Music Makers
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KNOW-HOW 64 Studio and JAD Tuning up with the 64 Studio and JAD audio Linux distros MUSIC MAKERS The 64 Studio and JAD Linux distributions specialize in tools for the audiophile. BY DAVE PHILLIPS n July 27 of this year developers cludes a small-scale studio for teaching Daniel James and Free Ekana- and music production. I use 64 Studio Oyaka released 64 Studio 2.0, a for all my work at the computer, not just Debian Etch-based Linux distribution for music production. 64 Studio’s default optimized for professional-quality multi- applications base provides most of my media performance and production. The necessary software, but if I need some- Maksim Pasko, Fotolia Pasko, Maksim system’s kernel has been compiled for thing that was not included in the origi- optimal real-time performance, and the nal installation, I can usually find it in expected Linux applications base has the standard Etch repositories. been extended with 64 This report also includes a non-scien- Studio’s suite of tific performance comparison between powerful audio/ 64 Studio and the outstanding JAD – an- video tools and other Linux distribution with an audio programs, all built emphasis. This study was not intended for a pure 64-bit to be conclusive, but the results indicate environment. that there is more to the issue than a I tried out 64 Stu- consideration of raw speed. dio 2.0 (Figure 1) on some practical A Little Tech Talk daily tasks First, I’ll answer the most frequently here at Stu- asked question regarding this system: dio Dave, a Yes, it’s fast, very fast. I’ll look at some home busi- numbers later, but for now, you can take ness that in- my word for it: 64 Studio is fast. AMD’s publicity state- ments list applications that are likely to benefit from 64-bit advantages, specifically mentioning digital music production, video editing, real- time media streaming, image/ video/ sig- nal processing, and voice recognition. The Linux applications arsenal now in- cludes excellent 64-bit software for all those categories, and much of that software is included with 64 Studio. 64 Studio’s Debian Etch core is pure 64-bit. According to Debian documentation, this offi- cially supported port consists of a kernel for all AMD 64-bit CPUs with the AMD64 extension and all Intel CPUs with the EM64T extension. Specific advan- tages over the i386 architecture in- 54 ISSUE 86 JANUARY 2008 054-058_64studio.indd 54 14.11.2007 19:56:55 Uhr 64 Studio and JAD KNOW-HOW ware. The default applications list in- cludes software for all my usual sound and music activities, including compos- ing and editing MIDI sequences (Rose- garden, seq24), recording my own music and performances by my students (Ar- dour, Figure 2), editing and processing audio files (Audacity, ReZound), and typesetting music for high-quality print- ing (LilyPond). Everything worked out of the box, but I’m careful about my hardware. On the Linux Audio Users mail list, I asked my colleagues for advice and experience re- garding my intended purchases, and of course, I searched Google for technical specifications and other reports. I didn’t need to change much at the system level. 64 Studio’s JACK settings are con- servative by default, so I reconfigured them with QJackCtl, and I am now oper- Figure 1: 64 Studio is a complete 64-bit, Debian-based Linux system with an audio focus. ating JACK with a comfortable 5.8 milli- seconds latency. I also added two more clude notable advances in memory man- were reported – and soon I was ready to sound devices to the system, a task eas- agement (with support for up to 64TB of restore my preferences (with much assis- ily accomplished thanks to advice in the physical memory), floating-point calcu- tance from apt/Synaptic and the Debian 64 Studio FAQ. lation (SSE2), and other compiler opti- package repositories). I have some long-established practices mizations. The documentation further in my production work. First, I’m a notes kernel support for native execution Running the System fanatic about weight. I jettisoned the of 32-bit binaries, thanks to libraries pro- As a music professional, my primary in- Gnome desktop immediately to install vided by the ia32-libs package. terest is in 64 Studio’s audio system and Fluxbox, despite having more than suffi- Here at Studio Dave, I run 64 Studio applications set. Current stable versions cient hardware resources. Next, I must on a machine built around an AMD64 of ALSA and JACK provide basic and ad- have support for my preferred applica- 3200+ (a 2GHz processor) on a Giga- vanced sound capabilities, with excellent tions. For recording and mixing, I rely on byte motherboard with 2GB of memory support for