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#1
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Hello,
This is sort of off-topic, but not. I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. And.... Any thoughts on audio software evolving into 64 bit architectures? That would probably kill the argument that you need to go analog to mix due to summing issues. And then there are different versions of Vista. Supossedly, only the "ultimate super premium" edition is true 64 bit. Just trying to get pointed in the right direction. Took a break for a while... |
#2
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
wrote ...
I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. It is 64 bit and backwards-compatible to run 32... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:In...2#32_vs_64_bit And then there are different versions of Vista. Supossedly, only the "ultimate super premium" edition is true 64 bit. And you would be interested in "Vista" because....? Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. |
#3
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
On Feb 8, 10:13 pm, "Richard Crowley" wrote:
wrote ... I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. It is 64 bit and backwards-compatible to run 32...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:In...2#32_vs_64_bit And then there are different versions of Vista. Supossedly, only the "ultimate super premium" edition is true 64 bit. And you would be interested in "Vista" because....? Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. well, that's what is out there and time marches on. i'm sure it will settle in. a big drawback is that it requires a lot of ram. but ultimately, the architecture will allow massive amounts of ram. we will be able to forget about how fast the drives are, raid, etc. just load the entire file into fast ram and don't worry about the drives. |
#4
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
wrote ...
"Richard Crowley" wrote: Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. well, that's what is out there and time marches on. i'm sure it will settle in. I propose to migrate to Linux (or Mac?) by the time WinXP support ends. a big drawback is that it requires a lot of ram. but ultimately, the architecture will allow massive amounts of ram. we will be able to forget about how fast the drives are, raid, etc. just load the entire file into fast ram and don't worry about the drives. None of those things are the major concern. As you say, Moore's Law provides improved CPU, RAM, hard drive, display, etc. technology all the time. The embedded (and draconian by most accounts) DRM is the show-stopper for many people. |
#5
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Richard Crowley wrote:
wrote ... I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. It is 64 bit and backwards-compatible to run 32... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:In...2#32_vs_64_bit And then there are different versions of Vista. Supossedly, only the "ultimate super premium" edition is true 64 bit. And you would be interested in "Vista" because....? Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. And this movie plays itself out every time a new OS is introduced... |
#6
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Richard Crowley wrote:
wrote ... "Richard Crowley" wrote: Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. well, that's what is out there and time marches on. i'm sure it will settle in. I propose to migrate to Linux (or Mac?) by the time WinXP support ends. Good luck with that :-) Let us all know how that works for ya :-) |
#7
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
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#8
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
On Thu, 8 Feb 2007 19:13:56 -0800, "Richard Crowley"
wrote: And you would be interested in "Vista" because....? Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. I'm sure the knowledgeable ones are avoiding early adoption, while avoiding striking any emotional attitude to Vista. |
#9
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
On Feb 8, 9:59 pm, wrote:
I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. I see nobody has answered the question. The Core 2 Duo is one that's been described as "Vista ready" whatever that means. I agree that eventually Vista will be the only Windows you can get (until the next great operating system comes along) but I also agree that it would be a good idea to hold off setting up a Vista-based audio system for another several months, or maybe a year. Can you continue to use what you have? Or are you willing to install XP on a new Vista-ready machine now and upgrade it to Vista when the need becomes apparent? That would be the smartest thing, I think, if you're going to put together a new computer now anyway. But if you can wait to buy the computer until you really need it (and Vista), things will only get cheaper. Any thoughts on audio software evolving into 64 bit architectures? So far it seems that Cakewalk/Sonar is leading the pack. Either you like it or you don't, but because it's there wouldn't be enough to sell me on new hardware and software if what I had now was working fine. That would probably kill the argument that you need to go analog to mix due to summing issues. Only if it's well implemented. But then people seem to be satisfied with present 32-bit systems when they get the right software and set it up properly. Those who use external analog mixing do it for one of three reasons: 1. They like the comfort or a real mixer 2. They're behind the times and still believe that computers can't satisfactorily mix audio. 3. Their system is behind times and really benefits from analog mixing in some respects. And then there are different versions of Vista. Supossedly, only the "ultimate super premium" edition is true 64 bit. This is still confusing. At this point, if you really want to know what it does, I wouldn't trust what anybody tells you, because there are probably different ways of interpreting "true 64 bit." |
#10
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
"Richard Crowley" wrote in news:53277lF1qf5iaU1
@mid.individual.net: wrote ... I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. It is 64 bit and backwards-compatible to run 32... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:In...2#32_vs_64_bit And then there are different versions of Vista. Supossedly, only the "ultimate super premium" edition is true 64 bit. And you would be interested in "Vista" because....? Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. Yet my software company already has 4 clients who have bought Vista machines and are struggling to get everything running. Gotta love those early adopters. |
#11
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
"Carey Carlan" wrote ...
