What is the best distribution currently available for audio/media production? I’ve seen some like 64Studio or Ubuntu Studio but I have not tried them yet myself. Are there any others out there which have the same (similar?) focus?
I ask because a colleague and I are working on a music project together which involves audio recording but we do not at this time have the resources available for either a Mac or a new Windows box with the current DAW software (Cubase, Pro-Tools, Ableton Live, etc) and we are both quite familiar with Linux.
>
> Hi All,
>
> What is the best distribution currently available for audio/media
> production? I’ve seen some like 64Studio or Ubuntu Studio but I have
> not tried them yet myself. Are there any others out there which have
> the same (similar?) focus?
>
> I ask because a colleague and I are working on a music project
> together which involves audio recording but we do not at this time
> have the resources available for either a Mac or a new Windows box
> with the current DAW software (Cubase, Pro-Tools, Ableton Live, etc)
> and we are both quite familiar with Linux.
>
> Thanks.
I’ve heard of a distro called artistx, don’t remember if it was for graphic artists or media artists. You can find a list of pretty much every known distro at distrowatch.com.
You’re on the right track to look at 64 Studio and Ubuntu Studio. There’s also ArtistX as ken_yap suggested, like Ubuntu Studio, ArtistX is based on Ubuntu. I’m only aware of three differences:
Ubuntu Studio is an official Ubuntu derivative
Ubuntu Studio is built for both x86-32bit & 64bit, while ArtistX is x86-32bit only
Ubuntu Studio’s DVD is 1.3GiB (9.04 Alpha 5), ArtistX’s DVD is 3.2GiB (latest release - 0.6)
There are sure to be more differences given that ~2GB gap in media size between the two. Otherwise you should be aware that both are “Artist’s Distros” not just “DAW Distros” so a number of their packages have to do with images & video. I haven’t installed ArtistX but the Ubuntu Studio DVD lets you select whether you need audio, video or visual art tools (or some combination of them).
As for 64 Studio, they seem to be in beta for their 3.0 release. You can find iso files here. If you click “Last Modified” twice the most recent files should be listed first. Interestingly, despite the name they publish a 32bit version of the distro.
Something to watch for with Ubuntu Studio…Upon release, 8.10 had issues with the real-time kernel. At that time they recommended users who needed the RT kernel to stick with version 8.04. Whether that issue remains I’m not sure, try the Ubuntu Forums to find out more in that regard. Alternatively, you might want to try Alpha 5 of the 9.04 release. Lastly, the official status of Ubuntu Studio means you can install any of the *buntus and install Ubuntu Studio meta-packages from the repositories later. So although Ubuntu Studio uses GNOME by default, if you prefer Xfce you can install Xubuntu then add Ubuntu Studio on top. You can also do the same with KDE & Kubuntu. This method is also useful if you cannot burn a DVD.
If you are familiar with openSUSE, then you could look for an openSUSE solution. A lot depends on what you wish to do in your audio/media production. For an audio emphasis, you could check out JackLab, which is openSUSE based: JackLab - openSUSE
Note also that one can get many multimedia and audio production applications from Packman for openSUSE, and hence simply update one’s nominal PC: PackMan :: home The “search” tab on the Packman page is VERY good.
With the Build Service and other openSUSE community support, you can even build your own optimal openSUSE distribution (although I have not tried this myself, and I suspect it would take time).
If you ever move from a “music project” to a “video project”, there is a wiki (still needs work) listing various video editors for openSUSE: Video editing - openSUSE
Wow thanks for the responses! Looks like I have a wealth of options in front of me.
Is anyone here into the audio/music production stuff as well? Now that I know fo the software options available how is Linux’s hardware compatibility with recording interfaces? For a while now I’ve been looking at M-Audio’s Audiophle 2496, Firewire 410, and the DigiDesign MBox2 hardware. I’ve heard of mixed results of getting these hardware interfaces to work correctly with Linux. Does anyone have knoweldge or experience with this stuff?
I am not that familiar with openSUSE, TBH. Most of my experience is with Mandriva and Debian, but preferably Debian…perhaps that includes Ubuntu as well since it is a derivative. Both Jacklab and the openSUSE build service sounds quite fascinating, I’ll have to check those out. Thanks for your help!