planetccrma/software/ has all the info you
need.
(*)How on Earth did this piece of crud make it into the mainstream
distribution, anyway? For the life of me I can't see what it adds to
the operating environment.
--
======================================================================
Joe Hartley - UNIX/network Consultant - jh(a)brainiac.com
Without deviation from the norm, "progress" is not possible. - FZappa
1:13 p.m.
Thanks Joe. I may have to try Fedora then. Does skype run well on it? Also
with Video?
And what about disabling PulseAudio.... this package seems to cause quite
some trouble, ive seen it being duscussed on the Ubuntu forum as well. Some
recommending to remove it, others disagreeing.
Regards, mikk
2009/2/22 Joe Hartley <jh(a)brainiac.com>
On Sun, 22 Feb 2009 17:29:16 +0100
Michiel <michiel33(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Which Linux distro is regarded as a good and
reliable choice for audio?
Playing, recording, gaming, voip, etc.
I've been using Fedora with the PlanetCCRMA packages and kernel for a
long time now and have had very good results. I'm currently on Fedora 9
with the 2.6.26.8-1.rt15.1.fc9.ccrma.i686.rt kernel, and have not had
issues other than having to disable PulseAudio(*).
http://ccrma.stanford.edu/planetccrma/software/ has all the info you
need.
(*)How on Earth did this piece of crud make it into the mainstream
distribution, anyway? For the life of me I can't see what it adds to
the operating environment.
--
======================================================================
Joe Hartley - UNIX/network Consultant - jh(a)brainiac.com
Without deviation from the norm, "progress" is not possible. - FZappa
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-audio-user
2:50 p.m.
On Sun, 22 Feb 2009 18:13:26 +0100
mikk <michiel33(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Thanks Joe. I may have to try Fedora then. Does skype
run well on it? Also
with Video?
I've never used skype, so I can't say anything about that. For video,
I used the tips at http://www.gagme.com/greg/linux/f9-tips.php for
installing video codecs, Flash and Java, and have been happy about that.
I don't bother with any of the Real stuff, though - it used to be so
problematic I stopped using it, and rarely find content I'd care to see
with it.
And what about disabling PulseAudio.... this package
seems to cause quite
some trouble, ive seen it being duscussed on the Ubuntu forum as well. Some
recommending to remove it, others disagreeing.
I had had an issue with it holding on to devices when I wanted them, so
I disabled it and haven't missed it since.
--
======================================================================
Joe Hartley - UNIX/network Consultant - jh(a)brainiac.com
Without deviation from the norm, "progress" is not possible. - FZappa
7:34 p.m.
On Sun, Feb 22, 2009 at 1:49 PM, Joe Hartley <jh(a)brainiac.com> wrote:
On Sun, 22 Feb 2009 18:13:26 +0100
mikk <michiel33(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Skype runs perfectly on F9 and F10. At least on my systems, which have had
Pulse removed/disabled.
We relied on Skype connectivity while we were in Berlin for 6 months, and
never had a single issue with it (other than needing to stop JACK :)
Thanks Joe. I may have to try Fedora then. Does
skype run well on it?
Also
with Video?
I've never used skype, so I can't say anything about that. 
23 Feb
23 Feb
7:48 a.m.
Le Dimanche, 22 février 2009 18:34:22 -0500,
Paul Davis <paul(a)linuxaudiosystems.com> a écrit :
Skype runs perfectly on F9 and F10. At least on my
systems, which
have had Pulse removed/disabled.
If I may go on a tangent here, how did you got rid of Pulse ? I'm
using F8 x86_64 and it's not in the services menu. It does not
interfere with Jack, but when some audio is played w/o jack, xine has
to wait until a connection with Pulse does not work in order to
playback sound and that causes some delay.
Cheers.
8:16 a.m.
