Professional Audio on Linux?

twilightzero asks: "Recently a friend of mine who is chief engineer at a medium size recording studio/radio station has become increasingly unhappy with Windows (and would like to stay away from Macs) and has asked me if there is any sort of professional audio solution for Linux. Has anybody, anywhere ever tried this? Is it possible to buy a pro audio card with Linux drivers and just run Sound Forge in WINE or do you need an entirely native package?" This is one of those questions that just needs to be answered. What Open Source sound packages out there are good enough for even the professionals to use when they need to make their squeaks, squeals, and whistles. Also, what can they use to put their created sounds together into some semblance of music? As an addendum, coasterfreak asks: "Being an avid Linux user and composer is a bit of a problem right now. I've never run across any decent music creation programs for Linux. I've used Finale and Cakewalk before, but have yet to see them for Linux. I've heard rumors of something coming from the Debain crew, but nothing more than rumors." Can anyone confirm or deny them?

Just as a bit of a helpful hint, how many of you have tried Audacity yet? It looks to be a fairly feature rich sound editor, and it supports mixing tracks, plugin sound effects, and is cross platform, to boot! Maybe this is a decent spring board for those of you looking to start experimenting with sound under Linux, but I'm not quite sure it's ready for professionals yet...this based on the version number of 0.97 rather than any actual experience, so I'd take the word of those who have said they have used it rather than mine. It would be great if Audacity is further along than it looks.

Comments

Linuxsound.at

[mirko]

I was about to write you a loooooong answer in order to show you most alternatives but this link just does it much better that I may have...

Have fun!

Re:Linuxsound.at

[NathanL]

I hope that someone does come out with a Linux solution. This will trash Avid in much the same way Avid trashed the whole entertainment industry (at least in the post-prod business I worked in in California). If people think that the entertainment industry losing jobs to Canada is the whole problem, they aren't seeing the big picture.

When Avid came out with their AudioVision tool as well as a broadcast quality video editor, this is really what trashed the industry. Instead of needing a $500k-$3M system to do it all, you could now set up a whole post suite in a clost for less than $100k. This was easier to set up, so all the engineers with tons of experience started losing their $50-$100 jobs to less experienced "kids" that were happy to make $15-$25 an hour. The value of experience was thrown out the window.

So next time you hear a radio ad or TV commercial that has loud digital hiss, you know that its because some film-school puke didn't have enough experience to know that a DAT should be copied digtially rather than through the analog inputs. Same with crappy TV commercials that sound like the mic was at the bottom of a trash can while the actor was talking.

Re:Linuxsound.at

[garcia]

they are expensive, proprietary, and lack freedom.

that's what most Linux users have against any software/hardware/OS. (or is that most /. readers -- one in the same I guess on most levels hehe)

Yes, they are probably the best source for professional audio but the cost of an Intel based machine w/Linux is far better than a Mac.

Money is everything. I wonder if the RIAA uses Macs, ;)

Obligitory book link..

[cheesyfru]

Check out Dave Phillips' excellent book on the subject, Linux Music and Sound. There is a chapter dedicated to what you're wanting to do.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/188641134 4/ qid=1003254837/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_7_1/103-5443063-182 7000

Macs?

[Baba Abhui]

Digital audio production and Macs are virtually synonomous; what does this guy have against macs?

Pure Data, Jmax

[AtaruMoroboshi]

There is an audio solution for hardcore sound designers, it's called pd or Pure Data.

It's basically an attempt at an open source version of Max/MSP which is a program that is mac only and is used by groups like Autechre, Aphex Twin...

What PD is is a visual object oriented music "programing" language. It lets you build synths, midi controlers, do math, store data, create generative (algorythmic) music, do interactive composition...

here is a good link on PD:

http://wonk.epy.co.at/

Re:Pure Data, Jmax

[AtaruMoroboshi]

Oh yeah, and i forgot to mention Jmax.

Jmax is the same kind of deal, and the GUI is built in Java, so they call it Jmax. it runs on linux and windows.