"Richard Crowley" wrote Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. Yet my software company already has 4 clients who have bought Vista machines and are struggling to get everything running. Gotta love those early adopters. Sure. There have been hundreds of people running Vista at the office for months. But I don't expect widespread proliferation until next year. At least not in my department which is very risk-averse (and IT-averse :-) |
#12
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
"Romeo Rondeau" wrote ...
Richard Crowley wrote: wrote ... "Richard Crowley" wrote: Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. well, that's what is out there and time marches on. i'm sure it will settle in. I propose to migrate to Linux (or Mac?) by the time WinXP support ends. Good luck with that :-) Let us all know how that works for ya :-) Of course, secretly, I'm hoping that Vista will settle down and be reasonable. I'm too old to make major changes to my computing on a whim. ;-) |
#13
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Hello Richard,
I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. The Intel Core 2 Duo, is a true 64 bit processor. It can run both 64 bit and 32 bit application next to each other. Any thoughts on audio software evolving into 64 bit architectures? I myself see two significant changes that 64 bit architecture will offer: - Use of more memory for internal buffers, keeping buffers for a high number of channels and high sample rates add up very fast. - Able to do memory mapped I/O, this allows a programmer to use an audio file as if it was normal memory (64 bit address space allows us to do this). That would probably kill the argument that you need to go analog to mix due to summing issues. 64 bit does not fix or cause summing issues. The floating point processing of all Intel processors since the original IBM PC handles 32 and 64 bit floating point natively. Right now most audio application do their internal processing in 32 bit floating point, but could just as easily be done with 64 bit floating point. 64 bit floating point does cause twice as much memory usage for buffers, and also twice the amount of memory bandwidth; needing more and faster memory and processing power. As most audio devices do not have AD/DA converters more accurate than 24 bit integer there have not been much use for 64 bit floating point. Cheers, Take |
#14
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
On Feb 9, 10:03 am, "Take Vos" wrote:
As most audio devices do not have AD/DA converters more accurate than 24 bit integer there have not been much use for 64 bit floating point. There is some method to this madness. Whenever you perform some operation on a sample like change its level or add two sample values together (really, all audio processing can be reduced to these operation) the word length increases. Originally all arithmetic was done so that every operation was truncated to 16 bits and this got to sounding pretty rough after a few operations. This got translated to "digital mixing doesn't sound good" and people were getting better sounding mixes of digital multitrack recordings by using an analog mixer. The added noise and analog distortion was preferable to the distortion caused by truncation. But old ideas die hard (the Internet hasn't helped that) so even in the 24- or 32-bit floating point world the perceived problems with digital mixing still remain. And with some systems, they probably do remain because not everyone does things right. But now at least it's possible to construct a good digital mixer if you have enough "headroom" (which we now have). |
#16
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
wrote in message
oups.com Any thoughts on audio software evolving into 64 bit architectures? That would probably kill the argument that you need to go analog to mix due to summing issues. There is a "64 bit" wav file format that has some charm, but it doesn't require anything but 32 bit XP. Other than that 64 bit operationg systems and processors are going to start selling like hotcakes when lots of people can't find the performance they want without going to 4 GB or more of RAM. Audio processing tends to be file-oriented, and not necessarily benefit with tons and tons of RAM. The idea of being able to bring a 1 hour 32 track session into RAM might be attractive to people who do a lot of heavy editing. The current widely-used nondestructive editing paradigm doesn't tend to be all that memory-hungry. Maybe stuff involving large wave tables for instrument simulation, or massive convolutions for acoustical simulations will drive RAM requirements up past the 4 GB line. Now, video editing seems to be a different animal - right now even 2 GB of RAM can be on the slim side. |
#17
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
"Romeo Rondeau" wrote in message
. net Richard Crowley wrote: wrote ... I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. It is 64 bit and backwards-compatible to run 32... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:In...2#32_vs_64_bit And then there are different versions of Vista. Supossedly, only the "ultimate super premium" edition is true 64 bit. And you would be interested in "Vista" because....? Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. And this movie plays itself out every time a new OS is introduced... And it will again, but probably pretty slowly, becasue XP is far more competent than any *obsolete* OS we ever had before. There is a 64 bit flavor of XP on the market, BTW. |
#18
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Romeo Rondeau wrote:
Richard Crowley wrote: wrote ... "Richard Crowley" wrote: Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. well, that's what is out there and time marches on. i'm sure it will settle in. Yes, I'm sure Vista may be useful in, say.. 1-1½ years time, whin we've seen the first one or two service packs, and how many things they fixed. I propose to migrate to Linux (or Mac?) by the time WinXP support ends. Good luck with that :-) Let us all know how that works for ya :-) Been into Linux for some ten years. Fine for serveruse, fine for the desktop, provided one is good at unix. The latter couple of years has revealed a few distros which can actually be used by non-techies. But... as a misic recordong/production platform... Lotsa work getting intimately familiar with alsa, integrating alsa nas stuff like jackd, not to speak about no professional music apps. Drivers for (semi) pro soundcards? Well, a few, like RME. Even being very well into several Linux distros and other unix, it was an easy job deciding to go for OSX. Just shopped a used dual G4.. -- Kind regards, Mogens V. |
#19
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64 bit processing, etc.
