Do you have an interface that works best with 48000 instead of 44100?

[bluebell]

This is no discussion of 48000 vs. 96000 vs. 192000 and so on but the question if some audio interfaces work better with 48000 than with 44100.

With my Focusrite Scarlett USB interfaces (Solo, 2i2, 2i4) I noticed that I can run them at 44100 with a buffer size of 64 without xruns. But at 48000 I can go down to 32 or even 24(!) on an old Core i5-2500T. I have not even a realtime kernel but a lowlatency kernel.

Additionally, when I run them at 44100 then I have some occasional clicks (about 1 per minute) that sound as if caused by a light switch or a refrigerator that starts cooling. No clicks when running them at 48000.

So it seems that there are some native and some non-native modes when running audio interfaces. Possible causes:
- Interfaces' firmware
- Internal ALSA structures
- Undocumented commands needed to prepare an interface for 44100

Do you have any interfaces where you observe similar effects? Only with Linux? Or maybe with Mac or Windows, too?

[Jack Winter]

AFAIK that is a possibility with more than one card.

[bluebell]

AFAIK that is a possibility with more than one card.

It happens with a single interface connected to the PC as well.

[Michael Willis]

You are possibly already aware of this, and I'm not even sure how relevant it is anymore, but this document seems to indicate that 48000 may be inherently better for some USB interfaces:

https://wiki.linuxaudio.org/wiki/list_o ... _interface

I have the first generation 2i4. After reading this, I use a sample rate of 48000 with periods/buffer set to 3, and the buffer size depends on how cpu intensive my project is. My cpu is older than your i5. If I'm recording a single virtual instrument or audio track, I can get away with a buffer size of 64, but if I'm doing a large project in a heavyweight DAW with dozens of tracks, multiple instances of LinuxSampler, and a handful of reverb busses, the buffer size has to be 256. That includes running a realtime kernel from AVLinux and turning off my wifi.

[Jack Winter]

It happens with a single interface connected to the PC as well.

What I meant is that I've heard about this happening with different cards. Never experienced it myself.

[English Guy]

I have an alesis io2. It is hard wired at 48000. If it was run at 44000 it would be constantly converting

[puleglot]

With my Focusrite Scarlett USB interfaces (Solo, 2i2, 2i4) ...

Additionally, when I run them at 44100 then I have some occasional clicks (about 1 per minute) that sound as if caused by a light switch or a refrigerator that starts cooling. No clicks when running them at 48000.

Are all of these 2nd gen? If yes, then you indeed hit the kernel bug. Solo was fixed last year [1], 2i2 and 2i4 will be fixed in 5.7 [2,3]. Explanation of the bug is in the last commit.

[1] https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/ke ... 250db5d0e5
[2] https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/ke ... 032dabf2e4
[3] https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/ke ... 20b7eaaf60

[bluebell]

1st and 2nd gen. Thanks for the info. Since then I stay with 48 kHz and everything is running ok.