Both pd and jmax can be used on Mac OS X, if you tweak them a bit.

Note that neither pd nor jmax have quite the robust roster of externals/objects that Max/MSP have, but they are open source and pretty functional, from what I understand from people who are hardcore about these things.

Re:Pure Data, Jmax

[jcw2112]

Pure Data will run nicely on NT/2000. Jmax, while prettier seems to have some major stability issues (based on my experience...no flames please). I would just stick with pd. The GUI is ugly, but the results are incredible.

happy noise-making!

Demudi

[Anonymous Coward]

A specialised debian dist. is being setup just for this purpose, read more at www.demudi.org (or read below ;o)

The GNU/Linux operating system is widely known as a robust base for running Internet servers, but has not reached yet a similar audience as a platform of choice for the musician and the multimedia artist. The DeMuDi project targets one reason of this issue, the lack of a GNU/Linux distribution oriented toward music and multimedia.
The Demudi project (for Debian Multimedia Distribution) aims to provide for the musician and artist a GNU/Linux distribution dedicated to music and multimedia that would ease installing and customizing GNU/Linux for their needs. Demudi is not actually a distribution in itself. Taking advantage of the existing Debian distribution, it enhances a Debian distribution by a collection of packages containing music and multimedia applications or development tools. The Debian distribution has been chosen, because it is the only distribution that is developed entirely by volunteers over the Internet, just like a significant part of the GNU system, the Linux kernel and many applications. Additionally, it supports several different hardware architectures.

--------------
Yes, I'm an AC - No, I don't feel like registering!

I don't know of the software side, but

[alleria]

M-Audio and MidiMan provide professional-caliber cards with pro-level features, and support Linux as one of their OSes, as well as Mac/Windows, of course.

Their driver support for Windows is okay, but I believe their Linux support may well be binary only. That said, their drivers generally don't suck.

I'm not affiliated with them -- just a happy home user who enjoys using their pro-level cards for cleaner sound output under Windoze.

Re:I don't know of the software side, but

[pigeon]

I just got a M-audio Audiophile 2496, and I love the thing. Primary reason I bought this card is that it works with windows (up to xp!) Mac (9 and X!) and Linux (with alsa drivers). I now use a PC with Linux for most of my tasks and windows 98se with logic for audio, but I'm really sick and tired of windows (and logic doesn't work on windows 2000/xp). I'd love to have logic on linux, but that's not evry likely. So I am saving for a Mac G4 . Mac's are more expensive than PC's but when you're doing pro audio the price of the machine itself is not so much an issue, the price of your protools, you're mackie 8bus digital mixer and your adat gear are more significant..

Try this:

[Green Aardvark House]

You could use Protux.

Even though it uses its own file format (PRAF) you can import .WAV, .OGG and .MP3 files, too.

Screen shots and more info can be found on the Protux home page.

Pro support seems to be very limited

[Chakat]

I'd say that you're probably going to have to wait a while to get professional level sound card (multiple analog inputs, ADAT, etc) available under Linux. Even with entry level pro sound boards, such as the Lexicon Core2, drivers are still non-existant. Linux may have good support for doing electronica, etc, but if you're doing "live" music, you've still got enough hoops you've got to jump through that it's just not worth it for the time being.

This isn't meant as a flame, or a troll, it's just the truth. It's time to start turning the screws on the big vendors to start making their high-end sound drivers available for Linux, even if they are simply binary drivers only.

Soundcard: M-Audio

[2ms]

I asked about pro soundcards once at linux.com and someone pointed me to http://www.m-audio.com - the 24-bit "audiophile" looks sweet to me.

Don't use windows emulators

[punchdrunk]

Emulators are generally slower than running native. Latency is the bane of pro audio software if you are trying to do anything remotely real-time (sequencing, sound sources, midi controllers, real-time audio manipulation, etc.). Since at least some of this is usually required in any pro audio situation, especially at a studio, any type of emulation is going to be a big problem. We're talking situations where milliseconds are extremely important.

