Is 64 Studio 3.0 based on Debian or Ubuntu?

For those who want to try Debian Unstable, there's Sidux liveCD - look it up at distrowatch.com . If you like that, you can install from the liveCD, too. I've been using Sidux for a few years now. It has about 4 releases per year. Last few releases, the kernel has high-resolution timer, preemption, SMP by default. I'm not sure it has the more recent RT-kernel-patch applied. Here's "uname -a" for the latest 200902 release: Linux sidux-200902 2.6.30-1.slh.3-sidux-686 #1 SMP PREEMPT Mon Jul 6 23:23:33 UTC 2009 i686 GNU/Linux Since Sidux uses Debian Unstable (Sid) and it's small repository of it's own apps (for the kernel, scripts...), most apps are at fairly recent releases. I only install each app as I need the latest releases of them. I don't do "apt-get upgrade" with Debian Unstable, which can probably get my system in unstable mode for a day or two. For those who want to try newer Linux distro releases, or a different distro, you may want to consider multiboot option with grub. I install each distro in a separate partition of 6-12 GB each, and having data files in yet other partition(s) separate from the operating system. I can keep my working installation alone, tweak away at new distro releases until it become my main working installation, then I can wipe out the old partition that I don't need any more from 6-12 months back. Just have to do a "df", or "mount" command to figure out which partition is the root partition that I currently run. So distro hopping is history for me (pretty much), now that I am at ease with Debian, plus Sidux get the latest versions of Debian Unstable sync up and tested every 3 months, just for me :-) I didn't like Ubuntu for the fact that they don't even have keyboard arrow keys mapped in the text console, or command line terminals. I don't even remember how that's done any more and don't care to look it up now because I don't have to - I'm really spoiled :-). I suppose Ubuntu folks spent all their time on the GUI thingy. Jimmy

Hi Tim. You are almost right... When 64studio was launched it was based on etch - which was not quite released at the time ;-) It was stable anyway Cheers, Quentin

Hi Pete, I have not tried, but upgrading from Ubuntu Studio 8.04 to 64 Studio 3.0 should work through applying this Mint how-to: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=42&t=25972 (Mint 5 is Ubuntu 8.04 + some eyecandy.) EDIT: Disable Ubuntu Studio repositories (e.g. from Synaptic) before upgrading. Would be nice to know how it worked out. Cheers, Tapani

I have been out of the loop for a bit and I'm tuning back in. So I just want to check I've understood this right. 64studio 3.0 *IS* based on Ubuntu Hardy 8.04 LTS. However, it has been built using Free's PDK system and does not involve Ubuntu's most annoying optimisations? I don't care for Ubuntu much either. But, it has to be said that the process of negotiating with Debian for multimedia support also seems like a losing battle. The dropping of Ardour from Lenny seemed like a watershed on this matter. I know exactly why it was dropped, it's not that Debian don't like Ardour or anything, it is more to do with the fact the the Ardour team aren't willing to kowtow to Debian's incredibly strict idea of how to build a program. (It's an argument on the level of Ardour being totally vegan, but Debian complains because they occasionally use non-organic soya milk - I always think of Debian as being software 'vegans' ;-) I have to pick Quentin up on one thing: I don't remember any version of 64 Studio or aGNUla/DeMuDi ever being based on Debian unstable. The logistics of getting multimedia apps to run smoothly require a stable base system. Due to pressure from people like me, releases have sometimes tracked Debian testing, but this mostly results in much more work for Free with little appreciable gain. Now that I own more than one computer, my personal solution for this is to run Debian squeeze on my laptop (which makes it a squeeze box !-D) and 64 Studio on my old tower system, which does not live online, is only used for music and backups and is therefore still running the old version. I'm just about to reinstall that with 64 Studio 3.0. That way I get the best of both worlds. BTW: AFAIK Free's rt kernels should work with ?any? distro - certainly anything based on Debian - as it doesn't depend on any other software (Correct me if I'm wrong here). That said, pretty much everything else depends upon the kernel, so you could find some software / hardware combinations that are not supported by the kernel. cheers, tim /|\

So after reading this, before i get my new amd64 machine up and running as a standalone for 64studio , can i upgradee my Ubuntu Studio Hardy 8.04 with rt kernel machine to 64ST 3.0 ? I'd like to try this on my (p4 1.8Ghz 32 bit ) Ubuntu system a- nd if so what should I do I already have a rt kernel and all apps and pluigns I want to use ( except Linux sampler ) but not sure how to proceed here ??? all advice welcome. cheers Pete

My multimedia workstation uses Debian Lenny with a custom rt kernel. Will I be able to replace my kernel with the 64 Studio 3.0 kernel? I would do a clean install of 64 Studio if it weren't for the fact that my system is highly customized and it would take a lot of time to back everything up and reconfigure it.

