Linux recording options

[Tarrbot]

OK, so being the geek that I am and also being a tightwad, I was looking into the options of digital sound recording for mixing into listenable music on my PC.

I looked into the Mac for options and discussed those options with geeky Mac users who also deal with guitars and mix/mastering.

While the Mac has some great options, if I don't already own a Mac I'm having to put a severe outlay of cash to get going.

So, with that said, I began looking at other alternatives.

And lo and behold, I believe I've found that alternative in Ubuntu Studio. It's Ubuntu linux prepackaged for audio/video production.

So, I downloaded the .iso and burnt that to a DVD for installing on a system at home I haven't been using in months.

The install was fairly seemless and likely would have been much easier if I didn't have to blow away a Vista install on that system beforehand.

Well, after installing and messing with the setup, I won't sugarcoat this and say it was fantabulous. It had some gotchas in it, such as getting my inputs to work properly. I have a generic onboard audio card that's not really great but workable.

Also, I have a Lightsnake that I bought last year and haven't done anything with--mainly because I didn't have any software that could take advantage of it. Now I do.

Ok, this is what it looks like with some tweaks. I added a few shortcuts and changed the background to suit my fancy.

Audacity (usable on many platforms, not just linux)

Most people already know what Audacity is, I thought I'd show what it looked like in ubuntu.

Hydrogen (drum machine with many downloadable drumkits)

I've never used a drum machine so this is a learning experience for me. Seems pretty straightforward though. I can see myself making all sorts of drum loops to jam to and now I can record while doing it if desired.

Ardour (Pro Tools for linux... but free)

Will accept the output from Hydrogen and allow the creation of music here. I've never used Pro Tools so this will be a huge learning curve as well.

.... (continued) ....

[Tarrbot]

With this frequency tweaker, you can take the input from your instrument and put a lot of different filters on it in real time. I was using Ardour and importing/recording on the Ric and could modify the tone depending on my options here. There are more options than are shown, too.

Another app is called Rosegarden. It can take outputs (or saved projects) from Hydrogen and import them into this app. I just installed this yesterday and have no idea what all it's capable of. I do know that it's able to take my bassline and create notations for it (or for anything that's on it's timeline). I haven't messed with this app much but thought I'd mention it and show some of its capabilities.

.... (continued) ....

[Tarrbot]

There's a garageband-like app that can have a ton of different loops played through it. I've only toyed with it briefly.

I much prefer the control of the other apps I've listed so far, though. It's called Jokosher (why such a strange name, I have no idea).

The entire audio subsystem has an API that's known as JACK. This allows one app to access any input that's coming in on JACK and manipulate it. This is how the frequency tweaker was able to deal realtime filtering when using Ardour. JACK seems like the Windows alternative to Direct X's Direct Sound but about 100 times better.

There are about 7 or 8 different JACK options, from the JACK Rack to an EQ that allows manipulation.

About the only thing I need now is 1) patience and time to learn these new apps and 2) a new sound card that will allow better signal processing and more inputs.

Oh, there are also apps in Ubuntu Studio that allow creation and distribution of streaming Internet radio. I haven't used them but I understand that several Internet radio stations use them on a daily basis.

There are some other apps that I'm forgetting right now, but I'll post on them as time provides.

Anyone else using linux for audio recording/mixing?

[gibsonlp]

Hi,
I tried and I actually compiled from source all these applications as I was using slackware up until a few months ago.
I ended up ditching the linuxbased studio for the time being as my echo audiofire 12 sound card is not supported under Linux
I actually installed a small windows partition in my laptop and became the laughingstock of the unix geeks I hang around with

[Tarrbot]

Ouch, Gil.

Did you ever find a good sound card that is workable in linux?

Ubuntu Studio seems pretty slick but obviously if the sound card isn't supported it won't be nearly as slick.

That's what I really want to know is what sound cards are good and work in linux.

[gibsonlp]

Check this out: http://freebob.sourceforge.net/index.ph ... ed_Devices
Which one of these cards is good - no idea, you'll have to ask around, but at least you have a finite list

[Tarrbot]

Finite lists are great. At least I only have x amount to research now.

I was hoping not to do the external Firewire enclosure but that my be what I have to do.

Thanks, Gil.

If you haven't tried it yet, ubuntu studio is pretty good. And there's that whole *nix thing going on with it.

[gibsonlp]

Well, you said that you are looking for a GOOD soundcard
Good soundcards are usually firewire, before you get into the firewire adventure though - make sure that your hardware has a good firewire chip, my desktop has a built-in Texas instruments firewire chip and the soundcard works on it with minimum latency (32 samples which is around 0.6ms on 192Khz. My laptop which was the most expensive non-mac machine when I bought it a year ago (fully loaded Lenovo T61p) has a ricoh firewire, I couldn't get a stable recording with it and I got lots of pops, clicks and cracks...
I am still waiting for my TI express-card to arrive from my inlaws, this will hopefully fix my problem, but the morale of the story is - make sure you have a good firewire hardware before you get into firewire sound interfaces, apparently it's not only a matter of having a firewire port available...

[Tarrbot]

That's a good point.

I need to look at some Firewire cards I think I have out in the garage that are probably close to a decade old.

I know they're TI cards, but I don't know if 1) they are supported in linux or 2) if they are even any good.

I may have to just get another card entirely.

Sorry to hear about the Lenovo T61p. On the plus side, it is better than the vanilla T61.