linuxaudio.org

On Nov 14, 2007 11:38 AM, Daniel James  wrote:

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> Hi Cory,

>

> > Some have said that moving the drawing of windows off the the GFX card

> > would help the load on the CPU and thus keep xruns to a minimum.

>

> I'm sceptical about that, because drawing windows shouldn't be causing

> xruns if the system is set up properly. I believe JACK Meterbridge uses

> libsdl for drawing the meter needles efficiently, but I believe most

> free software audio apps don't do much in the way of graphics

> acceleration (yet).

>

> I can think of a number of drawbacks to using Compiz on audio machines

> though:

>

> 1. Reliance on proprietary drivers for systems that otherwise don't

> require them. OpenGL is unusable if you don't have hardware

> acceleration, and not everyone has a Matrox card.

Since a few weeks ago, ATI users live in a happier, more free world.
> 2. Requirement for energy-hungry 3D cards (some of these cards need more

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> electricity than CPUs which are perfectly usable for audio work). Apart

> from any environmental or cost considerations, more energy = more waste

> heat = more cooling noise. Which is bad in the studio, of course.

Some GPUs have the equivalent of speedstep. fan-noise stays constant

here with windows stuff going on. Makes some noise only when playing

GPU hungry games.
> 3. Electrical waste mountain. There are millions of machines out there

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> which are perfectly (re)usable as audio workstations, but make Compiz a

> *requirement* for using free software, and they'll have to go into landfill.

Agreed, making it a requirement is stupid... I _chose_ to do it

because I find it fun, and because it has no impact on my system.
Cheers,

__________________

Marc-Olivier Barre,

MarcO'Chapeau.