Ubuntu Studio 21.10 released

Picotin

To whom it may concern, the last release of Ubuntu Studio is now live.

It looks like Studio Controls now includes also the audio network settings. No more additional scripts to run.

This means that it is even easier than before to access an optional remote Windows machines running the usual VSTs from the Linux one. The best of both worlds IMHO.

I'm going to test 21.10 soon as I still run 20.04

P.S. This is a copy of a reply I posted on another thread that I suppose could spark another discussion. I guess it is possible to quote another post in a new thread, but I couldn't figure it out how.

Sorry for the double posting.

Del Vento

Picotin the last release of Ubuntu Studio is now live.

I recommend against "regular" releases. They "expire" too soon. I only install LTS. Yes, one could upgrade the regular releases, but in my experience the upgrades cause more troubles than they solve, and I don't do them anymore: only installs from scratch.

I always have two Linux installs: old and current. When there is new LTS that I care to install, the "current" becomes "old" and the old is overwritten with the new one. This is what I recommend everybody to do, especially newbies. Of course people have different opinions and approaches.

Picotin This means that it is even easier than before to access an optional remote Windows machines running the usual VSTs from the Linux one.

Can you elaborate on this? I know nothing about that. And does not remote mean high latency?

Picotin

Del Vento I recommend against "regular" releases.

I'd agree with you for a live production system. For my personal playground, I like to experiment when time allows.

Del Vento Can you elaborate on this

In a nutshell, this is about the network module of the popular JACK audio subsystem. (PIPEWIRE is also gaining some popularity recently)

Jack allows to route easily audio and MIDI input/outputs to any program. With the Jack network module, such connectivity is expanded over the network to other remote machine "slaves" running Jack, regardless of heterogeneous OS.

Del Vento does not remote mean high latency?

Obviously there is some latency (the network roundtrip) but it is neglectable. In my personal experience, even over a basic 100 Mbit/s wired network. I reckon somebody experimented successfully even over the internet, although just for audio streaming, not involving MIDI play.

There are two network modes available with jack network: Synchronous and asynchronous.

The former waiting the network roundtrip to complete within the same cycle on the master (lower latency but higher CPU load) and the latter allowing the slave to respond on its own time (more latency but less CPU load).

I do not run high specs hardware, mostly consumer grade corporate surplus, and I was pleased with the asynchronous mode with the following setup:

Piano MIDI USB to Linux -> JACK on Linux -> Carla (audio plugin host - nice to have) -> 100 Mbit/s wired nework -> JACK on Windows -> Carla (again, just nice to have) -> BBC Orchestra VST -> VST audio output back to Linux through the same path backwards.

Such setting required some minimal scripting. I understand it's now redundant with the new Studio Controls version as delivered with Ubuntu Studio 21.10.

I can share more details, would anyone be interested

Del Vento

Picotin Piano MIDI USB to Linux -> JACK on Linux -> Carla (audio plugin host - nice to have) -> 100 Mbit/s wired nework -> JACK on Windows -> Carla (again, just nice to have) -> BBC Orchestra VST -> VST audio output back to Linux through the same path backwards.

Got it thanks, make sense and is very interesting. I thought you were doing WiFi or "over the internet".

By the way, how do you like Carla? With Carla, couldn't you it to play the samples you purchased directly on Linux? I know that would mean losing some of the original virtual instrument settings, just asking.

Picotin

Del Vento I thought you were doing WiFi or "over the internet"

That's is also possible. I reckon wifi is quite faster than 100Mbit/s nowadays. Over the internet is also possible, although I never experimented that.

Del Vento By the way, how do you like Carla?

It's simply great in my experience. Everything is immediately visible and easy to manage. I used to struggle quite a bit before trying Carla. Maybe my lack of understanding, but everything seems so natural with Carla.

Del Vento Couldn't you it to play the samples you purchased directly on Linux? I know that would mean losing some of the original virtual instrument settings.

There are plenty of open-source virtual instruments, plug-ins and effects avaliable on a Linux. I understand that some are highly praised by musicians and alikes.

Unfortunately most of the commercial VSTs require a proprietary "player" available only on Windows and Mac. I'm not aware of any for Linux yet.