It seems that the best Ubuntu version to use for such a project would be the 8.04 LTS. This is the long term support version. The primary advantage is that the real time kernel has been applied by some other groups so it is more of a known factor. You might take a look at Enhanced Machine Controll ( http://www.linuxcnc.org/ ). They have a very nice CNC oriented distribution with real-time kernel that could be a good resource and maybe lead to even more helpful input. Other Ubuntu distributions have been known to be troublesome with the RT kernel.

I don't really care what 64studio is built on it was impossible to install on a vanilla IBM thinkpad. After downloading ALL the ISOs and burning them patiently, the whole thing became just a disaster,- it strongly reminiscent of the mess at Agnula all those years ago.....with all the false hopes, promises and vapourware.... I'm not exactly a newbie to Linux (even run woody/etch and lenny successfully on Dec alpha 64 bit CPUs!), and I had had excellent experiences with Etch....removing the early studio 64 distro in the process. (I upgraded because the hard disk went out on RMA). I burnt a DVD ISO of Lenny (as I had installed it recently on an alpha machine) and had EXACTLY the same experience of an easy install and superb performance......unlike 64 studio which failed every single time. Nothing would ever entice me back to 64Studio after this catalogue of failures. I have done some work on DAWs and would love to be able to say Linux is more than a load of "show-off" "we can do it too" stuff, but so far nothing I have seen, can rival OSX or Win32... They allow me to produce a product that works. The notebook in Q dual boots win2k3 and Debian with fuse. (I even have had Jmax working on Linux), but LATENCY is not the most important thing.....functionality is more important. Acquisition of video/DV seems to be very reliable on Linux but it's even incapable of writing to my SCSI Authoring writer or authoring DVD-A, unlike any other OS. I prefer to use it for video acq, so it then becomes another tool in a work flow situation, not a proper be-all end-all solution. What hope for such a platform when it can't match Sonic on OSX???? DVD-A is the future and it dosn't work on Studio 64 in any meaningful way for anyone. Does this sound unhappy? Yes it sure does, because I get a better result every time, installing Debian & then working on the authoring in another OS altogether with Samba for transfers.

What is interesting with Ubuntu (Studio or standard) is the installer with the large hardware support. Debian is not so easy to install, even for somebody using Linux for years. With Debian, choosing his hardware is by far more difficult. I told that, I am one of the tester of Ubuntu Studio, and a former Ubuntu Studio developer (not programmer, but support, documentation and testing with various kind of audio hardware). Despite this experience, on my workstation, installing 64 Studio 2.1 is simply impossible for me, because of the installer and my hardware. So I hope that we will have the best of Ubuntu (easy to install/use, hardware support) and not the bad of Ubuntu (a lot of non optimized stuff like Pulse Audio, etc...), and the best of 64 Studio. At Agnula time, the change from ReMuDI (based on Red Hat) to DeMuDi (Based on Debian) made a lot of long discussions like this one in forums. As in this period, for me, it is a good thing that 64 Studio change. Today, it is for Ubuntu : it means using a more popular distribution base, so more people maus be interested. And I am pretty sure that it is not a surprise if Free has made this choice. I am confident that it has been done after a lot of tests and experience (for exemple, the job done for the Indamix OEM distribution based on Ubuntu by the 64 Studio team) It is too a bad and good news at the same time for Ubuntu Studio developers. A bad news in the way that there will a far better mutimedia distribution based on Ubuntu. A good news in the way that they will able to provide some good stuff of 64 Studio in Ubuntu Studio. So, as the British people used to say, "wait and see", so "install and test". But I bet that 64 Studio 3.0 will rock the multimedia Linux distributions place. Toine