On Monday 23 February 2009 12:48, lanas wrote:
Le Dimanche, 22 février 2009 18:34:22 -0500,
Paul Davis <paul(a)linuxaudiosystems.com> a écrit :
On Fedora 8,9, and 10, simply removing the package alsa-plugins-pulseaudio,
will disable pulseaudio. If you also have KDE installed, removing the above
package will also remove kde-settings-pulseaudio package.
If you have any SDL audio apps, add the line below to ~/.bashrc, which will
remove the hack that SDL programs needed to use pulseaudio.
unset SDL_AUDIODRIVER
All the best.
Nigel.
Skype runs perfectly on F9 and F10. At least on
my systems, which
have had Pulse removed/disabled.
If I may go on a tangent here, how did you got rid of Pulse ? I'm
using F8 x86_64 and it's not in the services menu. It does not
interfere with Jack, but when some audio is played w/o jack, xine has
to wait until a connection with Pulse does not work in order to
playback sound and that causes some delay.
Cheers. 
10:57 a.m.
If I may go on a tangent here, how did you got rid of
Pulse ? I'm
My question is, once you get rid of pulse and have jack running, how do
you use Firefox (e.g for youtube)? skype?
What I do nowadays is run pulseaudio on top of jack (with the jack sink
module):
pulseaudio -L module-jack-sink -D
although that was also hard to get working
-- Dan
12:25 p.m.
Who can explain to me why it seems to be so hard to get a stable audio and
video environment in Linux (not requiring recompilations and intricate
tweaks) while this problem seems to have been solved quite satisfactorily in
Windows? What is the fundamental reason for this?
Michiel
12:50 p.m.
On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 11:25 AM, mikk <michiel33(a)gmail.com> wrote:
while this problem seems to have been solved quite
satisfactorily in
Windows?
Umm, have you ever tried to use windows for audio??
It may be (sorta) stable, but functionality is almost non-existant. Jack
beats anything I've ever seen, hands down.
And if you are complaining about the whole Realtime thing, realize this:
Windows does not provide *any* RT options. So, if you like that, just use a
non-rt kernel. It's pretty stable in my experience.
--
Christopher Stamper
Email: christopherstamper(a)gmail.com
Web: http://tinyurl.com/2ooncg
gTalk: http://tinyurl.com/6e359r
Skype: cdstamper
1:34 p.m.
Hi all.
I have been following this thread and meant to add my own .02 units of
time and neural activity but was a bit swamped with work. I take this
opportunity because since Windblows is being dragged into the debate,
it's getting even more fun.
Disclaimer: I have never tried to use Windblows for pro audio.
I have been in recording studios that relied on windows and I have
seen frequent crashes and issues with audio latency, compatibility,
driver installation and reinstallation and stuff like that. Just last
night I went to see a friend's demo of a VJ system he's developing
which was delayed because of some video driver setting that was not
compatible with the projector. It took 2 hours of fiddling with XP to
get the demo going (including intricate tweaks and several reboots).
Far from user-friendly if you ask me. I have seen countless blue
screens of death in performances, art installations, studios, demo
kiosks, publicity panels etc.
The only time I used Windows for an installation where performance and
stability was an issue it had to be stripped down to a minimum,
offered a lot of RAM, etc. So basically we had a bare Windows XP
Professional system running only the components that were being used.
In that situation we have actually achieved the performance and
stability we required (but the machine still needs rebooting from time
to time in order to ensure perfect functioning). Since the computer
was dedicated to that installation it was not a big issue but it took
use quite a bit of effort to actually make it perform to our spec.
The only people that I have known to have stable and reliable Windows
system for audio and/or video were people who knew Windows inside-out
and performed the necessary tweaks (which often were very intricate)
to ensure the proper functioning. Also, having a dedicated windows
machine to do audio or video is a must. That's a waste of resources
if you ask me.
However, if you are referring to the fact that in windows you do not
need to hunt for video codecs or perform separate flash installation
to watch youtube, then feel free to disregard the above rant.
Now, on to Linux. I have been using Ubuntu for the past couple of
years and I have been generally happy with it. I was running 7.10
until around November or December last year. All was fine, including
-rt kernel and low latency performance. I moved on to 8.04 and
that's when my problems started. Lots of problems with -rt kernel.
