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Linux - what I think its really good for in audio

I started some threads a while back on systems with linux and there has been several others recently discussing several aspects of this OS. I would like to make some clarifications and try and make a succinct case for what I am proposing as a system that would be good for many people here.

I am primarily proposing a system where the DAC (PCI soundcard, USB DAC etc) is NOT connected to the "primary" computer. The DAC gets connected to a small low power computer running a stripped down very simple linux OS, probably without any hard drives at all. The audio data comes over a normal network connection. By doing this most of the issues about how different players and disk types effect sound go out the window, they are unimportant. This gives you the flexibility to use whatever player software you want to use, you now longer have to choose between one that sounds good and one that has a user interface you like!!!!

The music server can be on a PC under XP, Vista, OR linux, or on a Mac. You can have other things happening on this computer as long as it has enough resources to handle it all. You can have the music file storage on this server computer, connected over USB or firewire, or on a network (NAS or other computer). This system gives you the flexibility to have things centralized or spread out depending on how YOU want to set things up. You can have the music server in another room so you don't have to worry about physical sound from it, and remote control the sound app from your listening chair with a laptop, eee, N800 or other form of control.

If you like running software DSP for room correction or software crossover you can do it with this system as well. You can have a separate computer in another room that had has the high speed processor chugging away doing your DSP stuff and piping the result over the network.

This scheme is all about decoupling whats happening on the computer directly connected to the DAC from everything else going on. If setup right, everything else happening with the system MAKES NO DIFFERENCE ON THE SOUND QUALITY.

The only things that affect the sound are whats in the small box, what it is, what the power supply is, what ITS OS is etc. BUT we can come up with some simple standardized solutions for this that will work with many, many different systems.

Think of this computer as being part of the DAC rather than as a general purpose computer that you can play games on and surf the net. (You COULD surf the net on this computer, but that defeats the purpose of the system)

Linux comes in because it is perfect for running on this box. You can easily put together a stream lined package that can run entirely out of ram, so no need for hard drives or even SSDs while the system is running! Linux will also run well on low power systems that would have no chance of running say Vista. With a low power system it becomes possible to run it off a linear power supply or even batteries. Definitely no fans. And with no HDs the system is completely quiet, and quite low EMI emissions. It will fit in nicely with in a stereo rack with other high end stereo equipment.

This is the system I am advocating. I'm working on the streamlined linux package and hope to have a version ready for testing in a couple weeks. There are a couple off the shelf computers that are perfect for this IF you use a USB DAC. Unfortunately there really isn't an off the shelf system for using a PCI soundcard. I'm working on designing that right now. Its possible to use some existing motherboards and a homebuilt PS that will come close to meeting what I'm talking about. I'm also working on a custom motherboard for this (more on THAT later)

In all the above I am not advocating linux running on a single monolithic computer as the ultimate solution. Running something like Ubuntu on a singe computer that has large HDs and the PCI soundcard or USB DAC might very well sound better than running Windows (of any flavor), but it still won't hold a candle to what I am proposing.

All the above has been possible for years (and I have done it using a slim devices system), BUT what caused me to bring this out now was a release of netjack for windows and Mac. This provides a high quality virtual soundcard interface on a computer that pipes the data over network to the remote player computer. This is what makes it possible to use whatever software you want on the "server" computer and provides the decoupling I have been talking about.

I have run a bunch of tests over the last couple weeks and at least in my setup all these goals have been met. I have not been able to do anything on the server computer that changes the sound, as long as the computer has been able to keep up the stream. (you obviously can load it down so much that you get dropouts, but I'm not talking about that) And the sound quality coming over the "wire" is actually the best I could get out of the system. It actually very slightly beat out playing a file from ram. That surprised me.

Don't get me wrong, there are some hurdles yet. The windows netjack is brand spanking new and has some problems that will need to get ironed out. In addition linux does not have sound drivers for every "soundcard" out there. Some of them that have traditionally been missing are now starting to show up (such as drivers for Lynx cards). But there are going to be some sound hardware that is simply not going to work with this system.

But the rewards of this system are so great that I think it behooves us as a community to start working on this and getting the kinks ironed out.

I hope this clarifies my position and why I'm excited about this. Lets not let this die.

John S.


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Topic - Linux - what I think its really good for in audio - John Swenson 18:40:34 12/26/08 (40)

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