thanks guys. i sold off my stuff, took a break from it all, and
moved. so it's a clean start. i forgot about xp64. all good things to think about. actually the guy from algorithmix said a while back that he thought sonar sounded the best, perhaps ironically, of the apps he has looked into. i hate sonar, but love algorithmix stuff. i'd like to see ram sizes get gigantic, then we can forget about hard drives and track counts. it will all be in ram. intel talks about eliminating the frontside buss on processors in the year 2009. that will be wild. they also talk about dozens, even hundreds of cores on a single chip. wild. |
#20
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
wrote:
wrote: Hello, This is sort of off-topic, but not. I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. Define "a true 64 bit processor" 64 bit datapaths? 64 bit addressing? 64 bit functional units? None of the above. It's all defined by the marketing department. If the marketing department says the Z-80 is a 64-bit processor, it is. --scott -- "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis." |
#21
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Scott Dorsey wrote:
wrote: wrote: Hello, This is sort of off-topic, but not. I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. Define "a true 64 bit processor" 64 bit datapaths? 64 bit addressing? 64 bit functional units? None of the above. It's all defined by the marketing department. If the marketing department says the Z-80 is a 64-bit processor, it is. --scott Not true, but I see your point I'd say a processor with 64bit registers, ALU and so forth AND 64bit addressing makes it 64bit, but without the bus and MMU it's pretty much useless. -- Kind regards, Mogens V. |
#22
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Soundhaspriority wrote:
wrote in message But... as a misic recordong/production platform... Lotsa work getting intimately familiar with alsa, integrating alsa nas stuff like jackd, not to speak about no professional music apps. Drivers for (semi) pro soundcards? Well, a few, like RME. Another myth. But it is completely understandable how, if you haven't been a programmer, that you don't understand it. You can be a very intelligent person, and still not understand. ??? Have you actually tried implementing a sound studio on Linux? If so, you may have been based on Debian.. I believe it's the only distro having those audio parts available in a repository (though I mostly work with Redhat, Centos, Slackware ((and FreeBSD, Solaris)) And oh yeah, I was a systems programmer back in the late 80's to early 90's, later went into systems integration, sysadm, network and security. I work with *nix every day as a sysadmin. It's exactly because of my teck background I wouldn't dream of spending month setting up a Linux studio system. Tell me, where can I buy supported studio audio apps for Linux? Those audio apps that can be downloaded free from freshmeat and sourceforge, do they integrate with Protools, Reason, Cubase, Logic...? Don't get me wrong. I love working with *nix, but when it comes to music, I look at the tech side as a musician. Prefer twangin' strings, and actually make music. In three to five years maybe, who knows. When We've gotten rid of the two competing GUI's (Gnome and KDE) and have one official GUI with one API and one set of libs. And when users can install all the stuff without havng to perform post-config requiring tech knowledge. Yes, a distro like debian-based Ubuntu has made real good steps WRT enduser useability, but when do you suppose the GPL will allow us to see VST or the other standard whats-its-name plugin's? I believe the German build Muse stuff does it, but that's a sealed Linux-based box, not an enduser accessable Linux distro. -hope I didn't misunderstand your comments, else I've just made a fun fool out of myself -- Kind regards, Mogens V. "Unix is very simple, but it takes a genius to understand the simplicity." -- Dennis Ritchie |
#23
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Mogens V. wrote:
Not true, but I see your point I'd say a processor with 64bit registers, ALU and so forth AND 64bit addressing makes it 64bit, but without the bus and MMU it's pretty much useless. Intel claimed the 8086 was a 16-bit processor, since the internal data paths were 16-bit even though the data buss was only 8-bit. And then there was the wonderful TI 9900, which had a 16-bit data path but only 15-bit addresses. They called that 16-bit too. That sort of silliness doesn't go on much any more, though. --scott -- "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis." |
#24
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Hello Scott,
