Subject: Re: Re[2]: [linux-audio-dev] Reverse-engineering files
From: Jay Ts (jay_AT_toltec.metran.cx)
Date: Fri Dec 01 2000 - 08:29:42 EET
>
> I don't know if you are aware of this, but If I am not mistaken, Emu
> is owned by Creative Labs anyways.
Yes, very accurate. And E-mu is actually now E-mu/Ensoniq. All three
companies have or had sound card products, and I have a couple of CL/Ensoniq
AudioPCIs here. One in my Linux box and one in the 'doze machine.
I think the merging of these companies is another indicator that the
field is smearing together, with a variety of hybrid products resulting.
> Long ago when the SB16 was $250
> and the WaveBlaster was $250 (which I bought both) I requested the
> documentation from Creative labs and they sent me the proteus user
> guide.
Wow, that's interesting... maybe I should look into the Soundblaster
Live! a bit deeper. It might be possible to write an app for it that
turns it into a pretty nice Proteus-like sampler/synth. It'd be _really_
nice to have a Linux driver for the E-mu pro sound card, though.
> Editing effects stacks on a monochromatic LCD screen
> is crazy, I would rather have knobs!
It depends on the interface. Both Paul Barton-Davis and I have Alesis
Quadraverbs, and speaking for myself only (I don't need to repeat Paul's
words for him here), that interface is very easy to use. Still, I'd
much rather use my 19" color hi-res monitor, mouse and keyboard. But
Alesis went a loooooong way with a monochrome LCD screen! I am not
complaining.
BTW, regarding editing using knobs, the Proteus family modules have
what E-mu calls "quick edit mode" and "deep edit mode", which allows
the realtime controllers to edit parameters just by turning the knob.
It's a lot quicker than stepping through menus with cursor buttons,
then spinning the data entry wheel. Maybe this is what you were
referring to?
> Once your product becomes software and not hardware you loose an edge.
I wasn't really arguing in favor of E-mu converting to a software product,
but moving some functionality to the computer for a more hybrid system.
They would still be selling hardware.
Think of it, a lot of what an Ultra sampler does (memory management,
filesystem, SCSI/IDE hardware interface, etc.) would be handled a
lot better by the Linux kernel and cheap PC hardware. In fact, they
could come out with a future product based on Linux if they wanted to.
I wonder if that new Mackie hard disk recorder, for example, is running
Linux inside? Why not?
> why redo something the right way when you can hack up the old
> technology with a faster processor :) Believe me, I design IC chips
> and I see this go on all the time!
My XL-1 has a 40MHz Motorola COLDFire processor, obviously to handle
the user interface and such, while the E-mu custom chips are generating
sounds. Meanwhile, a 1GHz system has a lot of computing power, even if
a good percentage of that gets sopped up in overhead. There's a point
where it's cheaper and easier to throw a PC at the problem than buy some
closed and proprietary solution that had a lot of development cost per
customer associated with it. Since you say you design IC chips, maybe
you understand the cost factor in designing and fabbing a new chip.
(I have had some experience in chip design too...) Meanwhile, a 600MHz
Duron is only $60. Intel spends billions on chip development, and the
competition and huge market drive the price down to peanuts.
I sincerely hope that E-mu holds up, because I really like the company.
Yet at the same time I'm wondering, why don't I just start writing sampler
software for Linux, and in a few years a 4 GHz Linux system might
easily blow away any sampler that E-mu (or AKAI, Yamaha, et. al.)
have by then. Might even be better than Gigasampler. :)
- Jay Ts
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