The vanilla kernel unusable for realtime audio work. I upgraded to
8.10. Bunch of other problems (bluetooth stopped working, file
sharing with XP stopped working, bunch of other annoying little
problems) greeted me every day. Some of them have been corrected and
I am slowly getting back to a usable system. The -rt kernel (again
from ubuntustidio, IIRC) was total mess. I decided to give vanilla a
run. I am now running a kernel identified as 2.6.27-11-generic #1
SMP. I run jack with 11.6 ms latency, this was the best setting I
could come up with in 44.1 kHz. It's good enough for me right now. I
get an occasional xrun but no more that 3-4 a day and most of the time
they happen when loading or closing applications (or surfing the net
with firefox). I have been able to run Pd, process multichannel audio
(2-4), and simultaneously record 4-6 tracks into ardour. no glitches.
All this on a CoreDuo 1.8G laptop. I do not do any overdubs so I
don't know if my setup would be sufficient for a typical studio use.
I seem to be the only other user (besides Jostein Chr. Andersen) who
is satisfied with Ubuntu (vanilla kernel in my case!) as an audio
platform. I am not satisfied with it as a desktop, however, it is
beginning to feel like windows, but I am biased (hey, I have been
using linux since 1997 and developed nasty habits such as typing
commands into the terminal window and editing configuration files by
hand. I still find it weird to configure stuff with a GUI, sometimes
even annoying). I run xfce or awesome anyways so I don't get to see
most of the GNOME bloat.
So, why is it that vanilla kernel works for me and nobody else? Have
I done something wrong?
./MiS
On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 11:25 AM, mikk <michiel33(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Who can explain to me why it seems to be so hard to
get a stable audio and
video environment in Linux (not requiring recompilations and intricate
tweaks) while this problem seems to have been solved quite satisfactorily in
Windows? What is the fundamental reason for this?
Michiel
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-audio-user
--
./MiS
514-344-0726
http://www.creazone.ca
2:38 p.m.
There's so many of these conversations that revolve around dual purpose
setups.
Work and domestic.
I've split the two, with a work box, and the laptop for domestic stuff. As
soon as i did that, most of the problems i had initially using
linux/Ubuntu disappeared. (Plus research, 4 million user errors, learn some,
make more mistakes, ask patient and talented people who knew about this
stuff when i didn't, etc..)
Running a red hot audio box is like owning a ferrari. It needs setting up
properly, for a specific purpose. Most of us trying to make a modest living
with this stuff don't have the luxury of full time engineers and developers
tweaking and maintaining our systems. (Zimmerman, Howard, Frizzell, etc....)
I reckon trying to run a dedicated audio box, with domestic use as well, is
like a disturbing hybrid of ferrari and ford, one getting in the way of the
other at times. (The Jack v Pulse paradigm springs to mind here.)
I used to have 5 gig boxes, going into a win box running cubase and
sibelius. I had no end of challenges, and some humilitating moments in front
of punters wanting to hear their masterpiece in all it's glory, only to see
the system throw the teddies out of the pram without warning. It was a
bloody nightmare, and when i did the time/motion bit, i was spending more
time fixing, than writing. And that was a dedicated setup with no domestic
stuff at all.
When i first got into linux, i resolved to learn as much as i could, as the
idea of adding and subtracting apps specific to purpose appealed to me. I
did the dual role bit, and discovered conflicts of interest in a dual
purpose box, but when i divided the tasks, well, the light came on, and life
got a lot simpler, day in day out. My old G4 laptop, once i dumped mac, and
put linux on it (even better now with a shiny new Debian 5 install), does a
good job of handling domestic, and the audio rig is as clean as my current
knowledge level will allow. I have UBStudio Hardy 32 and 64 bit boots, soon
to be pure single boot 64bit (Still deciding on UBStudio or Debian.) It's
stable and works, every day. 5ms average latency dependent on task, and over
80 tracks in Ardour, with the same in RG, and over 250 tracks in
Linuxsampler, which frankly, imho, completely destroys gigastudio for
performance. (1 LS instance =at least 5 gig boxes, in my testing so far, and
it's stable versus that nervous 'giga' state that breeds grey hairs and bad
habits.)
