OS talk - Linux, Windows, macOS, iOS, etc.

Drew-r

CyberGene: This has started as a slight and then larger off-topic in another thread

CyberGene Maybe an IOS 15 bug.

This is among the reasons i do not 1) buy a new model iphone for hasty reasons ( like, because it came available) and likewise 2) do not load ios updates for similar reasons.

My “newer” ipad was bought 5 years ago. Just last month i updated its ios for the first time, despite the “update available” dot staring at me for 5 years. Guess what? The first thing i noticed with 14.4.2 are the pops & cracks listening to the same utube songs, with headphones, that were popless and crackless before the update 😐

My first ipad , bought 2009, is still useable for certain functions to include browsing web sites with home pages NOT larded with a & v excrement (ie. a main reason among many why i shun ALL mainstream sites and many off-broadway sites) . There are still some mostly text-based, advert-free sites i frequently browse with it.
Last week i did first ios update, to 9.something, but i still cannot get it to work as a backup to reading PianoClack, but i assume this is my problem, not PC’s, 🙂**

MacMacMac

Apple is not alone in creating update woes. Microsoft updates for Windows are a problem, especially for audio work.

I'm with you on this, CG. My Windows desktop has not been updated in three years, nor will it ever be updated in the future. Everything works, so there's no reason to update.

Drew-r

MacMacMac

MacMacMac Microsoft updates for Windows are a problem, especially for audio work.

My tech career started before MS existed. By the time it ended, i’d grown weary of the (20-plus years) MS experience .... ergo the main reason i bought first ipad and gradually migrated away from MS.
I’m slowly becoming un-enamored of things Apple .... what/where next to migrate other than sans computer life ?

magicpiano

MacMacMac My Windows desktop has not been updated in three years, nor will it ever be updated in the future. Everything works, so there's no reason to update.

There are many reasons to upgrade to a recent Windows version:

Your computer will be slower because the daily update background tasks. This will force you to play more the piano or dedicate more to your family.
Your computer hardware will be much more stressed. This will make it break sooner and so you'll have to buy new hardware. This is good for the world economic.
New Windows versions (Win11) will (unnecessarily) require new hardware, so you'll have to buy new PCs. This is good for the world economic.
Your PC files will by spie…ehm… checked every day from MS. This will make you feel safer.
You'll get a bunch of new beautiful desktop wallpapers!
Sometimes your PC will force a closing of the applications and will restart to apply updates, even if you don't want it. This is good education to let you remember that you have always to save those open documents if you don't want to risk losing your data!!!

Drew-r

PS. Yamaha, the P515 as one good example based on PW discussions the past 3 months, is also among those good at introducing new woes with new releases.

Some good news: there has been a small, non-corporate but nonetheless vibrant, virtual flesh&blood community to voluntarily help turn many of those P515 frowns upside down.

magicpiano

Drew-r I’m slowly becoming un-enamored of things Apple .... what/where next to migrate other than sans computer life ?

IMHO Linux distros are very good today.

Mikas

Drew-r what/where next to migrate other than sans computer life ?

I use Linux as my main desktop (computer graphics and programming mainly) and I prefer it over Windows or OSX anytime. There are plenty of beginner friendly distributions around. Linux Mint, Manjaro, Elementary just to name a few.

MacMacMac

I'm beginning to lean toward Linux, too. Windows is not so bad ... but Microsoft is. And the Mac (like anything else from Apple) is out of the question ... more because of Apple than because of the Mac.

I stayed away from Linux because it's not a desktop OS. It's a fine server, but the desktop suffers because it lacks the three decades of UI tuning that has made for improvement in Windows and Mac.

I'm hearing, though, that Linux has improved. Maybe I'll give it a try ... next computer. But I have one requirement: It has to be a simple install.

I'll give the computer a name. I'll give my account a user name and password. Maybe I'll adjust the color scheme and font selection. But I'll do NO other configuration. If that's not possible then Linux is a no-go.

So ... is that yet possible?

(Another caveat: If my next piano needs help from a virtual instrument, then Linux must support the latter. But I'm hoping that piano [[which will it be?]] won't need a VST.) (Where's the "hope" emoticon when I need it?)

Mikas

MacMacMac I'm hearing, though, that Linux has improved. Maybe I'll give it a try ... next computer. But I have one requirement: It has to be a simple install.

TBH most of the Linux installations are much simpler and quicker than Windows nowadays. It takes ~20 minutes from zero to working desktop with all essentials installed. Most of the hardware is supported out of the box, unless some very rare/specific hardware is used.

Very nice thing about most of the Linux distros is - you can try them before you install them. If you use Windows, just download Rufus https://rufus.ie/en/ and burn your USB drive. Then boot from it and you'll have your choice of distro to try.

I recommend starting something mainstream Linux Mint, Manjaro, Elementary, Xubuntu. They all are very easy to use coming from Windows background and easy enough on resources.

Mikas

MacMacMac (Another caveat: If my next piano needs help from a virtual instrument, then Linux must support the latter. But I'm hoping that piano [[which will it be?]] won't need a VST.) (Where's the "hope" emoticon when I need it?)

There is a list of supported VST's on this page:

http://linux-sound.org/linux-vst-plugins.html

https://wiki.linuxaudio.org/wiki/vst_support_and_commercial_apps#commercial_vsts_for_linux

Haven't check it myself though.

As QuasiUnaFantasia mentioned, pianoteq is running fine on Linux as well (I followed Raspberry Pi installation procedure, runs just fine on Raspberry Pi 400)

Picotin

MacMacMac

I've been using Linux since the late '90 and Windows just because of corporate policy.