Not true, but I see your point I'd say a processor with 64bit registers, ALU and so forth AND 64bit addressing makes it 64bit, but without the bus and MMU it's pretty much useless. Intel claimed the 8086 was a 16-bit processor, since the internal data paths were 16-bit even though the data buss was only 8-bit. From what I remember from the datasheets, the 8086 did have a external 16 bit data bus. The 8088 which was actually used in the original IBM PC, was a scaled down version which only has a 8 bit data bus. Cheers, Take |
#25
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
On Sat, 10 Feb 2007 13:52:20 +0100, Mogens V. wrote:
Soundhaspriority wrote: wrote in message But... as a misic recordong/production platform... Lotsa work getting intimately familiar with alsa, integrating alsa nas stuff like jackd, not to speak about no professional music apps. Drivers for (semi) pro soundcards? Well, a few, like RME. Another myth. But it is completely understandable how, if you haven't been a programmer, that you don't understand it. You can be a very intelligent person, and still not understand. ??? Have you actually tried implementing a sound studio on Linux? If so, you may have been based on Debian.. I believe it's the only distro having those audio parts available in a repository (though I mostly work with Redhat, Centos, Slackware ((and FreeBSD, Solaris)) Most popular distros have audio apps. And oh yeah, I was a systems programmer back in the late 80's to early 90's, later went into systems integration, sysadm, network and security. I work with *nix every day as a sysadmin. It's exactly because of my teck background I wouldn't dream of spending month setting up a Linux studio system. While I'm sure you have great experience of Linux as a server OS, you probably know as much about the audio side as someone who has used Windows/OSX as a server OS knows about audio apps on Windows/OSX. Tell me, where can I buy supported studio audio apps for Linux? Those audio apps that can be downloaded free from freshmeat and sourceforge, do they integrate with Protools, Reason, Cubase, Logic...? Those four programs are completely incompatible with eachother, as none of them can open projects in any of the other's native formats. Ardour on Linux is as compatible with Cubase as Cubase is with Logic. Outside WAV files and the occasional success with AAF/OMS, there are no standards to integrate with. Steinberg have enough trouble maintaining compatability between the different versions of their own software, let alone with other DAWs. Don't get me wrong. I love working with *nix, but when it comes to music, I look at the tech side as a musician. Prefer twangin' strings, and actually make music. Assuming it takes me a couple of hours to set up a Linux DAW, exactly what tech stuff is required after I've done an initial test recording to make sure everything is working properly? The secret to audio happiness is the same on Linux as on any other OS, get it working, then leave it alone and don't fiddle. In three to five years maybe, who knows. When We've gotten rid of the two competing GUI's (Gnome and KDE) and have one official GUI with one API and one set of libs. And when users can install all the stuff without havng to perform post-config requiring tech knowledge. Yes, a distro like debian-based Ubuntu has made real good steps WRT enduser useability, but when do you suppose the GPL will allow us to see VST or the other standard whats-its-name plugin's? When Steinberg change their licence to the VST header file. To be fair they never anticipated people using GPL'd audio software when the licence was written, so it's not really their fault. I believe the German build Muse stuff does it, but that's a sealed Linux-based box, not an enduser accessable Linux distro. The equivalent of the sealed box on a standard computer are Live CDs. Try a distro called Fervant some day. It's not free, but it's the nearest you will get to a zero configuration Linux DAW. There are plenty of other live music distros, but they all feel a bit messy to me, though Jacklab looks promising. -hope I didn't misunderstand your comments, else I've just made a fun fool out of myself |
#26
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Take Vos wrote:
Hello Scott, Not true, but I see your point I'd say a processor with 64bit registers, ALU and so forth AND 64bit addressing makes it 64bit, but without the bus and MMU it's pretty much useless. Intel claimed the 8086 was a 16-bit processor, since the internal data paths were 16-bit even though the data buss was only 8-bit. From what I remember from the datasheets, the 8086 did have a external 16 bit data bus. The 8088 which was actually used in the original IBM PC, was a scaled down version which only has a 8 bit data bus. Yes, I meant the 8088. My error. The 68008 was the same way, too. --scott -- "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis." |
#27
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64 bit processing, etc.