I have used and enjoyed 64 Studio 2.0. It has always --- Always-- worked with a Samsung scx-4200 multifunction printer (all functions). No 'buntu derivative has ever worked. Attempted installation of the SCX drivers completely cripples Ubuntu and all its derivatives (Mint 6.0 most recent attempt); I end up trying to startx, which invariably fails, and the system crashes. Debian has always worked well. I trust its repositorie. I think I will have to pass on 64 Studio 3.0 and go back to 2.1. It does all the necessary. Dennis

jawara My first preference is for a Debian based system for multimedia and every day use, just love apt-get/aptitude. I initially favored and used 64 Studio 2.0 > 2.1, but ran into MIDI and Ardour version issues. Therefore JAD 1.0 and eventually and Ubuntu Studio 8.04 LTS allowed me to continue the projects i was working on. I am currently using Ubuntu Studio on a XEON SMP Workstation with 2 GB of memory for heavy multi-tracking and 64 Studio 2.1 on a Thinkpad T30 with 1 GB of memory for sequencing with Muse, building beats with Hydrogen and mastering with Jamin. Still waiting to get an SATA PC Card to connect an external Hard Disk and a Firewire PC Card for an Audio Interface, to give Ardour a good test run on this Thinkpad. These are some issues i have encountered with Ubuntu Studio 8.04 LTS: Slow display of menu after login, slow loading of applications. Still not abreast of latest Ardour releases, Ardour is functional but crashes sometimes. Video play back issues with xine. It attempts to open the video and hangs, have to SIGKILL. But the same video plays fine in VLC. This may be due to the Matrox P650 drivers. Sometimes the kernel does not load on first boot, so i usually have to warm reboot. Then after that the Matrox drivers may or may not load, and have to warm reboot. Recently, after kernel upgrade, still have have issues with kernel loading/not loading, but now the splash screen does not load period. I have this same issue with the splash screen after kernel upgrade with Edubuntu 8.10 on a dell laptop, so didn't even bother to try and fix it again. Can't upgrade to Ubuntu Studio 8.10 for newer versions of Ardour etc..., No realtime kernel yet. So to me the only benefits of moving to an Ubuntu base is for new applications as oppose to what Debian Lenny provides. I have been waiting patiently for 64 Studio 3.0 to be released, assuming it was going to be based on Lenny. Now there is this Ubuntu curve ball, which makes me wonder. I hope this doesn't transfer the Ubuntu issues and heavy desktop requirements. In my opinion Ubuntu is beginning to suck big time, due to my issues with their recent kernel updates. Beyond the above the, FOSS community is doing great work to empower professional GNU/Linux DAWs. It is a great alternative to Pro Tools LE/Digidesign/M-Audio MAC/PC Systems. Proof of concept and Shameless Plug for votes. Remix of John Legend Song "If You'Re Out There" for remix contest. Tracked and mixed in Ardour on Ubuntu Studio and mastered with Ardour/Jamin/Rezound on 64 Studio 2.1 http://www.indabamusic.com/submissions/show/6798 Keep up the good work.

The biggest problem IMO with Debian is that they do not package Ardour in stable. Otherwise it's a good base for multimedia distro. I solved my need for a realtime kernel and Ardour in my Debian system by compiling both the kernel and Ardour from source. I mean, if Debian is your choice of distro, why not extend it on your own? Debian has all the tools and libraries in the repositories. But that's no good an answer for a distro maintainer. So far 64 Studio has been an excellent multimedia distro, I'm using it and it fits my needs. I do have to agree that Ubuntu has a lot of quirks and therefore I recommend sticking to the LTS version.

It's great to see 64studio going forward. I'm going to dip my toe in the waters this weekend with a test install of beta3, and you clever chaps sold me when you added the .29 RT kernel. I'd also add that Dave, aka Skullnotions, has been talking about 64studio in good terms since he first told me about linux, so i guess this moment is almost inevitable. :) Alex.

