From owner-freebsd-multimedia Thu Oct 16 03:08:58 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) id DAA20066 for multimedia-outgoing; Thu, 16 Oct 1997 03:08:58 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-multimedia) Received: from whqvax.picker.com (whqvax.picker.com [144.54.1.1]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id DAA20061 for ; Thu, 16 Oct 1997 03:08:51 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from rhh@ct.picker.com) Resent-From: rhh@ct.picker.com Received: from ct.picker.com by whqvax.picker.com with SMTP; Thu, 16 Oct 1997 6:08:20 -0400 (EDT) Received: from elmer.ct.picker.com by ct.picker.com (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA02699; Thu, 16 Oct 97 06:08:18 EDT Received: by elmer.ct.picker.com (SMI-8.6/SMI-SVR4) id GAA06420; Thu, 16 Oct 1997 06:03:58 -0400 Resent-Message-Id: <199710161003.GAA06420@elmer.ct.picker.com> Message-Id: <19971015171047.05325@ct.picker.com> Date: Wed, 15 Oct 1997 17:10:47 -0400 From: Randall Hopper To: Luigi Rizzo Cc: multimedia@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Who is interested in /dev/midi and /dev/synth ? References: <19971015134829.31569@ct.picker.com> <199710151735.SAA09719@labinfo.iet.unipi.it> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Mailer: Mutt 0.81 In-Reply-To: <199710151735.SAA09719@labinfo.iet.unipi.it>; from Luigi Rizzo on Wed, Oct 15, 1997 at 06:35:34PM +0100 Resent-Date: Thu, 16 Oct 1997 06:03:58 -0400 Resent-To: multimedia@freebsd.org Sender: owner-freebsd-multimedia@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Luigi Rizzo: |> Luigi Rizzo: |> |I am wondering if there is anyone who really needs /dev/midi and |> |/dev/synth, and used them on the old sound driver. If you do, (Uncle |> |Sam's finger pointed at you) speak up, telling which apps you use |> |which do not work with the new audio driver, where I can find them, |> |and how are you going to help in implementing these devices. |> |> I use timidity on my Sparc at work and have used it on Linux boxes. Nice |> program if you don't have a card with wavetable support (which BTW are dirt |> cheap nowadays). However it sucks serious CPU, and the sound quality with | |i forgot... also CPUs are dirt cheap these days, and last time I |checked a Pentium133 (or 166 ?) was cheaper than an AWE32... | |my point is, perhaps you can invest the money for the wavewable card |into a much faster (or secondary) CPU. Are you serious? So do you mean to say that since there's a program that'll do better-than-nothing MIDI synth on the CPU, we should rip out support for the synth devices and for soundcards that support synth in hardware? ...Ignoring for a second the fact that MIDIs aren't the only thing the synth devices are used for, that not everyone's rolling in upgrade money like you and me, and that the audio quality and CPU load of timidity is -- just that, better-than-nothing. If the functionality is there from the old driver, why rip it out? You originally asked for those that use the synth devices with the old sound driver to speak up and I did. Though the AWE driver and sequencer apps, I play MIDIs, MODs, 669s, S3Ms, etc. (while I work on other things) and the Doom Music server (on occasion) on the wavetable side of my SB32. It sounds like I didn't give you the answer you wanted. Now if the absense of the synth devices is just a temporary thing not intended to be the case in the checked-in release, then I that's fine -- I misunderstood. But if we're talking about removing them for good, then I have objections to this. Randall