Any thoughts on audio software evolving into 64 bit architectures?
That would probably kill the argument that you need to go analog to mix due to summing issues. The arise of 64 bit architecture has absolutely nothing to do with the difference in sound you get from analog summing. The two are completely unrelated. Analog summing is used, and will be used into the future, because electronic components have inconsistent irregularities that color the sound. While more processing word length per clock would mean we can come up processes that work on a more precise level, this will not change the fact that analog summing will give you the color of the gear you are using. BTW... Pro Tools summing is already done in 48 bit. check out http://akmedia.digidesign.com/suppor...ixer_26688.pdf |
#29
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philicorda wrote:
On Sat, 10 Feb 2007 13:52:20 +0100, Mogens V. wrote: Soundhaspriority wrote: wrote in message But... as a misic recordong/production platform... Lotsa work getting intimately familiar with alsa, integrating alsa nas stuff like jackd, not to speak about no professional music apps. Drivers for (semi) pro soundcards? Well, a few, like RME. Another myth. But it is completely understandable how, if you haven't been a programmer, that you don't understand it. You can be a very intelligent person, and still not understand. ??? Have you actually tried implementing a sound studio on Linux? If so, you may have been based on Debian.. I believe it's the only distro having those audio parts available in a repository (though I mostly work with Redhat, Centos, Slackware ((and FreeBSD, Solaris)) Most popular distros have audio apps. And oh yeah, I was a systems programmer back in the late 80's to early 90's, later went into systems integration, sysadm, network and security. I work with *nix every day as a sysadmin. It's exactly because of my teck background I wouldn't dream of spending month setting up a Linux studio system. While I'm sure you have great experience of Linux as a server OS, you probably know as much about the audio side as someone who has used Windows/OSX as a server OS knows about audio apps on Windows/OSX. Only been using linux on the desktop for 8+ years, including audio. A couple of times tried downloading audio apps beyond replaying music, always the same: Alsa and jack integration problems. As noted below, this wasn't on Debian. I have no problem admitting that almost no companies I've worked for have been using Linux on the desktop, and overtime as a sysadmin didn't make me wan't to spend the time back home, so my comments may be biased. Do give me a couple of pointers to the late progression using Linux for a DAW installation, i.e. distro, apps, audio routing deamon et al, and I'll take a fresh look. Tell me, where can I buy supported studio audio apps for Linux? Those audio apps that can be downloaded free from freshmeat and sourceforge, do they integrate with Protools, Reason, Cubase, Logic...? Those four programs are completely incompatible with eachother, as none of them can open projects in any of the other's native formats. Yes, what I meant is, using a Linux DAW setup, will I be able to share and work with other musicians and studios? Without having checked further lately, I think not, but things may've changed. Only, if Linux _is_ suitable, I fail to see much evidence of musicians/studios using it. I may be halfblind, though Ardour on Linux is as compatible with Cubase as Cubase is with Logic. Outside WAV files and the occasional success with AAF/OMS, there are no standards to integrate with. Steinberg have enough trouble maintaining compatability between the different versions of their own software, let alone with other DAWs. Don't get me wrong. I love working with *nix, but when it comes to music, I look at the tech side as a musician. Prefer twangin' strings, and actually make music. Assuming it takes me a couple of hours to set up a Linux DAW, exactly what tech stuff is required after I've done an initial test recording to make sure everything is working properly? A couple of hours? On which distro? To be fair, I haven't tried setting up on Debian as a workstation, and hence also not for audio. The secret to audio happiness is the same on Linux as on any other OS, get it working, then leave it alone and don't fiddle. You, basic audio works out of the box on most distros now, but moving on from there isn't nessesarily straightforward. In three to five years maybe, who knows. When We've gotten rid of the two competing GUI's (Gnome and KDE) and have one official GUI with one API and one set of libs. And when users can install all the stuff without havng to perform post-config requiring tech knowledge. Yes, a distro like debian-based Ubuntu has made real good steps WRT enduser useability, but when do you suppose the GPL will allow us to see VST or the other standard whats-its-name plugin's? When Steinberg change their licence to the VST header file. To be fair they never anticipated people using GPL'd audio software when the licence was written, so it's not really their fault. You're right about that. There are plenty of other live music distros, but they all feel a bit messy to me, though Jacklab looks promising. I'll take a fresh look. -- Kind regards, Mogens V. |
#30
Posted to rec.audio.pro
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64 bit processing, etc.