Gutsy was even better for performance, imho, but the devs tempted me with
new stuff that i wanted in my workflow. (RG's brilliant free segment
positioning per track, for just one example. Great addition that reduces
donkey work by a sizable chunk. Or the formidable progress being made in
Denemo. And then there's inline midi editing in Ardour to look forward
to...)
I'd agree that 8.0.4 is slightly less friendly than Gutsy, and takes a
little more to setup, but if the task is audio only, it goes fine. (at least
here.)
I wonder if we're asking too much sometimes, expecting a single computer to
handle ferrari audio, and ford domestic, all in one place. so i think the
discussion gets clouded sometimes, often with personal experiences based on
hybrid use and expectation, that will sit uneasily at times in any OS.
Domestic is a ford, and most linux distros do that well. (Allowing for the
big kernel changes we've been getting lately, and the activity required of
distro builders to keep up with this.)
Specific audio/graphic use is a Ferrari that needs time, knowledge, and
patience, to setup for great, stable, performance. And i've been delighted
to discover the speed and performance boost i get when i work from terminal
as much as possible. The more i do this, the more stable, well behaved, and
strong in performance, the box seems to be.
Either domestic or dedicated purpose is an interesting discussion to have,
but together may be an exercise in smoke and mirrors that clouds the real
challenges, and confuses user expectations.
2 roubles worth,
Alex.
p.s. Jconv is an excellent terminal app that performs really well. Have i
mentioned that? Nothing wrong with working from terminal with scripts, at
all.
:)
On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 7:34 PM, Michal Seta <mis(a)artengine.ca> wrote:
Hi all.
I have been following this thread and meant to add my own .02 units of
time and neural activity but was a bit swamped with work. I take this
opportunity because since Windblows is being dragged into the debate,
it's getting even more fun.
Disclaimer: I have never tried to use Windblows for pro audio.
I have been in recording studios that relied on windows and I have
seen frequent crashes and issues with audio latency, compatibility,
driver installation and reinstallation and stuff like that. Just last
night I went to see a friend's demo of a VJ system he's developing
which was delayed because of some video driver setting that was not
compatible with the projector. It took 2 hours of fiddling with XP to
get the demo going (including intricate tweaks and several reboots).
Far from user-friendly if you ask me. I have seen countless blue
screens of death in performances, art installations, studios, demo
kiosks, publicity panels etc.
The only time I used Windows for an installation where performance and
stability was an issue it had to be stripped down to a minimum,
offered a lot of RAM, etc. So basically we had a bare Windows XP
Professional system running only the components that were being used.
In that situation we have actually achieved the performance and
stability we required (but the machine still needs rebooting from time
to time in order to ensure perfect functioning). Since the computer
was dedicated to that installation it was not a big issue but it took
use quite a bit of effort to actually make it perform to our spec.
The only people that I have known to have stable and reliable Windows
system for audio and/or video were people who knew Windows inside-out
and performed the necessary tweaks (which often were very intricate)
to ensure the proper functioning. Also, having a dedicated windows
machine to do audio or video is a must. That's a waste of resources
if you ask me.
However, if you are referring to the fact that in windows you do not
need to hunt for video codecs or perform separate flash installation
to watch youtube, then feel free to disregard the above rant.
Now, on to Linux. I have been using Ubuntu for the past couple of
years and I have been generally happy with it. I was running 7.10
until around November or December last year. All was fine, including
-rt kernel and low latency performance. I moved on to 8.04 and
that's when my problems started. Lots of problems with -rt kernel.