Thanks for response another time Quentin The question post by member about Debian-Ubuntu is right for me but not primary, In the end Ubuntu may be considered son of Debian . For beginners 64STudio 2.1 stable or 3.0 alpha 3 testing ? Bye

64 Studio used the hardy package repositories, because of its stability and because it is used is the other distributions maintained by 64 Studio. We basically get for free what the guys have to do to keep the custom distributions shipshape. This question is answered extensively in this thread already ;-)

Hello guys I'm Guido from Italy . Excuse me for a cross post , I'have open a thread similar to this. I have some question : 1- about comment of Quentin Harley when he said " 64 Studio 3.0 is based on... 64 studio" what mean if if use Ubuntu hardy repo ? why not Debian Lenny 5.0 actal stable or also the testing Squeeze ? 2- version 3.0 of 64 STudio is right for a newbie to computer music but have medium music theory knowledge , plays guitar and know the world of Linux using Debian and Ubuntu ? Thank for you attention Bye Guido

There is an easier way. On the Ubuntu tab juts click on the repositories you want active...

Hi, Is it possible to add Hardy repository to Beta3, without crashing ? At this time, just want to take TAPEUTAPE from Hardy repo, it seems that's the sampler I'm looking for since several months ! Thanks for answers, Fred ( If add "http://archives.ubuntu/ ubuntu hardy main multiverse universe" in /etc/sources.list, is it ok ? )

Hi all! Just wanted to give my opinion I can understand certainquirk's concern. I've had the same experience with some previous Ubuntu installations, although Intrepid has shown to be better overall. I even had the same feeling, and was a little afraid, when the change to an Ubuntu base was announced, as I too think Debian is far much stable (in general terms) than Ubuntu and many other distros. However, I went ahead and gave it a try with the Alpha install. I must say I'm amazed at how great the development is going on. Pretty stable for an Alpha version, and all the good stuff you'll expect from the good guy's at 64 Studio. Hardy is a mature (almost a year now) version with LTS, and pretty stable by now. Although the change to Ubuntu base came unexpectedly for some of us, I believe the distro will turn out great, and we'll have a distro with all the quality and performance 64 Studio is known and distinguished for. Besides, all the critical multimedia apps, and most important, the rt kernel, are compiled/packaged/configured by 64 Studio. In summary, I will encourage anybody who is a bit surprised by the change to just give it a shot - I believe it will be worth it. And to the development group at 64 Studio: Keep up the excellent work! And thanks for such an excellent distro for multimedia work. 64 Studio is currently my #1 choice for MIDI & audio work, in both live and recording settings. I'm anxious to see 64 Studio 3.0 official.

As an additional motivator, all the high performance packages of 64 Studio are built by Free. Effectively we are just using the day to day packages from Ubuntu, and the Hot Stuff is 64 Studio.com backports / packages from Debian sources. Give it a shot... What do you have to loose? Cheers, Quentin

Hi Shawn, Have you ever heard of PDK (Platform Development Kit) Free Ekanayaka, or the 64 Studio team? PDK is just *one* of the hidden gems of 64studio, I use it to build 64 Studio, or any customized Debian variation I wish. It's a bit of a steep learning curve, I'm on the first step. My present project is 64 Studio with Emacs Supercollider. I have been using Free Ekanayaka's releases since aGNUla DeMuDi, in fact since I first installed GNU/Linux. If you read or google for the history of Debian/Linux/Audio you will understand why I follow his work. I hope one day we see you back here, but if not all the best and good luck with whichever distribution you choose. Cheers! dave

Thanks for the response Quentin. Still doesn't make sense to me (it's disappointing too). I will not let anything Ubuntu touch my system and waste my time ever again. Best wishes, Shawn

This is a bit of a fine line... 64 Studio 3.0 is based on... 64 studio, being put together with the PDK tool, and cutting edge multimedia packages built and/or backported by our own in-house official Debian developer. 64 Studio is built for stable performance. All the components in the official release are tested and maintained to ensure reliable operation. 2.1 is just showing it's kernel and GUI age at the moment... We are using the Hardy package pool, and Ubuntu Hardy packages are compatible with 64 Studio 3.0. This means you are free to install any of the packages from Ubuntu Hardy if needed. Hardy was chosen as it is a LTS version of ubuntu, that means 3 years of security updates, of which we will get at least 2 with the release of 3.0 Unstable packages repositories are, as you can imagine, unstable. I can remember the early days when we built on Debian unstable, etch at the time. Stuff would stop working for no reason... The look and feel will be 64 Studio, and most of the Ubuntu quirks are either removed or not implemented. My 3.0 alpha is running like a tank, with great performance, and (so far) no instability in any of the applications. Free is working on the beta, due for release soon.