Laurence Payne wrote:
On Thu, 8 Feb 2007 19:13:56 -0800, "Richard Crowley" wrote: And you would be interested in "Vista" because....? Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. I'm sure the knowledgeable ones are avoiding early adoption, while avoiding striking any emotional attitude to Vista. Well put Laurence. I couldn't agree more. Anybody who makes as drastic a change as to upgrade the OS on something mission critical like a DAW deserves the possible crash. And they also deserve my bill when it comes time to put it all back together. Emergencies can get real expensive :-) Bottom line is, put it on a machine that don't have to use everyday and get used to it, keep up on what's happening with other folks who are using it. Take the "sky is falling" reports with a grain of salt. It reminds me of a guy who used to live across the courtyard from me, he was running OS/2. I had just upgraded my home machine to Windows 95 to get a good feel for it. He told me all kinds of horror stories about folks who upgraded to Windows 95 and it toasted their machines and that he was sticking with OS/2. I performed the upgrade (with a few bumps along the way, but it worked out fine and didn't cost me anything more than buying the OS), I showed him it was working fine and he still **** on it. There are some people who hate change so bad they will stick with the old thing and **** on the new one at any cost. This particular guy would rather sit in front of a PC with very limited usability than sit down and learn something new. I haven't upgraded to Vista yet, but I will, and I'm sure there will be a few bumps along the way. But looking back on all of the new OS releases I've gone through over the years and I haven't regretted a single one, and I go all the way back to Windows 286. |
#31
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64 bit processing, etc.
Richard Crowley wrote:
"Romeo Rondeau" wrote ... Richard Crowley wrote: wrote ... "Richard Crowley" wrote: Most knowledgeable people in my acquaintance are avoiding it like the plague. well, that's what is out there and time marches on. i'm sure it will settle in. I propose to migrate to Linux (or Mac?) by the time WinXP support ends. Good luck with that :-) Let us all know how that works for ya :-) Of course, secretly, I'm hoping that Vista will settle down and be reasonable. I'm too old to make major changes to my computing on a whim. ;-) I agree, besides I generally don't like leaping off a cliff not knowing if there's water down there to break my fall :-) And that can go both ways. I've seen this whole scenario way too many times on both the PC and the Mac side. There are times when you want to leave the machine alone and NOT upgrade the OS. Our old Sonic Solutions system comes to mind. It ran just fine, it did it's job... it's all it did. No reason to upgrade at all. We left it alone and never had a problem with it. |
#32
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64 bit processing, etc.
wrote:
wrote: Hello, This is sort of off-topic, but not. I'm in the market for a new computer with Vista. I can't for the life of me figure out if the Intel Core 2 Duo is a true 64 bit processor, a fake one, or nothing at all to do with 32 bit. Define "a true 64 bit processor" 64 bit datapaths? 64 bit addressing? 64 bit functional units? "64 bit" printed on the sticker that goes on the front of the machine :-) |
#33
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64 bit processing, etc.
Arny Krueger wrote:
wrote in message oups.com Any thoughts on audio software evolving into 64 bit architectures? That would probably kill the argument that you need to go analog to mix due to summing issues. There is a "64 bit" wav file format that has some charm, but it doesn't require anything but 32 bit XP. The 64 part of the W64 spec is just that the header is 64-bits. The bitdepth is not 64 bits. |
#34
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64 bit processing, etc.
And this movie plays itself out every time a new OS is introduced... And it will again, but probably pretty slowly, becasue XP is far more competent than any *obsolete* OS we ever had before. There is a 64 bit flavor of XP on the market, BTW. I'll bet you it plays out exactly like it always has. When folks buy new PC's, they will have Vista on them. That in itself will take care of it... like it always has. There is nothing different about Vista than other operating systems. Some users will wait a long time, some will stand in line outside the store the night before the launch (like they did this time), it happens every time. |
#35
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64 bit processing, etc.
Yes, I'm sure Vista may be useful in, say.. 1-1½ years time, whin we've seen the first one or two service packs, and how many things they fixed. What? Vista is useful right now. Whether or not all of your software and hardware will work with it without problems is what the variable is here. Yes, there are gonna be bugs... there always are. I propose to migrate to Linux (or Mac?) by the time WinXP support ends. Good luck with that :-) Let us all know how that works for ya :-) Been into Linux for some ten years. Fine for serveruse, fine for the desktop, provided one is good at unix. The latter couple of years has revealed a few distros which can actually be used by non-techies. But... as a misic recordong/production platform... Lotsa work getting intimately familiar with alsa, integrating alsa nas stuff like jackd, not to speak about no professional music apps. Drivers for (semi) pro soundcards? Well, a few, like RME. Even being very well into several Linux distros and other unix, it was an easy job deciding to go for OSX. Just shopped a used dual G4.. When you can build a DAW with all of the functionality of a Windows or MacOS machine, I'll be interested, otherwise Linux is not "Scottish" :-) |
#36
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64 bit processing, etc.