The vanilla kernel unusable for realtime audio work. I upgraded to
8.10. Bunch of other problems (bluetooth stopped working, file
sharing with XP stopped working, bunch of other annoying little
problems) greeted me every day. Some of them have been corrected and
I am slowly getting back to a usable system. The -rt kernel (again
from ubuntustidio, IIRC) was total mess. I decided to give vanilla a
run. I am now running a kernel identified as 2.6.27-11-generic #1
SMP. I run jack with 11.6 ms latency, this was the best setting I
could come up with in 44.1 kHz. It's good enough for me right now. I
get an occasional xrun but no more that 3-4 a day and most of the time
they happen when loading or closing applications (or surfing the net
with firefox). I have been able to run Pd, process multichannel audio
(2-4), and simultaneously record 4-6 tracks into ardour. no glitches.
All this on a CoreDuo 1.8G laptop. I do not do any overdubs so I
don't know if my setup would be sufficient for a typical studio use.
I seem to be the only other user (besides Jostein Chr. Andersen) who
is satisfied with Ubuntu (vanilla kernel in my case!) as an audio
platform. I am not satisfied with it as a desktop, however, it is
beginning to feel like windows, but I am biased (hey, I have been
using linux since 1997 and developed nasty habits such as typing
commands into the terminal window and editing configuration files by
hand. I still find it weird to configure stuff with a GUI, sometimes
even annoying). I run xfce or awesome anyways so I don't get to see
most of the GNOME bloat.
So, why is it that vanilla kernel works for me and nobody else? Have
I done something wrong?
./MiS
On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 11:25 AM, mikk <michiel33(a)gmail.com> wrote:
--
Parchment Studios (It started as a joke...)
Who can explain to me why it seems to be so hard
to get a stable audio
and
video environment in Linux (not requiring
recompilations and intricate
tweaks) while this problem seems to have been solved quite satisfactorily
in
Windows? What is the fundamental reason for
this?
Michiel
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-audio-user
--
./MiS
514-344-0726
http://www.creazone.ca
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-audio-user
2:47 p.m.
Hi Michal,
This is turning into a me too discussion. Which is fine with me.
First, I'd wager the view that Windows works fine for audio and video is
based on a consumer perspective, where I basically agree, (less so since
Vista)
In general (and I like to generalize) Windows works... for consumers.
Less so for hobby/pro work where stability and reliability are much more
important here Windows breaks probably as often as Linux (though in
different ways)
I do EVERYTHING in Linux. I've had the fortune of being able to use 99%
Linux at work too. (At the moment this isn't true, which has caused me
headaches, but also perspective)
As for audio work.. it's interesting that you find that RT kernels are a
pain. Basically this is my view too. They tend to be broken one way or
another, pretty much all of them to some degree... this view is reinforced
by the steady stream of discussions about which patch to use.
For the type of audio work I do, recording mainly, I am quite happy with the
standard ubuntu kernel. The occasional xrun happens, but very seldom during
recording. Keeping the cpu load down and not doing any other work during
recording (who would???) tend to keep things stable for me.
My 2 € cents
Robert
2:36 p.m.
On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 11:25 AM, mikk <michiel33(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Who can explain to me why it seems to be so hard to
get a stable audio and
video environment in Linux (not requiring recompilations and intricate
tweaks) while this problem seems to have been solved quite satisfactorily in
Windows? What is the fundamental reason for this?
Economics, and operating system design.
You can't compare Windows with any other operating, its like comparing
apples to oranges. As with all things, you pick the best tool to
accomplish the job.
Linux is not as advanced in audio processing as Windows/MacOS simply
because development of AV applications has not been around as long as
it has for Windows/MacOS. Also, the design of the operating system
itself and how the OS interfaces with hardware poses different
challenges to developers than those challenges faced by developers
using Windows.
Since the return on investment for linux AV application development
isn't measured in monetary forms (mostly), existing applications
were/are developed for much the same reason most open source
applications are:
to scratch an itch, to learn something new, to provide a specific
means to achieve a specific end result.
