Linux audio laptop advice needed

Strangely enough you sound like you are in the EXACT situation I am Ill try to answer what I can of it...

>That the mobo chipset will allow smooth running with jack at low-ish latency, and allow harddisk dma (the Ferrari and other Turion laptops I've seen use an "ATI Xpress 200" chipset (not graphics chip!) - I'm not sure what kernel support for this is like.)

Good question, I havent heard of much on this topic. The only chipset I have heard of problems with was the nForce4(or was it nForce3? Whatever my desktop has and its a TYAN Thunder K8WE, however that particular motherboard doesnt have said problems which is what is confusing so many people right now)

>That it's possible to get either a firewire or USB soundcard working with jack (I'm a complete novice in all areas of USB!) Linux-friendly USB soundcard suggestions would be very welcome.

As Much as I love Firewire, in this instance you kinda HAVE to go with USB. Firewire support is minimal on Linux due to so many manufacturers not going by the standard and writing custom drivers to get around it, and then not rereleasing the info for use on linux. Essentially EVERYTHING would have to be reverse engineered meaning a LOT of time since each driver is different and it obviously hasnt happened yet(With one exception, that being freebob that I am aware of)

So USB is pretty much the choice, check alsa-project.org BEFORE you buy your sound card and MAKE SURE it is FULLY supported.

>That it's possible to get either a firewire or USB soundcard working with jack (I'm a complete novice in all areas of USB!) Linux-friendly USB soundcard suggestions would be very welcome.

As long as ALSA supports it, it should be posible to get it running under Jack I believe. Now note I havent done this yet so I may be wrong, but I believe that is pretty much how that works, and am sure enough about it to buy a soundcard myself based off that.

>That I really will see some benefit from a 64-bit processor (I realize apps have to be compiled as 64bit to get this..) - I'm also unsure as to the relative performance of athlon mobile 64 and turion - does the mobile 64 have "hypertransport", and what difference would that make?

http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/..._12651,00.html

Yes they have hypertransport.

You will see some benefit in linux IMO, how much is open for debate still, however especially going the gentoo route and compiling everything as march=x86_64 I believe you will see a fair amnount of benefit, I definitly do on my opteron machine mentioned above. The only exception to this is I am not sure if the ATI driver has been released as 32 bit or 64 bit. So you may want to check on that as I dont know right at this moment.

>A minor concern is that I'd like to have working 3D acceleration in linux, since I like to dabble in the odd bit of OpenGL programming..

See above, though I believe you shoudl be able to get it working.

OK some info I found on a quick google...

The ATI driver is 32 bit.

http://www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/linux_8.16.20.html
(Look under Web Content)
Note: 64 bit driver support for XFree86 version 4.1 and 4.2 are not supported.

And yes the driver will run on a true 64 bit system apparently...

http://xoomer.virgilio.it/flavio.sta...tml#amd64notes

Linux 64 Bit systems you can install emulation to run 32 bit software(Such as Wine or apparently drivers) I know from past experience this never is as easy as it sounds, but it apparently works for the driver according to that site above. You wont get 64 bit performance out of it(Another reason to stick to nvidia) but itll at least work apparently.

>On the Ferrari - I have read a bit about linux on it (the double clock fix, ACPI issues, etc.), here (TYVM!) and elsewhere, but I'm not sure how those issues relate to the audio concerns..

They will relate to the general running of your laptop, not nessecarily to the audio specificly. HOWEVER you WILL wnat to fix these issues via the patches and such so that it doesnt make your laptop any less stable, and it runs correctly.

>Any advice, general or (un)recommending specific machines relating to the above points would be much appreciated!

Heh well unfortunatly I can only give you so much advice But feel free to ask questions and Ill try to answer them.

Seablade

As usual seablade, you are a wealth of knowledge.

I'm in the process of trying to get my m-audio firewire 410 working. Sadly, M-Audio's site says that the firewire410 is not supported in linux. If that turns out to be the case, what usb audio card would you suggest?

deVries, I'll try and help where ever I can as I stumble through getting ardour working on my laptop.

-BT

Heh understand about the lack of time

And thanks for the compliments though I am far from an expert on Linux audio... trust me there is a lot more I could learn.

Unfortunatly BigTrouble I dont think the 410 will work, but if it does PLEASE let me know because I have one myself and will be replacing the Mac I use it on(Had to get a PT setup to finish up a project I was working on on a tour unfortunatly, also use it with Live to run shows off of, good interface IMO). Anyways I looked into it about 4 or 5 months ago I tihnk and at that time I couldnt find any evidence it was supported.

Seablade

By the way in case I didnt mention it, I am ALSO looking at that exact laptop

Old thread yes, but I figured Iwould post something for those of yall that work in Audio under linux..

My Desktop currently is my main audio machine, running linux, and is currently running with jack under 3 mS of latency and is pretty stable(Meaning I have yet to have a problem). There are some things I still am going to do to it but if you needed to know how good linux could handle audio... that would be a good example. I could probably push the thing further if I thought I would get much benefit. This is running a Gentoo Stage 3 install, without configuring use flags yet, I will be going back and doing that and recompiling everything a bit later after I dont have an immediate project to finish.

