A comment on operating systems is below. I recently received a PM remarking on the ASIO driver for Yggy being broken. This begs the enclosed comments on 3 O/Ses in general.
One would be Windoze, one Mac, and the third would be Linux. Windoze is and always has been designed and marketed to be as ubiquitous as possible. The O/S battle is not just won by the O/S itself; a need for a variety of software designed to be run on Windoze was correctly targeted by Microsoft. Third party software developers were encouraged by the relative ease of obtaining microsoft tools and APIs by independents. Most importantly, Windoze was designed as a software product only intended to run on Intel based processors, which were collectively soon known as PCs. Many vendors existed for these machines, which gave rise to a variety of price points headed lower and lower as competition dictated. Economics dictate that low prices equal more sales, all other factors being the same. Microsoft did not give a rat's ass about selling computer hardware, leaving that to others. All they cared about was dominating the O/S market, which they did quite well, particularly in the business market, and in the less expensive home market as well.
As their domination of the market continued to grow, they became less and less concerned about the featureset of the O/S for the less significant sectors of the market. In our case, that would be their not incorporating USB2 audio into their O/S at all – substituting audio toys - dubious quality software mixers, etc. No harm, no foul – after all they had many software engineers (read driver writers) who could be compensated by the makers of the USB2 audio device makers. In other words, leave the writing of USB2 for Windows audio to a clusterphuck of competing manufacturers. I was hopeful that with Win10, they would incorporate USB2 into the OS – they did not. “Plug and pray” hopes that the system will find a proper USB2 implementation (driver) as the device is hooked up. Win10 automates this procedure a bit more as it attempts to match and download the proper driver to whatever device ID is plugged into the USB port. As more devices proliferate, the odds of errors increase greatly. The largest corporate customers find their way into the microsoft driver databases more quickly. The bottom line is that if Windoze does not value USB2 audio enough to incorporate it into the OS, they may well not be in the biggest hurry to attend to user complaints and or fix the omission of USB2 audio themselves.
Mac computers are sold as a hardware/software system. The advantage here is that since the hardware is known, it is a simple matter to tailor the modified BSD OS specifically specifically for all of the devices on board. So they did. Since Mac could not $$$ compete with the lower 98% of the market-targeted PCs, they catered to the high end market segments that the PC did not. They targeted the academic and non-profit community (put us in the budget, we are better, less buggy, and easier to use), the graphic design market (same thing, with big huge files), high end computer hardware geeks (oohhh, look at the aluminum – none of that cheap PC plastic), and most important to us, the professional audio sector and movie production industry. You bet your ass USB2 audio is included.
Linux, you say? Yup. The modern distros are getting easier and easier to use – even rivaling/beating newer PC stuff. It shares to Mac advantage of Unix roots. Stability and consistency. Unlike Windows, USB2 audio is built in. The newer Linux distros for the most part figure out your hardware and build it as kernel modules as it installs. At higher sampling rates it is still not as good as the Mac (requires some tweaking) but for Redbook it is just fine. Oh, and did I say? It is free, just provide an old PC to install it on.
So where does that leave us, then? Well, believe it or not, I use all three. The best engineering software, which I use for circuit board design and schematic capture runs on PCs – period. This sort of software is a bit buggy, so it is perfect for a hardware and software Windows clusterphuck culture, with the expectancy of weird crashes and incompatibilities, things which engineers thrive on. It is not politically correct in a computer sense to note that countless Windoze crashes over time with USB2 audio have been countless Windoze crashes over time with USB2 audio. It is, however, quite true. You may be lucky, but much of the time, trying to make it work is much akin to the pleasure of root canals. Alas, even after you have it running, it has a much higher chance to sound like ass than either of the two other OSes. Remember that Windoze is an OS that runs on almost any PC hardware, from two layer fubar motherboards to well built hardware. Your performance will also vary according to all what else is running on the PC, much of which Windoze conceals from you. The advantage is that it is convenient and everywhere, just like McDonalds.
Linux, particularly the Ubuntu distro, is very easy to use and has the advantage of several free audio and audio/video players. Banshee, Amarok, and many others perform well for redbook (they also have all of the album cover bells and whistles, so you can show all of your friends!) If you are a techie, you can google and tweak the players for higher than redbook sample rates. Also with redbook, you will almost certainly find that it sounds better on the same machine as Windoze. Oh, lest I forget, it is free of charge. I use a Chromebook with Linux installed to Browse the web, get email, and listen to music in my bedroom system. It never crashes and sounds great. Linux is like a dive restaurant that has really good tasting food. It is not as convenient as the Windoze PC, but can be nearly so with a bit of work.
Finally, Macs. They are great to impress your friends with. When you go to Starbucks, you can proudly hang out in front with your illuminated apple showing to the world how rich your parents are, or that you are a competent or wannabe graphics designer. Perhaps you want to show off not just your lit apple, but your monocoque aluminum chassis which contributes nothing to performance but much to price. They are the epitome of how to spend money you may not have to impress people you may not like. Almost as good as a super expensive, underperforming audio system like are shown by constipated looking, overly serious hucksters up in the tower rooms of many audio shows.
That said, if you are using one for audio or video, you either make your living with audio/video or are doing so knowing that they always work. Of course, unlike Windoze, USB 2 audio is built in. It is not quite true, but nearly so, that the worst sounding Mac is better than the best sounding PC. Sorry, folks, that is the way it is. Take heart, there is an older model Mac available used for a very small amount of money that makes the very best sounding USB music server I have ever found. As soon as I have my backup unit, I will formally offer that opinion.
To recap – IMHO, if you have a PC, use it to run Quickbooks and a small to medium sized business. Using it for USB audio is using a chainsaw to carve a turkey.
If you want an adventure, grab an old PC or laptop PC and install Ubuntu or just boot the Ubuntu disk on an existing PC without install and listen to it. No fuggin drivers required as with Winblows.
If you are lazy, get a Mac. The easiest way to get the best sound. If you are low on money, you can get one of the older units with a CD/DVD drive and rip your CDs. You can also strut with pride into a Starbucks if you bought a powerbook.
There once was some guy who actually committed suicide by drilling holes in his head – I think he was on the 17th hole when he finally died. He reminds me of PC USB audio users. There are alternatives which are much easier, and even some which are cheaper.
Let me close by saying that we continue to liase with C-Media on working out our driver issues 100% with Win10. It has improved, but still has a bit to go. Such is the price on Windoze progress.