Most audio software developers want to get paid for creating their
software. So they develop on a commercial operating system, for that
operating system. Then sell that software. There simply isn't enough
demand monetarily to make developers look at porting their codebases
to linux. Lets face it, most linux users can't/won't/don't pay for
their software, the expectation being all linux software should be
freely available. This is anathema to commercial applications
developers whom expect to get paid to write their code. Until there's
enough demand (read as economically viable for the developer) to
substantiate the time and effort to port to linux, linux users will
continue to have less variety, and in some cases, lower quality audio
processing software.
Add to this each users specific needs, an expectation of linux to
behave like Windows, an expectation for linux to be a
one-size-fits-all solution for new users coming from Windows or MacOS,
and you begin to see just how far linux has come, but also how much
more work needs to be done to be on par with commercial operating
systems.
Every OS has its pros and cons, no single OS is a one-size-fits-all
solution. Weigh your actual needs against the pros and cons of each OS
you use, pick the best tool for the specific task you want to execute.
On a personal note, while I've done a little audio
recording/processing under linux, I find overall I can achieve more,
and be more efficient and productive, using Windows. The availability,
variety, and quality of audio processing software surpasses that which
is currently available to linux, AT THIS TIME. I can hope, and expect,
this may change in the future, but time, and demand, will tell.
Does this make things easier to understand?
--
aRDy Music and Rick Dicaire present:
http://www.ardynet.com
http://www.ardynet.com:9000/ardymusic.ogg.m3u
6:10 p.m.
On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 05:25:45PM +0100, mikk wrote:
Who can explain to me why it seems to be so hard to
get a stable audio and
video environment in Linux (not requiring recompilations and intricate tweaks)
while this problem seems to have been solved quite satisfactorily in Windows?
What is the fundamental reason for this?
Central control versus distributed control of the software lifecycle;
feature selection, development, integration packaging, distribution,
deployment, support, and fixes for major issues. Everything you observe
as a difference derives from the difference in control.
The features of the available open source software now easily outweigh
the features of the base operating system from Microsoft. If you don't
need those features, and you can afford the higher price, and you hate
freedom, then please change back.
--
James Cameron mailto:quozl@us.netrek.org http://quozl.netrek.org/
9:22 p.m.
New subject: good linux distros for audio: paludis+proaudio
> this problem seems to have been solved quite
satisfactorily in Windows?
quite satisfactorily to you. despite (linux) 64bit drivers for my sound hardware in 2004:
- Echo took 4 years to rls 64bit windows drivers
- MOTU's drivers never worked right. the reverse engineered linux stuff at least made
sound without chewing 35% CPU and breaking frequently
intricate tweaks, or even basic fixes/recompiles arent possible without source, so youre
reduced to whining on your developer's forum.. hopefuly enough people have the same
whine as you, and they decide to do something about it, and the fix arrives in some future
update (that you can then pay for or use a crack)
(forum-trolling) sounds more like intricate tweaking to me. intricate half-futile
posturing to achieve a goal, instead of just achieving it yourself
integration packaging, distribution,
deployment, support, and fixes for major issues. Everything you observe
as a difference derives from the difference in control.
this is why i use Paludis. funneling everything thru a centrla point of
compilation/approval slows things down quite a bit
Debian (and surely redhat, et al) slow things down even more by adapting to its weird
licensing/build requriements, and frequent patch-related fiddling...
a simple metadata file which contains pointers to source packages and git/hg repos is a
hallmark of simplicity, i thnk. if some superismple pkgman cant
./configure&&make&&makeinstall (or scons/waf/whateveR) the upstream should
fix their siht..
virtually every obscure piece of software mentioned on this list is available for
installation, given the proaudio ebuild repository..
eg:
paludis -i --dl-reinstall-scm always ingen
will give you the latest SVN version with other SVN'd depchain items rebuilt
beforehand, automagically..
[1] http://paludis.pioto.org/
[2] http://proaudio.tuxfamily.org/
24 Feb
24 Feb
9:59 p.m.