MacCentral: Mac OS X great for pro audio

[HalimCMe]

Apple betting audio pros will like Mac OS X 10.1

Interesting article for those interested in professional audio under a well-supported non-Windows Unix-based OS.

Some helpful places to check out:

[Azog]

From reading the Linux Audio mailing list, I can offer a quick summary: There is pretty decent hardware support for a variety of pro audio gear. See below. The software side is not quite so good. As one poster put it: "The problem is not a lack of developers for Linux Audio. The problem is that instead of two or three 90% complete software packages, we've got twelve or fifteen 20% complete packages."

That might be a little pessimistic, but there's some truth to it. However, there is usable software out there, even if it is not done. Broadcast 2000 was aimed at video editing, but was apparently useful for audio as well. Ardor is a hard disk recorder package. There's a lot of stuff out there - heck, just search Google and Sourceforge.

The ALSA project http://www.alsa-project.org/ is an important site if you are looking for pro audio Linux drivers and software.

Now, about the hardware: http://www.linuxdj.com/audio/lad/ is a place to start.

Also check out http://www.boosthardware.com/LAU/Linux_Audio_Users _Guide/

The M-Audio pro hardware has a lot of good cards - everything from an inexpensive 24 bit / 96 Khz DA /AD card all the way up to the 10 channel Delta 1010, suitable for real pro / recording work. These cards have Linux support, and is probably your best bet for really good AD / DA and Midi under Linux.

The RME Hammerfall card is also supported under Linux. Other quality hardware (from Echo and other companies) is unfortunately not so well supported.

Personally, I'm planning on getting one of the M-Audio cards just for playing with.

Re:Some helpful places to check out:

[Stonehead]

The ALSA Project is really cool. I have a nameless Aztech 2320-based sound card. Last time I checked, the only available Windows drivers where for 95 and NT. Lots of bugs in there, too, and it couldn't record via the line-in without a lot of hiss. The default Linux kernel recognizes the azt2320 card, but can't play music through it. But ALSA works! Unlike in Windows, I can now adjust *all* volume controls, line-in recordings are pretty clean and even midi works fine. The joystick too, but you don't need alsa for the game port of course :)
Actually, the Linux kernel with ALSA might support many older cards better than the current Windows drivers. Some features for the Soundblaster Live! and a few more high-end cards are still underway, though..

Relevant Linux Journal article

[the_rev_matt]

Here's an article on exactly that subject.. http://www2.linuxjournal.com/articles/style/0009.h tml

Linux Driver Support

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think there really is a Linux alternative for pro-sound recording environments. Mostly due to a lack driver support for high-end sound cards. Any serious recording studio that works in the digital domiain is usually working in the realm of 24 bit, 96 kHz audio (soon to be 192 kHz audio), with sound cards with muliple I/O interfaces, and often built in MIDI. In my experiences, you can get high end sound cards working on Linux, but never with 24 bit 96 kHz audio, and rarely with all the I/O ports functioning, and more rarely with accurate MIDI timing.

I've been in the Pro-audio industry for years, and I've never heard of a studio running Linux. I've been pressuring the company I work for to come out with Linux support, but after a real cost/benefit analysis, they never go for it.

Luke Deniston
Technical Manager
Ego Sys, Inc.
http://www.egosys.net

Audacity

[Dominic_Mazzoni]

I can't resist making a shameless plug for my project, Audacity.

