My experience so far is too limited to say, I've really just done some quick checks with headphones. I will report again once I've had more opportunity to make a better assessment.

- Dave

It is a pretty bad 11 bit onboard audio card. You really can hear it with low level audio signals like the ends of long reverb tails. Also, the signal itself is rather weak.  A USB soundcard is quite recommended.

Any class-compliant device should be fine. My old and cheap Edirol 
UA1-EX works cleanly plug'n'play in "standard" mode.

Richard Dobson

On 02/12/2013 16:18, Dominic Melville wrote:
> Thanks for the comments. Weirdly in all my reading I've never seen it
> being 11bit mentioned. No wonder it's got the reputation it has.
>
> Rather than go the commercial USB route I'll build myself a small DAC
> for it. I want small size and can get various DAC ICs very cheaply. Once
> I've got something working and refined I'll post up the parts and
> schematic somewhere for other users. Won't be complete till after new
> year though now.
>
> In the meantime, to aid speedy software development and refinement, is
> there a USB interface that's working well with the RPI and Csound? I
> won't need Jack running as it's going to be purely Arch Linux and
> Csound, nothing else running alongside the synth.
>

Thanks for the comments. Weirdly in all my reading I've never seen it being 11bit mentioned. No wonder it's got the reputation it has. 

Rather than go the commercial USB route I'll build myself a small DAC for it. I want small size and can get various DAC ICs very cheaply. Once I've got something working and refined I'll post up the parts and schematic somewhere for other users. Won't be complete till after new year though now. 

In the meantime, to aid speedy software development and refinement, is there a USB interface that's working well with the RPI and Csound? I won't need Jack running as it's going to be purely Arch Linux and Csound, nothing else running alongside the synth. 

Thanks

Dominic 

On Monday, December 2, 2013, Paul Batchelor wrote:

It is a pretty bad 11 bit onboard audio card. You really can hear it with low level audio signals like the ends of long reverb tails. Also, the signal itself is rather weak.  A USB soundcard is quite recommended.

On Dec 2, 2013 10:55 AM, "David Akbari" <dakbari@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello Dominic,

Depends on what you mean by "built in" audio. The Raspberry Pi has both an analogue out audio option as well as using the HDMI to output digitally.

Both sound acceptable to me, although the analogue option can be a little noisy depending on what types of electrical interference exist in your performance environment. The HDMI digital out sounds about as good as you would expect; you start to get into systems-level problems here because you are introducing variables such as transducer type when evaluating output.

With something as scalable and modular as Csound your bigger concern is almost assuredly going to be "break ups" in real-time synthesis or audio streaming due to the Raspberry Pi's limited processing capability.

In my professional and performance work, the Raspberry Pi has found a nice niche as a command / control interface. It seems perfectly suited to smoothing, processing, and routing of control streams over a network when used with several computers; for example an art installation or performing with multiple individuals. If you have several it is also a nice little experiment in hocketing or other traditional "ensemble" musical techniques using multiple Pis.

In short, don't expect the Pi to perform like a Big Iron system and you won't be disappointed!

Cheers,

David

On Mon, Dec 2, 2013 at 9:36 AM, Dominic Melville <dcamelville@gmail.com> wrote:

Slightly off topic, but related and I know some of you have experience with the RPI and Csound. 

Just how bad is the built in audio output? I've read lots of negative comments on various sites about the RPIs built in audio, but I'm curious to hear how any of you using one with Csound have found it. Is it workable, just not amazing? Or really as bad as some say? 

I'm getting my hands on one soon and have an FM and Formant synth I've developed that I want to run on it. The synth is pretty filthy sounding anyway so I wonder if an external USB interface is really needed or just "better". 

Thanks

Dominic

Anders, I could kiss you! This makes my intention so much easier. 

I've built DACs before from scratch so I've no worries about that side of it. This blog post is immensely helpful!!! 

Thank you!! 

Dominic 

On Monday, December 2, 2013, Anders Genell wrote:

If you ponder the DIY route, maybe this will be useful: http://blog.koalo.de/2013/05/i2s-support-for-raspberry-pi.html?m=1

Regards,

Anders

2 dec 2013 kl. 17:18 skrev Dominic Melville <dcamelville@gmail.com>:

Thanks for the comments. Weirdly in all my reading I've never seen it being 11bit mentioned. No wonder it's got the reputation it has. 

Rather than go the commercial USB route I'll build myself a small DAC for it. I want small size and can get various DAC ICs very cheaply. Once I've got something working and refined I'll post up the parts and schematic somewhere for other users. Won't be complete till after new year though now. 

In the meantime, to aid speedy software development and refinement, is there a USB interface that's working well with the RPI and Csound? I won't need Jack running as it's going to be purely Arch Linux and Csound, nothing else running alongside the synth. 

Thanks

Dominic 

On Monday, December 2, 2013, Paul Batchelor wrote:

It is a pretty bad 11 bit onboard audio card. You really can hear it with low level audio signals like the ends of long reverb tails. Also, the signal itself is rather weak.  A USB soundcard is quite recommended.

On Dec 2, 2013 10:55 AM, "David Akbari" <dakbari@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello Dominic,

Depends on what you mean by "built in" audio. The Raspberry Pi has both an analogue out audio option as well as using the HDMI to output digitally.

Both sound acceptable to me, although the analogue option can be a little noisy depending on what types of electrical interference exist in your performance environment. The HDMI digital out sounds about as good as you would expect; you start to get into systems-level problems here because you are introducing variables such as transducer type when evaluating output.

With something as scalable and modular as Csound your bigger concern is almost assuredly going to be "break ups" in real-time synthesis or audio streaming due to the Raspberry Pi's limited processing capability.

In my professional and performance work, the Raspberry Pi has found a nice niche as a command / control interface. It seems perfectly suited to smoothing, processing, and routing of control streams over a network when used with several computers; for example an art installation or performing with multiple individuals. If you have several it is also a nice little experiment in hocketing or other traditional "ensemble" musical techniques using multiple Pis.

In short, don't expect the Pi to perform like a Big Iron system and you won't be disappointed!

Cheers,

David

On Mon, Dec 2, 2013 at 9:36 AM, Dominic Melville <dcamelville@gmail.com> wrote:

Slightly off topic, but related and I know some of you have experience with the RPI and Csound. 

Just how bad is the built in audio output? I've read lots of negative comments on various sites about the RPIs built in audio, but I'm curious to hear how any of you using one with Csound have found it. Is it workable, just not amazing? Or really as bad as some say? 

I'm getting my hands on one soon and have an FM and Formant synth I've developed that I want to run on it. The synth is pretty filthy sounding anyway so I wonder if an external USB interface is really needed or just "better". 

Thanks

Dominic