New subject: good linux distros for audio: paludis+proaudio
Or
[1]http://www.archlinux.org
[2]http://archaudio.org
Not even half as complete as the above but will be, hopefully.
25 Feb
25 Feb
10:41 p.m.
Le Lundi, 23 février 2009 17:25:45 +0100,
mikk <michiel33(a)gmail.com> a écrit :
Who can explain to me why it seems to be so hard to
get a stable
audio and video environment in Linux (not requiring recompilations
and intricate tweaks) while this problem seems to have been solved
quite satisfactorily in Windows? What is the fundamental reason for
this?
For me it's simple: everything worked fine and then 'they' came up with
Pulse Audio.
Also, while at it:
kpdf worked fine and then 'they' got rid of it and replaced it with
some Okular in the newest KDE 4.x.
The Konqueror web browser had nice icons to zoom in/out of pages
and then 'they' removed them totally.
You could drag and drop files from a file manager to a console window
and then 'they' removed that functionality in KDE 4.x.
I could assign Alt-1. Alt-2, etc... to switch desktops and then they
made that really hard to assign in KDE 4.x (still haven't found it)
OK, what else... hmmm... can't find anything else. For the moment :-)
I don't know if this is progress, but sometimes I doubt it.
11:19 p.m.
lanas wrote:
Le Lundi, 23 février 2009 17:25:45 +0100,
mikk <michiel33(a)gmail.com> a écrit :
I just don't see this problem for consumer multimedia.
I have been using pulse audio over the past year and I haven't had any
issues with it other than it took a couple of hours to get used to the
two interfaces. I just installed a brand new laptop with Fedora 10 and
sound worked out of the box. The video camera worked out of the box. I
can see flash natively with the 64 bit adobe plugin. I was able to
quickly get access to the non-free repo and now have access to all the
multimedia tools I need to get up and running. Most audio and video I
stream via flash these days anyway. I rarely download but if I do I only
need vlc or amarok to play the data.
Granted I haven't tried to get the rt kernel running yet or any of the
professional tools installed on this setup but for a stock standard
install Fedora 10 has everything correct afaict. I had to do a similar
install recently on a desktop and I had everything I needed up and
running within a week thanks to yum and svn. I don't foresee this being
any more difficult on my new notebook.
I do agree with you that some of the things that have been removed over
the past couple of years to make the desktop more like a m$ windows are
a step backwards. I am hoping that the trend will be slowly reversed but
I doubt it. The more people buying netbooks with ubuntu means the more
simplified/automated the gnome and kde desktops are going to become.
That's fine for non technical users as we power users can easily get our
favorite desktop running with minimal effort.
Who can explain to me why it seems to be so hard
to get a stable
audio and video environment in Linux (not requiring recompilations
and intricate tweaks) while this problem seems to have been solved
quite satisfactorily in Windows? What is the fundamental reason for
this?
For me it's simple: everything worked fine and then 'they' came up with
Pulse Audio.
Also, while at it:
kpdf worked fine and then 'they' got rid of it and replaced it with
some Okular in the newest KDE 4.x.
The Konqueror web browser had nice icons to zoom in/out of pages
and then 'they' removed them totally.
You could drag and drop files from a file manager to a console window
and then 'they' removed that functionality in KDE 4.x.
I could assign Alt-1. Alt-2, etc... to switch desktops and then they
made that really hard to assign in KDE 4.x (still haven't found it)
OK, what else... hmmm... can't find anything else. For the moment :-)
I don't know if this is progress, but sometimes I doubt it.
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-audio-user
--
Patrick Shirkey
Boost Hardware Ltd.
22 Feb
22 Feb
1:28 p.m.
Michiel wrote:
I am currently running Ubuntu Hardy Heron and I am
quite dissatisfied with
its audio performance. I find it a complete mess of settings that sometimes
work and sometimes dont. Skype does not work at all, neither does Second
Life Voice. Other audio applications sometimes work and sometimes dont. I
have tried a lot of recommendations on many forums. Reading those forums I
do get the impression that Ubuntu is not a good choice for audio at all. So
here is my question:
Which Linux distro is regarded as a good and reliable choice for audio?
