AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

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GMaq
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AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by GMaq »

Hi LM Friends!

For any who may be interested an updated ISO of AVL-MXE has been released:
http://www.bandshed.net/2021/05/22/avl- ... so-update/

Thanks and be well!
Glen
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by Rodney »

:D great News Thank you very much for this One
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by sunrat »

Nice work, Glen!
I watched the LinVST video and like the OpenBox layout; was never a fan of docks. Wish I could have seen that video before I tried to set up LinVST. For what reason did you stick to the older LinVST version? I'm using the recent v4.1.0 with wine-stable 6.0 and it seems to work fine, with the added bonus that linvstconverttree is now deprecated and its functionality incorporated into linvstconvert.
I'd venture to say AVL-MXE is an improvement on MX Linux. :P :mrgreen:
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by GMaq »

sunrat wrote: Sat May 22, 2021 11:35 pm Nice work, Glen!
I watched the LinVST video and like the OpenBox layout; was never a fan of docks. Wish I could have seen that video before I tried to set up LinVST. For what reason did you stick to the older LinVST version? I'm using the recent v4.1.0 with wine-stable 6.0 and it seems to work fine, with the added bonus that linvstconverttree is now deprecated and its functionality incorporated into linvstconvert.
In my experiments and testing I did try the most recent LinVst and I seemed to be having some issues with it working in Reaper and Ardour both, so when I rolled back to 3.1.5 that issue seemed to go away so I stayed with it. I was testing a lot of things at the same time and is possible it was a glitch but I always try and play it safe. Often we get very distracted on version numbers... to me if something works it works and I try and leave it as long as I can.
sunrat wrote: Sat May 22, 2021 11:35 pm I'd venture to say AVL-MXE is an improvement on MX Linux. :P :mrgreen:
Lol...NOT! I just stand on the shoulders of giants!
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by Michael Willis »

GMaq wrote: Sun May 23, 2021 1:56 am Lol...NOT! I just stand on the shoulders of giants!
It's shoulders all the way down. Well, until you get to the turtles.
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by Jaaxx »

Glen, A little clarification please.

Does this release represent what would have been your usual April-ish version bump? Or is this just a updated and refreshed ISO for the last version with a new release still on the horizon? I seem to recall you were waiting on the new releases for Ardour and Mixbus before the new official release.

Thanks for all your work, I can't wait to get my new studio up to speed after a 6 year hiatus! Your efforts have cut mine in half, at least.
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by GuntherT »

@Jaaxx If I understand correctly, GMaq was waiting on Ardour 6.7, which was released two days ago and is included in this ISO release.

@GMaq Thank you for your continued efforts on this project. It is quite impressive. I was wondering, though, if you could wager a guess why the live ISO isn't working for me. It boots to the desktop, and I can right-click to get the openbox menu up, but no matter what program I select, nothing opens. There is also no taskbar, launcher, clock, etc. It is the wallpaper only. The md5 checks out, so it does not appear to be a corrupted ISO. I have dual monitors. Are there any known issues with this setup? I know that is not a lot to go on, but I am not sure what the problem is. I have booted several Linux distros on this machine before (Thinkpad x230, circa 2012?), so I know it isn't a hardware compatibility problem at the kernel level.

***Update*** When I remove my laptop from the dock, everything works as it should, so it appears the live ISO doesn't like my hardware afterall, lol. I'm not seeking a fix, just thought I'd leave this up in case someone else has a similar issue and is troubleshooting. It is quite possible this only is a problem for the live ISO and wouldn't happen if I installed it to the hard drive.
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by GMaq »

Jaaxx wrote: Sun May 23, 2021 6:03 am Glen, A little clarification please.

Does this release represent what would have been your usual April-ish version bump? Or is this just a updated and refreshed ISO for the last version with a new release still on the horizon? I seem to recall you were waiting on the new releases for Ardour and Mixbus before the new official release.

Thanks for all your work, I can't wait to get my new studio up to speed after a 6 year hiatus! Your efforts have cut mine in half, at least.
Hi Jaaxx,

Well things are in a bit of muddle for a couple of reasons... So first you are correct this was supposed to be a maintenance release and get me re-aligned with an April release schedule.. The nature of my job gives me a bit more time in the winter months so getting AVL out in the past during the late winter months before the spring rush sort of got me in a cycle of April releases.. But since AVL-MXE is tied pretty close to being a demo platform for Ardour and Mixbus I have to be mindful of their release schedules and as GuntherT said that was the delay in this case..

There is another wrinkle which will be Debian (and consequently MX Linux) shifting to Debian Bullseye once it goes stable... I have not even looked at Bullseye yet but I will have to turn my attention to it now and I can't say for sure how soon after Bullseye goes stable I will be ready with a release and how that is going to affect the annual April release model. That remains to be seen, but in any case the paint is still very wet on this release and most things are very up to date if not brand-spanking new so for people who just want to get to work this release should be productive for quite some time regardless of when Bullseye goes stable..
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by GMaq »

GuntherT wrote: Sun May 23, 2021 3:21 pm
@GMaq Thank you for your continued efforts on this project. It is quite impressive. I was wondering, though, if you could wager a guess why the live ISO isn't working for me. It boots to the desktop, and I can right-click to get the openbox menu up, but no matter what program I select, nothing opens. There is also no taskbar, launcher, clock, etc. It is the wallpaper only. The md5 checks out, so it does not appear to be a corrupted ISO. I have dual monitors. Are there any known issues with this setup? I know that is not a lot to go on, but I am not sure what the problem is. I have booted several Linux distros on this machine before (Thinkpad x230, circa 2012?), so I know it isn't a hardware compatibility problem at the kernel level.