While Audacity is nowhere near being a complete replacement for a full set of commercial audio tools, I believe it's one of the best editors available for Linux today and has a lot of potential to be extremely competitive with commercial multitrack audio solutions within the next year or two. Here's what it has going for it:

• It's cross-platform. We use wxWindows (but with native audio I/O code for each platform) and Audacity currently runs on Linux, Windows, MacOS (9 and X), and other Posix systems.
• Fully non-destructive editing, using a novel blocked-file approach which caches the current mix for faster real-time playback.
• Supports (on most sound cards) full-duplex recording - sing harmonies with yourself!
• Import and Export MP3 files from within Audacity (using LAME for exporting)
• Built-in effects include Bass Boost, FFT Filter, and Noise Reduction. Compression/Expansion under development. Support for VST plug-ins on Windows and MacOS, and LADSPA support is under development.
• Unlimited number of tracks and automatic mixing. The code in CVS (not yet released) supports automatic resampling.
• Built-in envelope editor
• Spectrogram mode and frequency analysis tools

(For those of you who have tried the current release (0.97) and are having audio I/O problems on Linux, rest assured that the latest version in CVS has much improved audio I/O and should solve all of those problems and more...)

There are three or four active developers of Audacity, and another dozen or so people who contribute code or bug fixes from time to time. We're definitely interested in more help - visit the web site and contact us if you're a C++ whiz (or have some other skill which might be useful for us) and want to join the team!

waiting for Cakewalk Sonar

[beanerspace]

Back in the 1986, Greg Hendershott made the PC a viable choice for MIDI production. Well, actually, it wasn't until the early 90's with the Windows version of Cakewalk that it became a weapon of choice. IN the late '90's the product improved to the point of a pro-weight Audio product now named Sonar.

My only complaint is that while the software is sturdy, the operating system under it isn't. More than once, Windows has "burped" in the middle of critical recordings. I recently set up a church with RealAudio Producer for Linux for precisely that reason. I didn't want an operating system getting in the way of a 20 minute sermon.

My hope is that Greg H. get's the innovation bug that's made him a hero in the industry, and provide a Linux solution. When that happens, you can kiss Windows goodbye in my own studio.

Pro Audio

[asv108]

Is it possible to buy a pro audio card with Linux drivers and just run Sound Forge in WINE

Last time I checked, Sound Forge was not something to be used for PRO audio.

Re:what about latency issues?

[h4b1t]

there are several low-latency kernel patches, up to and including 2.4.10 kernels... http://www.uow.edu.au/~andrewm/linux/schedlat.html #downloads check there u can get down to at least 8ms

Audio latency

[Another MacHack]

There's a paper, Audio Latency Measurements of Desktop Operating Systems, which might give you some useful information. Mac OS X's CoreAudio provided the most consistant latencies regardless of loads, although a suitably patched Linux 2.4 kernel has better latencies under no-load conditions.

"All of the current desktop operating systems offer excellent latency performance under some conditions, though most of them cannot deliver this performance in all situations. This is a substantial improvement over previous results (Brandt and Dannenberg 1998; Freed, Chaudhary, and Davila 1997), but because of the inconsistency of the results more improvement is necessary before reliable low-latency performance can be expected from desktop operating systems.

"In conclusion, Linux showed the best performance in the tests without load while MacOS X showed the best performance in the tests with load. Windows and MacOS 8 and 9 produced some of the best results when using a professional soundcard with the ASIO API but showed poor performance when using the standard APIs and consumer-grade soundcards."

MacOS X Latency

[Anonymous Coward]

In case you didn't get a chance to read (ofcourse I can't find the link to the article) the recent research from the Peabody Institute, they recently reviewed platforms for audio and named OS X the best of the group. (including Mac OS X, Linux and Windows)

In tests, audio was sampled at 44.1KHz with 16-bit or 24-bit precision. Apple's machines were the only ones on test that didn't require a soundcard.

The best latency test results for systems without load were as follows (time in milliseconds);

- Mac OS X running on a 400MHz G4: 2.83 ms.
- Soundcraft Desk: 1.81 ms.
- 933MHz Pentium 3 running Linux 2.4.1 with a third party audio software patch: 2.72 ms.
- 933MHz Pentium 3 running Linux: 2.72ms.

Mac OS X performed outstandingly when under system load. It offered the same latency speed as before - 2.83 ms. Previous competitors in the unloaded category dropped out of sight. Its nearest rival (with 4.3ms) was again Linux 2.4.1 OS, this time running on a dual processor Pentium 3 with a pro audio card installed and additional software.

