[PD-ot] subnotebook/netbook w/ linux 4 electronic music?

[Michael Zacherl.]

Hi Miller!

On 25.8.2011, at 19:29 , Miller Puckette wrote:

> My only suggestion would be to make sure the screen has 768 pixels
> of vertical resolution (Hans found an HP model that does - I'm not sure if
> others exist or not.)  Otherwise, you can't project at any higher res than
> 640x480, even if the screen itself claims more.  

It appears that 1366x768 became a standard resolution on netbooks of that size.
So this shouldn't be a big issue anymore. (fingers crossed)

> I run Fedora (out of the box) with no trouble except I always seem to need
> to install a newer ALSA which requires recompiling the kernel; this would
> probably be easier in Debian than it is in Fedora.

Actually, I just knew Red Hat, before Fedora was released.
I mostly used Ubuntu (but only until version 8) so I'm more familiar with that branch of Linux anyway.

> Finally, I don't know of any perfect solution for more-than-2-channels of
> audio I/O via USB.  The M-audio stuff doesn't work yet in duplex (they're
> working on that up in ALSA land).  As of a week or 2 ago the latest ALSA
> tarballs work with Native Instruments TRAKTOR audio 10 - I've got that going
> but haven't yet tested thoroughly.  Since the I/O is "phono" I'm unclear as
> to whether it does "RIAA equalization" or not; if so I'll make an
> inverse filter for Pd.

well ... doesn't sound that clean.
I didn't think of multichannel interfaces connected to that machine rather than getting decent audio quality for stereo output.
I talked to Dan Wilcox on the bus from Weimar to Berlin and he mentioned he successfully uses the Roland UA-25 line.
For USB I just got my old and noisy ESI U24 box which needs to be replaced anyway.
I should get my hands on a MOTU Ultralight at some point maybe that answers some questions.
But that's all just in Apple-land so far.

Thanks a lot, Michael.


> On Thu, Aug 25, 2011 at 12:51:35PM +0200, Peter Plessas wrote:
>> Hi,
>> 
>> just my 2 cents
>> 
>> Michael Zacherl. wrote:
>>> Hello,
>>> in Weimar and Berlin I noticed quite a few people are using small laptops/netbooks.
>>> 
>>> I'm in the market for a netbook now and want to run linux w/ the usual suspects for experimental electronic music (Pure Data, SC, Ardour, Processing etc.)
>>> Softwarewise Im currently looking at pure:dyne as the operating system.
>> pure:dyne is a great project, but I recommend sticking to plain
>> debian, due to its large user base. Afaik, pure:dyne is based on
>> Debian anyway.
>>> But I'm open to suggestions.
>>> 
>>> What would you recommend for the hardware?
>>> Last time I checked some products was in 2009.
>>> I suppose battery life has improved, CPUs became a tad faster and linux runs a bit smoother on such a thing.
>>> What I really barely can cope with s the glossy screens, but I'm afraid there's no way around it.
>> Some brands have alternatives, I think Lenovos do....
>>> I'm planning to connect a USB-audio interface, so Firewire is not an issue (which Jack has troubles with, IIRC).
>>> Very nice to have would be a built in modem w/ Sim-card slot for mobile data transfer. (Linux supported of course).
>> Try to find a laptop for music with a quiet fan.
>> 
>> PP.
>>> 
>>> What would you suggest?
>>> Thanks a lot,  Michael.



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