[PlanetCCRMA] Suggestion for sound card

[JOHN LYON]

Hi, 

I have a focusrite SAFFIRE Pro IO 26, and the SAFFIRE Pro IO 10 howto helped me a lot.  Everything described there is pretty much the same.  

I had a problem with a older firewire card (Texas Instruments, but from 1999!).  I replaced it with a new PCI firewire card that happened to be a Texas Instruments chipset as well. Voila!  That's when my focusrite SAFFIRE Pro IO 26 started working.  So it's probably true that getting the right firewire card can be very important on Linux.  My old card still works fine on Windows...

It is important to run ffado-mixer when using the focusrite SAFFIRE Pro boards; for one thing, you need ffado-mixer to set the headphone levels and to turn on phantom power on the 2 sets of mic preamp channels (you can turn on phontom power on channels 1-4 and/or 5-5 from the ffado-mixer software).  Since there is no way to do this from the hardware, you have to install and run ffado-mixer to use these features.

Hope this is useful,

John Lyon

----- Original Message -----
From: Andreas Bergsland <andreas.bergsland at hf.ntnu.no>
Date: Thursday, April 16, 2009 2:13 pm
Subject: Re: [PlanetCCRMA] Suggestion for sound card
To: planetccrma at ccrma.Stanford.EDU

> Hi Rocco,
> and thanks for your tips! I have checked out the Saffire Pro10 
> and it looks very promising, and not too expensive either. And 
> thanks for the tips of ffado as well. I wasn't aware of that project.
> Great with those HOWTO's - for me as a newbie those are really 
> priceless!Best, 
> Andreas
> 
> Hi,
> 
> If you want to go with firewire, I have purchaced the Focusrite 
> Saffire 
> Pro 10. It may be more in/outs that you need, but focusrite 
> works 
> closely with ffado developers and as a result produced pretty 
> solid 
> results for a few of their firewire interfaces. They fit all 
> your 
> criteria, and are known to have great preamps.
> 
> Look at the device support page. I (think) there's a 2 channel 
> focusrite 
> interface that may work for you. This will take you right to the 
> focusrite interfaces...
> http://www.ffado.org/?q=devicesupport/list&page=1
> 
> Make sure it has a satisfactory rating (like "full support") 
> listed next 
> to it, if you want to be safe.
> 
> Also, I get the impression that there's (not) a lot of firewire 
> interfaces that work well with ffado. But, Texas Instruments 
> controllers 
> are said to work well (mine is a Texas Instruments firewire 
> interface in 
> my laptop).
> 
> I wrote a HOWTO to get up and running with the Pro 10 and 
> CCRMA/Fedora10 
>   that probably will be helpful no matter what firewire 
> device you choose...
> http://ccrma-mail.stanford.edu/pipermail/planetccrma/2009-
> March/015554.html
> The only thing I forgot to mention in the HOWTO is what CCRMA 
> Packages 
> to install...
> bash> yum install jack-audio-connection-kit qjackctl ffado
> 
> I'm currently writing a manual on how to get the Pro 10 working 
> with 
> ffado-mixer. You'd think I was building a rocket with the amount 
> of time 
> it's taking me. But I'll link it here when it's done.
> 
> Hope this helps,
> Rocco
> 
> > Andreas Bergsland wrote:
> >   
> >> Dear list,
> >> I have been a win user for many years, but I have now decided 
> to give 
> >> linux a go. Now, I am going to get a new external sound card 
> for my 
> >> laptop, and I want the new card to be easily included in my 
> setup in linux.
> >> My criteria for the sound card are:
> >> - low latency
> >> - low noise
> >> - XLR/jack ins/outs, at least 2
> >> - decent mic preamps
> >> - price tag: not above $700
> >> I am running fedora 10 with the latest ccrma rtkernel and the 
> whole 
> >> software package. I have a relatively new Dell Latitude E6500.
> >>
> >> Any suggestions for sound cards that fit these criteria?
> >>
> >> I have borrowed the RME HammerfallDSP - RPM card which I will 
> test, 
> >> since I know RME are known for low latency and low noise. But 
> this card 
> >> only have one single xlr/jack input and phono-out (designed 
> for DJ use), 
> >> so it is not ideal.
> >>
> >> Best regards,
> >> Andreas Bergsland
> >>     
> >
> >
> >
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> >   
> 
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