Linux 4.6-rc2 Kernel Released

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Linux 4.6-rc2 Kernel Released

Linus Torvalds has issued the second weekly release candidate for the Linux 4.6 kernel...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...6-rc2-Released

[haagch]

Hm... Not a great rc.

My bug report about radeon runpm: https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=115321 - not looked at

missing null pointer check for quirk still causes kernel null pointer derefernce https://github.com/torvalds/linux/bl...sb/card.c#L615 -reference: http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.linux....3/focus=139024

Even if the null pointer check is added, it still breaks usb sound cards because -ENODEV is returned instead of 0: https://github.com/torvalds/linux/bl...sb/media.c#L60 - reference: https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=115561#c9

[darkbasic]

I do not even try new kernels anymore before RC3, way too many bugs for me.

[cj.wijtmans]

Still waiting for ALX WOL to be patched back in. The patch has been waiting there for a long time...

[haagch]

My laptop does have an internal sound card and I do have my speakers connected to it. But that's all it's good for.

When connecting high impedance headphones to it, they sound terrible - much more terrible than any other pc sound card or smartphone I have tried. I could have bought a normal headphone amp, but I went with an USB DAC instead, because that can really be used everywhere.

The microphone port on my internal sound card is useless. Here is a sample recording I did with quite a good microphone of some music playing on my speakers:
http://haagch.frickel.club/files/mic.ogg
This is not a fucking joke. That's how recordings with this sound card have always been.
Here is a sample of the very same microphone on a 5€ (yes) USB sound card:
http://haagch.frickel.club/files/mic2.ogg
Yes, it's a bit quiet and I need a microphone amp for it, but that is no excuse for the internal sound card to produce this mess.

[haagch]

Well, I have the Dr. Dac nano. I like that it's so small I can always put it in my pocket and take it everywhere and that it doesn't need batteries because it is USB powered. So for example it can be used indefinitely with an Android 5.0+ device while a traditional analog amp for connection at the audio jack will require batteries. And lastly, that's a (moderately) high quality DAC that can be connected to any device with usb where an anlog amp can only be as good as the DAC that feeds sound to it.

[JonathanM]

Analog devices do not eat your cpu time. Some cheap pc speakers do have a headphone connection. You can also have a hifi amplifier and speakers, in a hifi amplifier you have a headphone connection. I bought this one with 70 euros 10 years ago, it is from 1987 and still rocking.

A good amplifier may not be enough if you have a bad integrated DAC. (Unless you only need amplification of course.)
I'm using an usb DAC right now and it makes no visible difference to cpu usage, and I have never had performance issues because of it.

[darkbasic]

By the way if someone looks for a good DAC for headphones/speakers (no inputs) have a look at the Audioengine D1. I have one which I use with my M-Audio BX8s and I'm very satisfied with it. The volume knob alone was enough to buy it for me

[darkbasic]

Do you also have audio problems with your integrated audio

I played live with my laptop's integrated audio, a midi keyboard and Pianoteq 5: it works much better than most people thinks with the Jack server and a low latency kernel.
Still the main problem when mixing/mastering (or with everyday's use) is the lack of an hardware volume knob. Also the quality is noticeably worse than an high quality DAC if you couple it with high quality studio monitors.

P.S.
When talking about headphones don't use the integrated audio if you don't have an headphones amplifier.

[darkbasic]

You can have the main volume slider in your desktop. You do more advanced mixing graphically with Rosegarden. Amplifier without any knobs is ideal, because potentiometers are one source of noise in analog systems.

The best solution of course would be having speakers with remotable amplifiers, but since I don't the only viable solution is using a DAC with a phisical volume knob. If you think it's not necessary you obviously never had studio monitors attached to the pc you use daily. You don't have the slightest idea how delightful may be suddenly listening to high wattage speakers when the software volume resets to 100%. Also I challenge you playing a game and having to alt-tab every time you want to adjust the volume. It is simply not feasible.

Regarding the integrated audio I don't care about the chip they use, there are a thousand of factors which may degrade the audio quality. I listen to it and if it doesn't sound good enough with the attached speakers I simply use something else. Also an USB DAC allows me to dock my laptop when I want, which is a big plus.

P.S.
Did you ever use Rosegarden? I did and I know it is a music composition software: why do you suggest me to use it to mix something? I use Ardour to mix when I do multitrack recordings.