[fluid-dev] Re: What is the best way start fluidsynth with zero/low latency? (Louis B.)

[Louis B.]

Yes, that is is indeed true it is all about avoiding under run, may be
it would best to add another section to the wiki for Netbooks. The
fact is I cannot run PianoBooster and fluidsynth successfully on a
netbook with out the -r22050 flag.

I have just run some tests and I can confirm that -r22050 has the
bigest effect on avoiding under run, even more adding the -C0 -R0
flags. Unfortunately I get this terrible crackling noise whenever I
get underrun which does not go away even when I have stoped the music
playing by turning off all the notes. This crackling come back again
if I try to start playing the music again. I have recorded this using
a VOICE recorder on my Samsung mobile phone. But cannot post it to the
list because at at 50K it is too big and just got bounced.

Ideally there should just be silence when every under run happens, and
the audio should come back as soon as more data arrived. Anybody know
what is causing this crackling sound.

Pedro, here are the results.
$ ./alsa-rate
supported sample rates for hw:0,0 : min=44100, max=192000
$ ./alsa-rate dmix
supported samplerates for dmix : min=48000, max=48000
$ ./alsa-rate plughw
supported sample rates for plughw : min=4000, max=4294967295
$ ./alsa-rate default
supported sample rates for default : min=1, max=192000
$

I am actually running an eeepc 900A (I put the 901 on the wiki as I
did not want it to get confused with the 900 which does not use an
atom processor)

Also I saw a Ubuntu wish list request that Pulse Audio uses less CPU!

On the positive side fluidsynth really does work _extremely_ well on
my netbook with the flags I have given on the wiki.

Thanks

Louis

PianoBooster is a MIDI file player that teaches you how to play the piano. see:

http://pianobooster.sourceforge.net/

On Mon, May 25, 2009 at 7:10 PM,  <address@hidden> wrote:
> Quoting Pedro Lopez-Cabanillas <address@hidden>:
>>
>> On Monday, May 25, 2009, address@hidden wrote:
>>>
>>> Quoting Pedro Lopez-Cabanillas <address@hidden>:
>>> > On Saturday, May 23, 2009, Louis B. wrote:
>>> >> Thanks for the info. I have just update the wiki with information on
>>> >> how to run fluid on a netbook. see
>>> >> http://fluidsynth.resonance.org/trac/wiki/LowLatency. Please correct
>>> >> it if it is wrong or you want to add anything else.
>>> >
>>> > "Also halving the sample rate with the flag '-r22050' helps a lot."
>>> >
>>> > I doubt the above advice would be beneficial for latency. On the
>>> > contrary, running FluidSynth with a native sound card sample rate will
>>> > give the better results, because reducing the sample rate requires ALSA
>>> > to perform software interpolation (by the plughw: layer) to transform
>>> > the
>>> > buffers into the native frequency before sending it to the hardware.
>>> > This
>>> > requires larger buffers and consumes CPU cycles. On the other hand,
>>> > using
>>> > the native frequency allows you to use the hw: interface directly.
>>> >
>>> > By the way, which netbook are we talking about? Which Linux distro?
>>> >
>>> > Regards,
>>> > Pedro
>>>
>>> If the system is running out of CPU and the sound card actually works
>>> with 22050 natively, then it could help reduce CPU usage, thus
>>> preventing CPU starvation.  Another idea is to decrease
>>> synth.polyphony in that case though.
>>
>> Louis said that he is using an eeepc 901. According to my sources this
>> device
>> has an integrated Intel HDA sound card:
>> http://array.org/ubuntu/status.html?model=eeepc-901
>>
>> The HDA cards allow only a very restricted set of native sample rates,
>> typically only above 44.1 KHz, so I found very improbable that sr=22050 is
>> natively supported. This can be verified compiling and running the
>> attached
>> program. Here are some results obtained on my Asus laptop:
>>
>> $ ./alsa-rate
>> supported sample rates for hw:0,0 : min=44100, max=192000
>> $ ./alsa-rate dmix
>> supported sample rates for dmix : min=48000, max=48000
>> $ ./alsa-rate plughw
>> supported sample rates for plughw : min=4000, max=4294967295
>> $ ./alsa-rate default
>> supported sample rates for default : min=4000, max=4294967295
>>
>> Note that "dmix", "plughw" and "default" are not native, they are software
>> conversion layers.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Pedro
>>
>
>
> It seems what we have both been pointing out, is that latency and CPU usage
> are 2 separate issues.  From what Louis said, I'm still not sure what
> problem he is experiencing.  Is it an issue with achieving low latency or an
> issue of the CPU consumption maxing out when playing certain MIDI files or
> many notes.
>
> Even in the case where the sound card doesn't support 22050, it could
> actually reduce CPU, if the conversion by the ALSA plughw layer to 44100 is
> less than required by the extra FluidSynth calculations for twice the number
> of samples per second.  I've never tested that myself, so its just a
> theory..  I wouldn't be surprised though if that is true.
>
> At any rate.  It seems like the comments added by Louis are more useful for
> the case of reducing CPU usage, rather than reducing latency, which perhaps
> warrants a separate wiki page altogether.
>
> The comment about 'Unfortunately specifying the hardware layer may bypass
> all of the desktop volume controls.' on the wiki, likely has to do with
> bypassing PulseAudio.  So that really belongs in a PulseAudio tips section.
>  Since if you are using ALSA mixer based audio controls, rather than
> PulseAudio mixer controls, that statement wont be true.
>
> It is a mess indeed :(  O how I wish PulseAudio could achieve low latency.
>  It seems like a potentially nice audio system.  Sad to say, but it seems
> like if a user wants user friendly low latency audio, CoreAudio on OS X is
> where it is at currently.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed, that Linux and
> audio for the desktop AND the musician will be sorted out soon.
>
> Cheers.
>
> Josh
>
>
>
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