Soundhaspriority wrote:
wrote in message But... as a misic recordong/production platform... Lotsa work getting intimately familiar with alsa, integrating alsa nas stuff like jackd, not to speak about no professional music apps. Drivers for (semi) pro soundcards? Well, a few, like RME. Another myth. But it is completely understandable how, if you haven't been a programmer, that you don't understand it. You can be a very intelligent person, and still not understand. I fully understand. On Windows, I can grab my disks and my dongle and head out for a few days of mixing at damn near anyone's studio. I don't even need to bring my machine unless I want to. I mixed a gospel album last week on a $125 laptop I bought from a pawnshop (the pawnsop guy thought it was broken... it works perfectly. BTW) Kind hard (more like time consuming) to even try to do something like that on Linux. |
#37
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64 bit processing, etc.
anahata wrote:
What the marketing department want it to be, of corse, but... To qualify as any sort of 64 bit processor, it should support the AMD/Intel 64 bit instruction set (which is different from x86.) Yes, but the Itanium is 64 bit, and it has a totally different instruction set. The NS32032 has double operations that will operate on 64-bit values, but take two cycles for each memory access since the buss is only 32 bits wide. "True" 64 bit should mean that external data and address paths are 64 bits wide too. Ever since the 8088 in the original IBM PC, there have been n bit CPUs squeezing their data through n/2 bit data paths, because it saved lots of money and made a cheap upgrade path for an existing system. Oh, it predates the 8088 by a long shot. The IBM 360/30 was an example, I think, as was the horrible PDP-8e. --scott -- "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis." |
#38
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64 bit processing, etc.
Scott Dorsey wrote:
Oh, it predates the 8088 by a long shot. The IBM 360/30 was an example, I think, as was the horrible PDP-8e. Err...horrible PDP-8s. The 8e actually had a real 12 bit datapath, the 8-s had a single-bit memory buss in at attempt to make it slower. --scott -- "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis." |
#39
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64 bit processing, etc.
"JReynolds" wrote in message ups.com... Any thoughts on audio software evolving into 64 bit architectures? That would probably kill the argument that you need to go analog to mix due to summing issues. The arise of 64 bit architecture has absolutely nothing to do with the difference in sound you get from analog summing. The two are completely unrelated. Analog summing is used, and will be used into the future, because electronic components have inconsistent irregularities that color the sound. While more processing word length per clock would mean we can come up processes that work on a more precise level, this will not change the fact that analog summing will give you the color of the gear you are using. Well said. |
#40
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64 bit processing, etc.
On 10 Feb, 15:58, "Mogens V." wrote:
philicorda wrote: On Sat, 10 Feb 2007 13:52:20 +0100, Mogens V. wrote: Soundhaspriority wrote: wrote in message But... as a misic recordong/production platform... Lotsa work getting intimately familiar with alsa, integrating alsa nas stuff like jackd, not to speak about no professional music apps. Drivers for (semi) pro soundcards? Well, a few, like RME. Another myth. But it is completely understandable how, if you haven't been a programmer, that you don't understand it. You can be a very intelligent person, and still not understand. ??? Have you actually tried implementing a sound studio on Linux? If so, you may have been based on Debian.. I believe it's the only distro having those audio parts available in a repository (though I mostly work with Redhat, Centos, Slackware ((and FreeBSD, Solaris)) Most popular distros have audio apps. And oh yeah, I was a systems programmer back in the late 80's to early 90's, later went into systems integration, sysadm, network and security. I work with *nix every day as a sysadmin. It's exactly because of my teck background I wouldn't dream of spending month setting up a Linux studio system. While I'm sure you have great experience of Linux as a server OS, you probably know as much about the audio side as someone who has used Windows/OSX as a server OS knows about audio apps on Windows/OSX. Only been using linux on the desktop for 8+ years, including audio. A couple of times tried downloading audio apps beyond replaying music, always the same: Alsa and jack integration problems. ALSA is powerful, but complicated to setup if you want to do something different from the default. OTOH, once your soundcard is supported it will work out of the box without installing drivers, and with ANY linux distro. That if you ask me is a _great_ benefit, and a warranty on your hardware purchase. I have soo bad experiences with closed source drivers (namely gadgetlabs wave 824 and opcode studio64) that I