Subject: Re: [linux-audio-dev] USB Souncards
From: Allan Klinbail (allank_AT_labyrinth.net.au)
Date: Sun Jan 20 2002 - 09:39:16 EET
Hi
This is more of a general comment....
I'd try and steer away from USB audio...
Reports in magazines like Sound on Sound and Audio Technology (an
Australian publication) don't rate any USB audio devices highly .. due
to the low bandwidth and shared nature of the USB protocol. i.e. the
FOstex USB Midi/audio desk (sorry can't remember the model) can't handle
full spec MIDI and all audio processes at one time...
When using laptops it is highly recommended to use a firewire hard disk
as your recording media as the latency of the hard drive on even the
best laptops is unacceptable under any OS (especially when multitracking
even just on output).
From reading the alsa-user-ML archives I have seen various reports.
Basically ALSA has not written support for USB audio specifically as
yet, however some people have had some luck in getting these devices to
work.
I would recommend posting a question to the alsa-user mailing list
alsa-user_AT_alsa-project.org (you need to be a member) to see how easily
it has been done, and with which devices.. if this is your only option.
My strongest reccomendation would be either to wait till there is a
firewire audio device, with it's information released so that someone
can write a driver specific to it. (i.e. not the MOTU or other devices
currently out there). With any luck maybe the mLan spec will be
available to open source developers at some stage.... and an mLan
(firewire) device would be the strongest suggestion, especially with
future studio expansion in mind.
Allan
On Fri, 2002-01-18 at 14:15, Brad Bowman wrote:
> I was planning to get a new sound card to use now
> with my current fragile laptop and future whizz-bang
> desktop. As they only have USB in common I thought
> that might be best although hints in the earlier
> usb audio thread have worried me. If I'm paying
> a premium price for poor performance then I might
> just wait until I'm in a position to get a nice
> desktop.
>
> So, in short, what are the issues with USB sound cards
> under Linux? In particular, does it effect latency and
> realtime reliability?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Brad
>
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