The article was authored by:
Karl MacMillan, Michael Droettboom and Ichiro Fujinaga of the Peabody Institute - part of John Hopkins University in the US.

You may also want to look at the following links:

http://www.apple.com/macosx/technologies/audio.h tm l

http://developer.apple.com/audio/

http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0110/05.audi o. php

You may not like the Mac or the MacOS but I would have to say that OS X looks like it has a very, very good chance of holding onto and attracting a large chunk of the audio market.

I am not a Mac/Linux/Windows fanatic, just someone who uses the best tool for the job and to me it appears like in the near future OS X will be the system of choice for audio professionals.

Apple OS X probably your best choice

[mir@ge]

There is always a best tool for the job. There may be a reason so many audio professionals go with a Mac. Check out this article a friend forwarded the other day:

Apple betting audio pros will like Mac OS X 10.1

I don't quite understand it all but it seems OS X is built for sound from the ground up.

Re:No real sound cards

[Anonymous Coward]

You forgot RME from your list of professional audio equipment. RME makes both very high quality product and supports quite a lot the developement of audio drivers for linux.

I bought an rme card for those very reasons, and encourage other fellow musicians to do the same.

Re:No real sound cards

[FrankNputer]

midiman [midiman.com]...(has) absolutely no linux support.

Actually, if you check the list at opensound.com, you'll see that they support the whole Delta series of cards, with a few limitations; M Audio have even advertised Linux compatibility in their recent print ads.

You'll also find support for the RME Digi/32 series & the Digi/96 series, all very fine cards. Also, they have recently added support for the Hoontech DSP24, which is a 8x8 24-bit card with a companion A/D & D/A converter box, not too unlike the Echo Layla. So, there are options at least on the semi-pro level.

And as for ProTools, the changes in the underlying audio handling in OS X means that, at the moment, ProTools is completely unsupported. It relies on a proprietary interface, and an Apple rep said in the recent EQ Magazine that they have no intention of supporting proprietary hardware interfaces - that will be up to ProTools to do. They probably will, since the bulk of their users are probably on Macs, but it's not native by any means.

not entirely true

[Anonymous Coward]

There is support for several families of pro-grade multichannel cards, most notably the Envy24 cards (M-Audio in particular) and the RME Hammerfall series. I have personally had 6-in 6-out full duplex 24/96 running with a Delta 66, and the Ardour guys run 'teens worth of channels on the Hammerfalls.
Don't know how midi fits into this, though.
Unfortunately, all of this requires ALSA, which is not the easiest road, even for techies. It's closing in on stability, but finding info is a chore.

Pro/Semi-Pro

[DigitalSorceress]

I used to use PCs for Digital Audio and MIDI sequencing, but I got really tired of the system "barfing" in the middle of 50% of my takes. I Finally came to the decision that if I was going to record music digitally, I would really need a dedicated device.

I ended up plunking down the cash for a Roland VS-1880 and have never looked back since. They are not cheap, but dedicated hard disk based digital recorders are rock solid. I still use a PC for creating/warping out samples before I load them into a keyboard, and of course, I use them to take my final tracks and rip them to MP3, but I don't think I will ever trust a PC again for digital multitrack audio recording.

Re:No real sound cards

[The Evil Twin]

hmm... after a quick check both Midiman and RME have linux support (or are supported).

Now I don't know about you, but RME is better than any of the brands you mentioned (In my opinion of course). And motu doesn't write very good drivers for any platform. But that's beside the point.

The Mac is not going to last forever as the leader of this race. Steinberg Canada has already stated that Windows 2000 is their preferred platform for stability and speed. Not to mention price of course (not the price of windows but the hardware).
I've talked to several Yamaha Techs from Japan who say the same thing.

Now I agree with you that OSX kicks ass in many ways. But Linux on a PC kicks even more ass. The raw speed, the choice of hardware, and the *ahem* choice of OS.