Seablade

seablade, have you found any decent usb2 audio cards yet? I can't get jack working until I get one. The Audigy 2 NX is only $86. I don't need multiple inputs, just something that can do 96khz. Sadly, I'm going to have to scrap my delta 1010lt and firewire410 due to lack of linux drivers.

Also, can Ardour import cubase2 or 3 sessions? The best latency I could ever get was 4ms, but even that crackled a bit in cubase. I'm dying to try ardour, just need a usb sound card first.

Thanks,
-BT

Hmm strange, you shouldnt need to ditch the 1010LT I am pretty sure that should work with Alsa, at least I am fairly sure the 1010 does and that the LT uses the same driver. I dont have one to test however.

Unfortunatly Ardour does not import CuBase sessions that I know of, you are better off finishing those up in CuBase, and starting from scratch withArdour, much like when you switch to ANY other sequencer.

In as far as a decent USB sound card, I have been looking at the Edirol series, the UA-101 or 1000 for my purposes since a fair amount of outputs is a nessecity for me, and the extra ins dont hurt. I am a bit worried though since I am not to familiar with the Edirol line.

Supposedly the M-Audio Audiophile works with Alsa, again I have not tried it so research it on the web first, but apparently the MobilePre does NOT. So again make sure you research anything you can with google. But if the Audiophile works then that should provide a decent 2x2 interface for those that dont need much.

By the way while I was there I took a glance at the 1010LT on alsa-project.org and noticed it uses the Ice1712 driver, much like my interface and was wondering if you have used the envy24control program yet? If you havent, try it with the 1010LT, it is worth it.

It took me a while to get my ice1712 based audio card up and running correctly, two seperate tries on Gentoo. But now that I have it up and running I love it. Of course mine is also a bit more complex than most of them are(Such as the M-Audio series) as it has an entire digital board it interfaces with.

I am also on the lookout for good Pres, I would love to be able to hook up some Onyx series mixers or pres to my computer but unfortunatly havent been able to, means I might just have to buy a standalone mic pre to use for recording unfortunatly. That wont happen for a while though.

Anyways feel free to post if you have any more questions.

Seablade

I'm getting rid of the 1010lt because I almost never use my desktop machine anymore. It's really just for windows games, which I almost never play anymore.

Well, I broke down today and drove out to guitar studio and snagged a Tascam US-122 usb. Apparently it's supported by the asla project here:
Tascam US-122

Sadly, I'm having problems getting this configure script working:
./configure --with-cards=usb-usx2y --with-sequencer=yes;make;make install

So many things are detected and not detected, there are a bunch of error messages... so I have no idea what's important and what's not.

In the beginning of the instructions it says you need soundcore compiled as a module which I believe I do because running 'modinfo soundcore' indicates that it is indeed running. The instructions say that if that module is installed I won't have to recompile the kernal. Any ideas on where to go from here? Here's the output from running the ./configure:
http://bob.bah.net/config.txt

On a positive note I finally got ardour running, but it's using my laptop's audio card. Looks like an awesome program.

-BT

well, I took out the makes and finally noticed the error: checking for which soundcards to compile driver for... configure: error: Unsupported soundcard usb-usx2y

maybe I downloaded the wrong driver...

Note Read the entire post before trying anything, some things to try first are at the end

This is the start of your problems so a few things I notice right off the bat....

You are using Ubuntu? Have you compiled a kernel at all or are you still using theirs? If you are still using theirs have you installed the kernel headers? If not try search apt for the kernel-header package, or you may have to custom compile a kernel, which once you get used to it is not hard, just time consuming. Post up if you want to follow that route and I can give you a few hints.

Also the lack of an ALSA module found by the config script is another problem. If you are still using the stock kernel you should have one. Make me wonder a LOT. In fact that config script isnt finding ANYTHING. No USB support, no PCMCIA support, no Parrallel Support(Ok that one might amke sense, except you are probably still dealing with the stock kernel right?)

So it looks like most of your problems stem from not having your Kernel Source installed, or not having the /usr/src/linux link correctly pointing to the directory where it is (Usually /usr/src/linux-kernel<version>)

Now before you go through and bother with the kernel, lemme ask, did you try installing the ALSA drivers through APT yet? If not try that first, they are already precompiled for use with the stock kernel and I think Ubuntu runs 1.09 at the moment anyways which is newer than what you are using. When they are done modprobe snd-usb-usx2y;modprobe snd-pcm-oss;modprobe snd-mixer-oss;modprobe snd-seq-oss and see what happens.

Seablade

1.08 is in fact slightly older, but I dont know when the Tascam support was added to tell you if this is the problem.

And by the way I cant remember if they installed a dialog to edit keybindings yet, just in case look in your home directory for some conf files for alsa(They are hidden I believe) they use an XML format so it will be easy to understand I think, but you can edit how it behaves in there, take your time and set it up so you feel comfortable with it, and then BACK UP that file somewhere. But once you do this it is a REALLY nice program.