I believe most recent Linux distros largely meets your requirements. Personally I use Ubuntu Studio for music and I had no issues whatsoever with the USB audio, MIDI and DAW software.

The only limitation I'm still facing is the availability of VSTs and instrument libraries for which I finally choose to leave it on dedicated Windows machine for occasional usage.

Windows emulators are also available on Linux but I've preferred leaving each product on its native environment and taking advantage of MIDI and Audio over network for integration.

My main environment remains Linux and I'm happy to share my experience with it in relation to music, if that might helps others.

Drew-r

MacMacMac

MacMacMac Where's the "hope" emoticon

🙏

Del Vento

MacMacMac I stayed away from Linux because it's not a desktop OS. It's a fine server, but the desktop suffers because it lacks the three decades of UI tuning that has made for improvement in Windows and Mac.

Actually the UI of Linux is fantastic and very well done, way above Mac or Windows in my opinion (especially the "old" Gnome now called Mate, IMHO, but also the other GUI options aren't that below). Of course it is different than Windows or Mac, so you will feel lost at first, like when going to a new town. But if you take the effort to explore it and learn it, you'll like it better in my experience. For example, the way that multi-desktop is implemented in Linux Mate is WAY better, more convenient and more flexible than the way it is implemented in Mac (not even worth mentioning Windows for that 😁)

The real problem with Linux is the lack of some software, for example Kontakt, Microsoft Office and Finale are not available. Lucky you PianoTeq is 😆

So check what kind of software you can't live without (e.g. VLC and Audacity work natively on Linux), what is nice to have but you have alternatives (e.g. you may be fine with Libre Office and Musescore) and what you simply can leave behind (you have some Kontakt replacements, but not for everything you might want to use it for). If you end up with something that sounds 🎵 reasonable, jump for it. You can dual boot or use a VM to have both OSes, and from a pure Software Engineering point of view they work just fine (besides for some audio driver ☹️) but in my experience it's the human factor that matters most. For that factor, it's much better if you just use one UI (rather than switching back and forth), at least until you are very familiar with Linux.

vagfilm

In the lists above, I see that are a couple of tools for loading VST2 and VST3 windows plugin in linux.

So, is it possible to load Kontakt and garritan or VSL on Reaper, for example? How? Apart from the VST.dll to communicate with the DAW, you don't need the actual engine (Kontakt, Garritan, VSL) running on the background? How can it run if it is not supported? Through an emulator? On a separate machine? I don't understand…

I believe you can do at least part of that via Fluidsynth (which I use mostly in Android). Before bothering with trying them on Linux, I tried most of these stuff on Mac and I hated the sound of all of them, so I did not bother to install them on Linux. I think the ones that have serious copy protection will not work.

The stuff that https://sites.google.com/site/soundfonts4u/ provides will work fine. Happy to discuss this more but please in a separate thread: feel free to create one and @ - mention me.

Should we now bring this thread back to the Yamahas? How does the P-515 sound compare to the NU1 ?

QuasiUnaFantasia

For a while I was using an old PC with Lubuntu on it (a variant of Ubuntu Linux) for digital piano purposes. It worked fine, and completely without hassles. It was even running without a harddrive; everything was running on a 16 GB USB stick.

The part that possibly makes this knowledge somewhat useless from a MacMacMac'ian perspective, is that I was running Pianoteq on it, and nothing else. 🙂

MacMacMac

QuasiUnaFantasia For a while I was using an old PC with Lubuntu on it (a variant of Ubuntu Linux) for digital piano purposes. ... The part that possibly makes this knowledge somewhat useless from a MacMacMac'ian perspective, is that I was running Pianoteq on it, and nothing else.

That's not useless! It's insulting! 🙂

vagfilm

In the lists above, I see that are a couple of tools for loading VST2 and VST3 windows plugin in linux.

So, is it possible to load Kontakt and garritan or VSL on Reaper, for example? How? Apart from the VST.dll to communicate with the DAW, you don't need the actual engine (Kontakt, Garritan, VSL) running on the background? How can it run if it is not supported? Through an emulator? On a separate machine? I don't understand…

Mikas

vagfilm

I haven't tried them myself, but reading descriptions they use WINE compatibility layer (which is kind of Windows emulator on Linux, which runs very fast when it works 😀 ). I don't have enough experience with VST's on Linux or in general TBH, maybe someone else can explain that better.

vagfilm

Thanks Mikas. That was my feeling… In that case windows resource-hungry software will probably not fare significantly better on Linux.

Just for the stability of it and for not having to deal with constant microsoft upgrades, I would be interested in Linux. If anyone has any experience, some here would like to hear from them 🙂

Picotin

In my experience, the most practical way to run plug-ins on Linux is Carla.

One can run plug-ins also directly on the DAW of choice but with less control in my opinion.

Some VSTs run in Carla out of the box but for the most popular commercial ones (Native Instrument, Spitfire, etc..) the proprietary player is needed which is often not available natively on Linux.

In that case WINE is the most practical Windows emulator (Carla handles that as well) and it takes very little overhead.

However in my experience I found it a bit annoying updating the proprietary player through WINE and I went the networking route.

Otherwise, if you happen to have recent hardware with plenty of RAM, you can run easily everything in one box

vagfilm

Thanks for the confirmation… I don't think that migrating is worth it for the moment: it is moving from nuisance to nuisance…

vagfilm

Del Vento Should we now bring this thread back to the Yamahas? How does the P-515 sound compare to the NU1 ?

Before getting back on track with the p515 discussion, thank you for the hands-on advice on Linux. Looks like I have to keep with Win10 for the moment ("you have an update… Yeaahhh").

CyberGene

I used to hate Linux a lot in the past. But if I’m not on Mac I would use Linux. But Windows? Meh!