Playing, recording, gaming, voip, etc.
I use 64 Studio for playing and recording on a 500MHz PIII desktop. I recommend
it highly. It features an -rt patch (low-latency) kernel.
Version 2.0 is very stable -- but a little dated (e.g. JACK version 0.100.?,
Ardour 0.90.?... or something like that). FWIW, it's based on Debian Etch. It
only provides a DVD ISO install, but it is possible to install Etch and upgrade
to 64 Studio.
Version 3.0 is in alpha/beta testing and is based on Ubuntu Hardy. I'm
currently using that, and enjoy it quite a bit. It provides a CD ISO for
install. The only trouble I had was with setting up my MidiSport 1x1 firmware
loader.
Peace,
Gabriel
2:12 p.m.
Den Sunday 22 February 2009 17:29:16 skrev Michiel:
...
Which Linux distro is regarded as a good and reliable
choice for audio?
Playing, recording, gaming, voip, etc.
I'm starting to wonder if I'm the only person on earth that's satisfied with
Ubuntu as a Sound Studio platform. The thing is: I have no problems - at least
not more than with other distros. In my experience, no audio distro functions
right out of the box so far (perhaps JAD did om my old P-4 from 2002, but I'm
not sure). I do compile all the basic apps by myself (not the real time
kernel) like Jack 1.9*, Ardour, Rosegarden, Audacity, Linuxsampler (and
related), lots of other stuff and loads of libraries and so on.
Most distros suffers from being outdated quite fast, but on the other hand: A
music studio should be reliable and stable and one should be able to produce
expected results every time, so perhaps this outdated thing is not so bad
after all.
I use Kubuntu 8.10 (with KDE 4.2 and a stock 2.6.27-3-rt kernel) on my dual
core 1.6 Lap top (with an external USB sound card) and Ubuntustudio 8.04 with
it's stock rt-kernel on my stationary machine.
In my experience, the hunt for low latencies and no xruns usually turns out to
be trial and error until the right balance between the machines capabilities,
giving everything sound related high run time priority and a low latency as
possible. I have tried Musix, JAD, 64 studio and Ubuntu the last 12 months or
so and can't say that one is better than an another regarding real time. Exept
for JAD, wich is the only distro that works for my old p-4 machine.
Jostein
2:31 p.m.
I use UbuntuStudio 8.04 (Hardy Heron) with Intel Dual Core, 6gb RAM, 64-bit.
My computer is compiled at a Computer Fair (I've done my homework -
informing myself about Alsa supported soundcards and bought the HDSP 96/32
soundcard and a compatible video-card).
In April 2008 I downloaded 5 recommended audio distro's - *Only UbuntuStudio
8.04 worked out of the box for me. *
I use it for professional work.
The distro is stable, solid (skype works well - I have used it in the past)
I use the installed software, adding some minor pieces (Rakarrack, Qsynth
and Qtractor upgrades, etc)
I am extremely satisfied - never had a system crash or any unusual issues.
I use Ardour (and lately Qtractor), Rosegarden, Hydrogen, Rackarrack, Jamin,
Qsynth, ZynAddSubFx -* all at the same time*, recording up to 20 audio and
many midi channels, plugins - no issues at all.
Viktor
5753
days inactive
5756
days old
linux-audio-user@lists.linuxaudio.org
22 comments
20 participants
participants (20)
-
alex stone -
carmen -
Christopher Stamper -
Dan Muresan -
Dave Phillips -
Gabriel M. Beddingfield -
James Cameron -
Joe Hartley -
Jostein Chr. Andersen -
lanas -
Michal Seta -
Michiel -
mikk
-
Nigel Henry -
Patrick Shirkey -
Paul Davis -
R Dicaire -
Ray Rashif -
Robert Jonsson -
Viktor Mastoridis