songcrafters & linux

[dasilvasings]

Hi!

I installed ubuntu (dual boot) in my desktop computer. Everything's fine, except i can't hear the sc player while on Linux. Any ideas?

I'm also thinking in ressurecting and old Fujitsu-Siemens (1,6 GHz / 1Mb RAM (?)). Does anyone knows of a light distribution well suited for music? What music applications do you suggest for Linux?

Miguel

[64Guitars]

I installed ubuntu (dual boot) in my desktop computer. Everything's fine, except i can't hear the sc player while on Linux. Any ideas?

You need to install the Adobe Flash Player plugin from the Ubuntu Software Centre.

I'm also thinking in ressurecting and old Fujitsu-Siemens (1,6 GHz / 1Mb RAM (?)). Does anyone knows of a light distribution well suited for music?

I assume you meant 1GB RAM rather than 1MB. I've got standard ubuntu running on a 2.4GHz PC with 1GB of RAM and it works well. I've also got it on an old Pentium III with 384MB RAM and its performance is reasonably good. Not fast but certainly usable. I think standard ubuntu will work well on your Fujitsu-Siemens PC.

There are also several light distributions based on ubuntu. For example, you could try lubuntu. But I don't think it will be any better than standard ubuntu on your Fujitsu-Siemens PC. It uses LXDE instead of Gnome for the desktop in order to reduce the memory requirements. But 1GB is more than enough RAM for standard ubuntu so a lighter desktop isn't really necessary.

What music applications do you suggest for Linux?

• Audacity
• Hydrogen
• Linux MultiMedia Studio (LMMS)
• Jokosher
• Rosegarden
• Ardour
• JACK
• JAMin
• MusE
• ZynAddSubFX
• amSynth
• tuxguitar
• rakarrack
• SooperLooper

The only one I use regularly is Audacity. I've installed and experimented with all of the others but I haven't yet used any of them except Audacity in recording a song. I hope to one day but just haven't got around to it yet.

More Linux music apps can be found here:

http://sound.condorow.net/

http://www.linuxmusicians.com/

[dasilvasings]

Thanks 64.

Guess what I'll be doing tonight!

I know audacity, lmms, tuxguitar and hydrogen from their windows versions. Besides audacity, I never really used any of them. I will look for a decent midi sequencer and hopefully I will share my findings.

M

[64Guitars]

Here's a recent article that might interest you. It covers several linux sequencers and other audio tools.

Making music in Linux and beyond

[dasilvasings]

I feel a bit defeated...

I had the impression the Fujitsu had and expendable memory of 256M, and and internal memory of 640M... well it's k, so overall I have about less than 256M memory.

I tried the big distros first: ubuntu, mint, and they couldn't even boot. I did some research and eventually got Lucid Puppy Linux running (fast!) in my laptop. It s fine for internet, movies, songs, etc... but limited in terms of music making. There is audacity, fine as always, and then LMMS. I couldn't run LMMS properly, and I figured out problem n.º 2 . ALSA and JACK... (btw 64 thanks for the article . spot on!)

I don't know how to compile packages, so I decided to try a multimedia oriented distro. I selected puredyne (too slow on computer, buggy when installing to hard disk) and dynebolic (couldn't even install. i read there were some security issues with that distro). I didn't even tried the big multimedia ditrso like ubuntu studio (looks great), musix, or 64 studio (I think they are under 64's brand ;-) )

In resume. One week later, I decided to install lucid puppy and let the computer take a rest as a music workstation.

My desktop computer has a dual boot of ubuntu and windows vista. One of this days I'll replace ubuntu by ubuntu studio or musix. I'll let you know.

Positive things: 1. with lucid puppy I now have a decent laptop for multimedia and internet (it runs songcrafters' player!), and perhaps secure enough for frenzied ebay ;-) 2. LMMS is worth a second shot. looks a lot like fruity loops, and seems powerful with some nice synths (commodore 64, etc.)

Good luck!