Subject: Re: [linux-audio-dev] an open letter to Linus re: low latency
From: Paul Barton-Davis (pbd_AT_Op.Net)
Date: Fri Jun 23 2000 - 21:06:34 EEST
>> if all
>> you are doing is a single task (eg. fx), you're much better off with
>> no disk, no monitor, no keyboard, no mouse, no floppy, no IDE or SCSI
>> bus, no video bus, no PCI bus, no ISA bus, etc. etc. etc. Thats why
>> you can get a kick-ass TC multi-fx unit for US$400, and only a pretty poor
>> computer for anything close to that price.
>
>Last I checked, a t.c. electronic Fireworx costs $1800 (street), not
>$400, and comes with a tiny monochrome LCD display. I'd much rather
The M-One (i think that is its name) is $499 at Sam Ash in the US.
>program a device such as that with my 19" Viewsonic monitor, or at
and use a goddam mouse for everything ? i like real buttons :)
>least a 15" model. Also, I recently purchased a used Pentium for
>$200 including monitor, and it is much more versatile than a dedicated
No A/D conversion, no D/A conversion. To buy a card with the digital
I/O options on a modern digital FX box will cost you, oh, at least
$200. The TC box has nice 24 bit converters too (the A/D part can even
be used standalone).
I take your point but that 200MHz Pentium, while great for pass thru
stuff and sample-based synthesis, will suffocate when faced with, say
4 channel 4-effect processing if the effects are any good.
>is that even this little 200 MHz Pentium has more processing power (and
>RAM and disk space) than some synths on the market, and I'm much better
>off running FruityLoops on my cheap Pentium than going out and buying a
>Roland MC-505 (currently about $1100, street). And we're getting
>close to where a computer can replace something like a t.c. electronic
>Fireworx or Finalizer or Eventide Harmonizer (currently about $3500-4000,
>street). Perhaps this is why we are now seeing so many effects and
>synthesizers showing up in the form of VST plugins. You can now buy
>a Waldorf keyboard (with physical keyboard, knobs and buttons), or get
>another model as standalone software, or as a VST instrument. And the cool
>thing about that is that there are different reasons to prefer any
>incarnation over any of the others.
Absolutely. And this is all why getting low latency stuff into Linux
matters *so* much. Onward Brothers And Sisters! We Shall Not Be
Stopped, We Shall Overcome, etc. etc. :)
--p (sadly considering running windows on a laptop just so that i can
use some of this cool stuff without having to re-write it all myself)
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