3/3 While the ability to run at nice priority -20 still requires root permission for the initial setup (or SYS_CAP_NICE), even that could *potentially* change with the introduction of a latency nice setting, if the kernel developers manage to implement unelevated latency re-nicing without opening up the gates for DOS attacks.
These developments are described in the LWN article 'The many faces of "latency nice"':
2/3 Not only is the risk of system lockups unwarranted to avoid audio drop outs, there is also no need for it to be taken.
Just prioritizing the audio rendering threads to run at nice level -20 is sufficient to prevent drop outs in low-latency setups, i.e. setups with <10ms round trip time. BTW, such setups require audio fragment sizes <= 128 samples (or "periods with <= 128 frames" in ALSA language).
1/3 On the topic of Linux low-latency audio setups…
Installing jackd (1 or 2) still requests "realtime priority" to minimize latency.
This project should really get its act together and stop demanding this kind of elevation from benign audiophile users.
Don't enable this! Running a process with realtime scheduling priority allows it lock up the system for good (and no code is bug free).
#linux #audio #lad
Beast version 0.14.0 is released.
#Beast is an LGPLv2+ music synthesizer and composer (#DAW), for #Linux, including a #MIDI #sequencer, real-time #synthesis and support for #Audio Plugins.
The full release announcement is out now:
https://beast.testbit.org/#news
https://mail.gnome.org/archives/beast/2019-July/msg00000.html
Beast version 0.13.0 is released.
Beast is an LGPLv2+ music synthesizer, composer and #DAW (Digital Audio Workstation).
It provides a #MIDI #sequencer, unlimited undo, real-time #synthesis, support for Linux #Audio Plugins (#LADSPA v1), Soundfont 2, WAV, AIFF, Vorbis, Gus Patch, FLAC and MP3 files, 32bit audio rendering, full duplex support, multi-core audio rendering and precise timing.
This release features a prebuilt binary (AppImage) for the first time.
The new and much simpler beast website just went live:
DSP + DAW developer, Free Software author + advocate, contributor to ALSA/GNOME/procps/LibreOffice/etc.