my audio and MIDI hard- Ardour, Audacity and ReZound for and a 320GB SATA hard-disk. An M-Audio Delta 66 manages the digital audio I/ O; hardware MIDI I/ O is handled by a Creative Labs PCI128. Not incidentally, this machine was built to be quiet, with an Antec Sonata II case, a Zalman CPU fan, and a fanless nVidia GeForce 7600 GS video card. The box isn’t absolutely silent, but at this point, my laptop is much louder. Installation & Configuration My hard disk crashed shortly after I was contacted about writing this article. Most of my material on that disk was backed up, so I took the opportunity to upgrade to a larger capacity SATA drive and to install the most current 64 Studio 2.0. I downloaded the ISO on another ma- chine, burned the DVD, and booted it up on the 64-bit box. Installation and basic configuration was largely a matter of accepting default decisions. Hardware detection was thorough – no problems Figure 2: 64 Studio with the Ardour2 digital audio workstation. JANUARY 2008 ISSUE 86 55 054-058_64studio.indd 55 14.11.2007 19:57:07 Uhr KNOW-HOW 64 Studio and JAD tial users don’t need to take my word – they can try it themselves. A “live” disc image is available for testing the system without installing it. The live version costs the same as the standard installable image (US$ 0 + download + disc), and it works nicely. I’m helping a friend migrate from Windows to Linux. He’s very excited with what he’s found on the live disc, and he’s looking forward to replacing Windows completely with 64 Studio. JAD The JackLab Audio Distribution (JAD) [2] is a 32-bit multimedia-optimized Linux system based on openSUSE 10.2 (Figure 3). JAD’s designers have added many of the same enhancements found in 64 Studio, including a kernel built for preemption and real-time performance. Figure 3: JAD comes with the Rosegarden music composition and editing environment. The audio applications set includes the usual suspects, with the significant addi- sound file editing, and a DOS sequencer began work on The Creative Desktop, a tion of explicit support for Wine and the for MIDI composition. Other indispens- community project to produce a helpful wineasio driver. This feature should able items include QJackCtl, JACK-Rack manual for new users. The general plan attract Windows-based musicians who (an effects rack), and QSynth (a sound- is simple enough: quickly bring new would like to move to Linux without los- font synthesizer). QSynth requires a users up to speed on system installation ing their investment in VST plugins. The user-installed sound font, and of course, and configuration, then show them the Wine/ wineasio combination also sup- the DOS sequencer is not included with basic invocation and use of the applica- ports impressive performance from 64 Studio, but everything else on my re- tions. The work currently includes well- Reaper, a popular audio/ MIDI sequencer quired list was present and ready to roll. written tutorials on JACK, Ardour, Rose- for Windows. I also needed the DOSemu and Wine garden, and Hydrogen, as well as a se- “The 32-bit system also has this advan- system emulators, but neither package is ries of tutorials on some of 64 Studio’s tage over its 64-bit competitor: you can available from 64 Studio’s default reposi- 2D graphics programs. build Ardour with VST support. Yes, tories. Fortunately, 64 Studio uses the apt Tim plans to expand coverage to 3D Ardour can be compiled with integrated package management system, and I can graphics, animation techniques, publish- VST support, but only for personal use, install packages from any Debian reposi- ing, web design, video editing, and of and the distribution of VST-enabled bina- tory. With a little help from Synaptic (a course, more audio applications tutori- ries is prohibited. Ardour’s VST support GUI for apt) I installed a build-essentials als, and he invites members of the com- also requires Wine, but it prefers its own package for compiling applications my- munity to join the project. internal mechanism over the wineasio so- self. I then downloaded the DOSemu Beyond the standard channels, com- lution. Before you rush off for the code, source code from its homepage, compiled mercial support is available from 64 Stu- be advised that the default JAD installa- it, and installed it, and DOSemu was dio Ltd., with pricing based on the ex- tion does not provide a complete tool- ready for use. Next, I tried to build Wine, pected use of the system in a small stu- chain for compiling software, nor are all but I hit some show-stopping errors. I dio with up to three machines. Interested required packages available from the was unable to resolve the problem, but a readers should visit the 64 Studio repositories.