won't put my hard-earned money anymore into a peripheral that doesn't have an open source driver. Jack and realtime operation is even more demanding since it needs a patched kernel to achieve the best performance for the lowest latency. As noted below, this wasn't on Debian. I have no problem admitting that almost no companies I've worked for have been using Linux on the desktop, and overtime as a sysadmin didn't make me wan't to spend the time back home, so my comments may be biased. Do give me a couple of pointers to the late progression using Linux for a DAW installation, i.e. distro, apps, audio routing deamon et al, and I'll take a fresh look. The most "audio friendly" and up to date debian based distro is 64studio: http://www.64studio.com They have both 64 bit and 32 bit versions. Use qjackctl to control jackd daemon and audio routing. Ardour as DAW. Rosegarden or muse as sequencer (synced via jack_transport), linuxsampler to play GIG files, zynaddsubfx as synth, jamin for mastering, audacity or rezound as audio editors. Need to do audio in batches? Try ecasound, sox, timidity, lame, oggenc, ... Then if you want to go experimental, try csound, puredata, supercollider. Apps are really not as mature as the windows commercial apps, but they do their work fairly well. Ardour has been rock solid for me, and more powerful than I ever needed. LADSPA plugins do not have the eye candy (in fact, they don't have a fixed GUI at all) but some are good sounding, and there are plenty of them. Tell me, where can I buy supported studio audio apps for Linux? I don't think any linux vendor do offer this kind of support for audio (maybe 64studio will) Those audio apps that can be downloaded free from freshmeat and sourceforge, do they integrate with Protools, Reason, Cubase, Logic...? Those four programs are completely incompatible with eachother, as none of them can open projects in any of the other's native formats. Yes, what I meant is, using a Linux DAW setup, will I be able to share and work with other musicians and studios? Open formats are one of the main advantages of free software, as you probably know. Ardour uses 32 bit broadcast wave files, and human readable XML for the project file. Moreover, the app is free so everyone can legally install it (it's also available for mac OS X) and use your projects without problems, including effects, automation, and so on. No windows version so far, though. Speaking of other session interchange formats, Paul Davis (ardour's author) said: "We are slowly working on support for AAF, which is about the only standard for session files worth paying attention to (OMF is widespread because of ProTools but its also proprietary and is hard for us to support)." Without having checked further lately, I think not, but things may've changed. Only, if Linux _is_ suitable, I fail to see much evidence of musicians/studios using it. I may be halfblind, though Check http://ardour.org forums. They are plenty of people using ardour... maybe they're not high end professionals, but the community is growing, and the app in my opinion is well worth to keep an eye on. Ardour on Linux is as compatible with Cubase as Cubase is with Logic. Outside WAV files and the occasional success with AAF/OMS, there are no standards to integrate with. Steinberg have enough trouble maintaining compatability between the different versions of their own software, let alone with other DAWs. Don't get me wrong. I love working with *nix, but when it comes to music, I look at the tech side as a musician. Prefer twangin' strings, and actually make music. Assuming it takes me a couple of hours to set up a Linux DAW, exactly what tech stuff is required after I've done an initial test recording to make sure everything is working properly? A couple of hours? On which distro? To be fair, I haven't tried setting up on Debian as a workstation, and hence also not for audio. Try 64studio. You might be surprised :-) The secret to audio happiness is the same on Linux as on any other OS, get it working, then leave it alone and don't fiddle. You, basic audio works out of the box on most distros now, but moving on from there isn't nessesarily straightforward. In three to five years maybe, who knows. When We've gotten rid of the two competing GUI's (Gnome and KDE) and have one official GUI with one API and one set of libs. And when users can install all the stuff without havng to perform post-config requiring tech knowledge. Yes, a distro like debian-based Ubuntu has made real good steps WRT enduser useability, but when do you suppose the GPL will allow us to see VST or the other standard whats-its-name plugin's? When Steinberg change their licence to the VST header file. To be fair they never anticipated people using GPL'd audio software when the licence was written, so it's not really their fault. You're right about that. There are plenty of other live music distros, but they all feel a bit messy to me, though Jacklab looks promising. I'll take a fresh look. Best regards, and sorry for my english -- Emiliano Grilli Linux user #209089 http://www.emillo.net |
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