There are alternatives available to the network setup as I described. Notably Window virtualization on Linux for such proprietary libraries.

There is no loss of features with virtualization AFAIK, but I felt it less convinient than connecting two separate machines given the hardware available to me.

Just my personal choice. I believe both ways are equally effective.

Del Vento

Picotin delvento I thought you were doing WiFi or "over the internet"

That's is also possible. I reckon wifi is quite faster than 100Mbit/s nowadays. Over the internet is also possible, although I never experimented that.

Sadly with networks the term "speed" and "fast" are attached to capacity which is quite different than speed. WiFi network are high bandwidth (capacity) but can be high(er) latency (than wired). Something to give it a try (too bad I don't have any Windows machine…)

Picotin delvento By the way, how do you like Carla?

It's simply great in my experience.

I'll raise my priority to give it a try, then. Since I hated Kontakt so much, it can't be worse than that 🤣
For non-Linux users lurking this thread, Carla is available for your OS too, so you may want to give it a try too.

Picotin Unfortunately most of the commercial VSTs require a proprietary "player" available only on Windows and Mac. I'm not aware of any for Linux yet.

Yes, that was exactly my point. If my understanding is correct, some VST (e.g. Garritan) have the samples "in clear" which could be copied from your windows machine to Linux and "played" with Carla. Of course part of the "experience" of playing those instruments is not just the samples, but the settings too and those will be most likely lost and need to be reconstructed manually in Carla, I believe. My question is if you gave this a try -- or a thought.

Picotin There are plenty of open-source virtual instruments, plug-ins and effects avaliable on a Linux. I understand that some are highly praised by musicians and alikes.

Can you name/link some of your favorite? I know some instruments that could be opened with FluidSynth and its Android version FluidSynthMIDI (which despite the name are sample players). Some other free instruments can be converted in format with Polyphone (e.g. from sfz to sf2 format) so that FluidSynth can use them. I particularly like the instruments maintained by https://sites.google.com/site/soundfonts4u/ (which he collects from various sources, respecting the original licences). Then of course there's Pianoteq. But that's all I know, and it's not quite "plenty". What (else) do you recommend? Thanks!

Frédéric L

I have tried to ping my router via WiFi : 48ms of round-trip time (median of 13 measures… a maximum at 948ms). I can’t rely on it to play with a virtual synth through it.

MacMacMac

MIDI over networking is still a non-starter. Even wired generally gives me 2 msec ping times. That would just about double my current MIDI latency.

Picotin

MacMacMac

I believe we have to accept some latency, given the physics of our current technology. I wonder then, what would be the acceptable level.

arc

MacMacMac MIDI over networking is still a non-starter. Even wired generally gives me 2 msec ping times. That would just about double my current MIDI latency.

Are we talking about wireless (WiFi) or cabled (Ethernet) network connections? The usual WiFi profiles we use at home cannot be used in near-real-time applications. So, I am assuming we are discussing cabled connections. MIDI over Ethernet has a latency under 0.5 ms. Achieving such latency does not require any specialized equipment but only a normal 1Gbps network router and Cat5e or Cat6 cables. This latency is several times lower than the USB MIDI latency.

MacMacMac

Picotin I wonder then, what would be the acceptable level.

Opinions vary. But I'm happy with 2 msec total latency. I suppose I could live with a bit more ... and I did years ago, stuck at around 8 msec.

Del Vento

I can ping my router over ethernet in

rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 1.268/1.931/3.864/0.633 ms

which isn't too bad and I could live with when playing the piano. That however will be on top of VST latency and Windows latency. But then I don't even have Windows machine, what am I talking about? 😅

On the other hand, if the ethernet cable isn't already laid, extra long MIDI cables exist and one could connect the piano directly to the machine, and use the smartphone/tablet to control the machine with some remote desktop app.

arc

Del Vento

That is using the standard network drivers. If you use a dedicated MIDI networking driver you will get lower latency. This is the same as with ASIO sound drivers vs. standard audio drivers.

Moreover, USB has a higher processing latency than networking. So, receiving MIDI data over USB will never be faster than receiving the same data over a network connection. The additional latency introduced by the layers above (VST, etc.) will be same.