Just noticed all my VSTi's are running Core Audio on my Mac, never looked before.
I’ve always been used to Asio, when I started using my Behringer 1820 this happened, as it’s class compliant with Mac no audio drivers are available for it.
Technical Editor, Sound On Sound...
(But generally posting my own personal views and not necessarily those of SOS, the company or the magazine!)
In my world, things get less strange when I read the manual...
Out of the three of them -- ASIO on Windows, ALSA on Linux and Core Audio on Mac Core Audio has the best design for audio. It uses a delay locked loop which adds a small amount of latency (8 -32 samples) but is more stable meaning less xruns (pops and clicks).
Paul Davis, the developer behind Ardour, JACK and the Linux RME drivers explains it here :
merlyn wrote:Out of the three of them -- ASIO on Windows, ALSA on Linux and Core Audio on Mac Core Audio has the best design for audio. It uses a delay locked loop which adds a small amount of latency (8 -32 samples) but is more stable meaning less xruns (pops and clicks).
Paul Davis, the developer behind Ardour, JACK and the Linux RME drivers explains it here :
As far as I know the low level design of ASIO, ALSA and Core Audio is still the same. It definitely is for ALSA.
Something that has changed is the rise of the monolithic DAW. Everything is a plug-in these days, run within one app -- Cubase, Ableton, Reaper ... The idea of a standalone app has mostly disappeared. Some of the advantages Paul Davis describes are for running multiple apps at the same time.
Things have moved on but the low level design remains the same.