***Update*** When I remove my laptop from the dock, everything works as it should, so it appears the live ISO doesn't like my hardware afterall, lol. I'm not seeking a fix, just thought I'd leave this up in case someone else has a similar issue and is troubleshooting. It is quite possible this only is a problem for the live ISO and wouldn't happen if I installed it to the hard drive.
Hi GuntherT, always nice to hear from you.

I'm not sure what to say, I know as we progress further with Kernels and more and more hardware to support comes on the market that the 'one-kernel-fits-all' paradigm is disappearing especially when we add in the specialized nature of the RT Kernel.. I can't say if your hardware issue relates to the Kernel or not but other than our RT Kernel all the 'chassis and wheels' system support stuff is not modified by me from whatever MX Linux provides.

I have added a section of the User Manual trying to address the increasing compatibility issues that seem to pop up related to Kernel and Hardware support on page 25:

http://bandshed.net/pdf/AVL-MXE-User-Manual.pdf
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by GuntherT »

I had a spare 80GB SSD, and the drive on the x230 is super quick to swap out, so I installed AVL on it. After booting into the new system, the docking station worked fine. I don't know why the live ISO didn't like it, but installing the OS to a SSD solved the issue I was having.

As a quick test, I started Ardour, created tracks for all 18 inputs on my interface and recorded them at 64 frames/3 periods for 10 minutes. 3 xruns were produced. I recorded again with the settings at 128/2, and there were no xruns after 10 minutes of recording. I tried again at 64 frames/3 periods, but only recorded two tracks since I will never be over-dubbing more than two tracks at a time, and there were no xruns. I continued to add two tracks at a time, playing back all recorded tracks while recording two new tracks, and after three passes, still no xruns. While not a scientific experiment and the computer itself is a big factor, clearly the default settings for AVL are really good for low latency recording. Thanks again for your efforts, @GMaq.
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by Jaaxx »

Not sure if it's a bug or expected, but I noticed an issue with the VSTs installed in /usr/local/lib/vst. While it appears that LinVST has been run on the dll files (.so are present) they will not run out of the box (at least not in LiveUSB environment.) I was assuming that the sample VSTs would be functional OOB. Perhaps the fact that /usr/local/lib/vst was not in the vst path for Carla and Ardour should have been a hint. :o

I found that I had to run LinVST over the directory once to replace the installed .so files and all is good.

After some testing I can say this looks to be a fantastic release and I have no qualms whatsoever with installing this in my home studio ASAP.
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by GMaq »

Jaaxx wrote: Tue May 25, 2021 3:56 am Not sure if it's a bug or expected, but I noticed an issue with the VSTs installed in /usr/local/lib/vst. While it appears that LinVST has been run on the dll files (.so are present) they will not run out of the box (at least not in LiveUSB environment.) I was assuming that the sample VSTs would be functional OOB. Perhaps the fact that /usr/local/lib/vst was not in the vst path for Carla and Ardour should have been a hint. :o

I found that I had to run LinVST over the directory once to replace the installed .so files and all is good.

After some testing I can say this looks to be a fantastic release and I have no qualms whatsoever with installing this in my home studio ASAP.
Hi Jaaxx, Yes that appears to be true and is probably due to that fact that I included some new plugins into the 'avl-mxe-extra-plugins-dist' package and installed that package just before building the release and I forgot to re-run LinVST after installing them, this is why the how-to Video in the release announcement was made..

It may not be a totally bad thing even though it is inconvenient, I've found on a Live session often the first Plugin scan of Ardour would choke on the WinVST part because Wine had not been run yet and would crash when it had to write its whole config in the middle of the Plugin scan... This way the video details the order of how to do things and other visual specifics that may not be obvious especially to people who have never used LinVST before..

Beyond that, glad to hear you like what you see.

@GuntherT

That's nice to hear! Some great numbers you've posted, To my knowledge AVL-MXE should have every tweak in the realtime quick config scan included, even for live sessions so I'm glad to see in your case you have complimentary hardware that works well with it!
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by gennargiu »

Hi Glenn,great news !!! Best regards from Naples (italy) :D

gennaro
Hp Elite 8200 3,1 Ghz - 16 Giga Ram Hd 2 Terabyte - Mx Linux 19.4-Ardour 6.8 - Mixbus 7
Asus X54c - Mx Linux 19.4-Ardour 6.8- Mixbus 7-RPI3 + Raspbian Buster- Rpi4 (4giga ram)
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by robbert-vdh »

@GMaq Pinging you here since you asked about this in the last AV Linux thread, but it looks like the GeekosDAW team (an OpenSUSE based audio distro) has taken up the task of creating a minimal GUI around `yabridgectl`:

Image

You can find the project here. Might be useful to be aware of if you ever want to bundle yabridge with a future version of AV Linux so you don't have to do duplicate work yourself. :D
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Re: AVL-MXE 2021.05.22 ISO Update Released!

Post by GMaq »

@robbert-vdh

Oooh that is very nice!! Thanks for the heads up and to the GeekosDAW team, great work!!
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