Seablade

OK, got a little further. First off I am using ubuntu with the stock amd K7 kernel. Yes, I installed alsa drivers through apt, it's v1.0.8-4. I also installed the kernel headers for my k7 kernel (just now). I've already done the modprobe's.

Now I'm assuming it's jackd that needs to point to the proper sound device. I assume hw:0 is my internal laptop sound device because that is what jack uses, and that's what ardour is outputting to.
I tried this:
jackd -d alsa -d hw:1
in the hope that the tascam us-122 was device hw:1, but it didn't work. I think all I have to do is get jackd to point to my tascam and i'll be good to go. Do you know have to display all available audio devices?

Thanks for the help!!
-BT

Jack runs on top of ALSA so you have to have ALSA up and running and configured first before you will be able to use Jack to control that interface.

Have you tried modprobing usb-us2xy as of yet(With your current Alsa install)? Or is it already listed in lsmod? I am a bit confused as to exactly where you are right now sorry

Seablade

well, usb-us2xy isn't listed in the lsmod. I'm going to try a few things tonight before I post back here. I'll be a little more clear when I clear things up for myself...

Thanks for the help so far, I will get this working!!!
-BT

Edit: I also wanted to mention that I'm amazed that the tascam us-122 can run exclusively on usb power. I really hope this thing works with low latency in ardour because I'd hate to return it.

Ok, I finally got a little more time to tackle this...

lsmod confirms that snd_usb_usx2y is active:
snd_usb_usx2y 20804 0 (shouldn't my us-122 be here instead of the 0?)

These USB sound modules appear to be used:
snd_usb_lib 12544 1 snd_usb_usx2y
usbcore 119224 7 hci_usb,usb_storage,ehci_hcd,uhci_hcd,snd_usb_usx2y,snd_usb_lib

When I run jack or alsamixer it still defaults to my integreated via audio, which makes sense because I think my us-122 device needs to use the snd_usb_usx2y module, which it's clearly not. The us-122 device is showing up in the device manager.

I guess this also brings up a more fundamental question about how linux handles multiple audio devices... Essentially, what I need is when I either run jack or plug in my us-122 to have my tascam us-122 take over most of the audio modules (so things like midi works for recording). As this is a laptop, I want my integrated audio to be used when the us-122 is not plugged in. I guess I just don't have a clue how that works.

Thanks,
-Bt

Hmm ok I think I understand your situation a bit better then, but I really need to go back and reread the entire thread to make sure I cover everything and dont have time to at the moment as I am about to fall asleep at my computer(Nearly fell asleep biking home... go figure

In your case you want to start specifying which audio device you are using, in qjackctl there is a setting in the setup dialog where you can specify your audio device, most likely your tascam will be hw:0, however to double check this go to a command prompt and type....

cat /proc/asound/cards

while all your appropriate drivers are loaded and your tascam is plugged in. The number appearing before the description of your tascam is the number that follows the colon in the hw:1 (or hw:2, hw:3 etc) It is a basic numbering sceheme from a programmers standpoint as all things start with 0 not 1, so your first card in your machine is card 0, second card is card 1....

Annoying for those not used to programmers ways of doing things

If this doesnt seem to help you post up the results of that cat operation earlier so I can take a look at them? Ill go back and reread the entire thread tommorrow if I ahve time... I need a break sometime

Seablade

Oh yea in regards to your question on the output of lsmod...

No, what you are seeing is correct, the 0 is where if that module was needed for other modules to load, those other modules would be listed there, for instance your snd module is needed for about every sound driver module that can be loaded to be loaded, so where the 0 is on that you see a long list of other modules that depend on it.

Seablade

Oh yea if you havent already post your .asoundrc file in your home directory? And your asound.conf(Or is it alsa.conf?) and asound.state in /etc if you have one? It is possible that you just dont have the correct setup file there.

Seablade

Thanks seablade, I'd be nowhere without your help. At least after I get this all working I could pick up some of the slack with the audio questions here...

Ok, so the: cat /proc/asound/cards
Produces this:
0 [V8235 ]: VIA8233 - VIA 8235
VIA 8235 with ALC650F at 0x1400, irq 22

Only my internal audio device is listed, that that's the first problem.
------------------------------------------------
Contents of the .asoundrc in my home(I added this file manually)
pcm.usb-usx2y {
type hw
card 0
}

ctl.usb-usx2y {
type hw
card 0
}
------------------------------------------------
Here's etc/asound.conf:
pcm.card0 {
type hw
card 0
}

pcm.!default {
type plug
slave.pcm "dmixer"
}

pcm.dmixer {
type dmix
ipc_key 1025
slave {
pcm "hw:0,0"
period_time 0
period_size 2048
buffer_size 32768
rate 48000
}
bindings {
0 0
1 1
}
}
------------------------------------------------
The usr/share/alsa.conf is a large file so I won't post it, but the hooks section does point to the etc/asound.conf file above.

I think I should be setting it to card 1 so it doesn't conflict with my internal audio in these config files.

Thanks again, much appreciated.
-BT