Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Unofficial support for the KXStudio Linux distribution and applications.
More info at http://kxstudio.linuxaudio.org/

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Tarrasque
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Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by Tarrasque »

Hi all.

I just recently managed to fix some broken hardware issues with my desktop PC and wanted to rebuild it from scratch.

I wanted to start with an Ubuntu distro, possibly with KDE, but avoiding derivatives like Mint.

The latest is 19.04. Is installing KXStudio via PPAs the best way to do it? Should I start with Kubuntu?

Last time I tried someone suggested me to use Neon, but unfortunately my desktob broke down some time after so I could not try it.
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sysrqer
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by sysrqer »

I would say Neon, it means you'll get up to date plasma but base of 18.04 LTS. I wouldn't bother with 19 unless you really have to.
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ufug
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by ufug »

sysrqer wrote:I would say Neon, it means you'll get up to date plasma but base of 18.04 LTS. I wouldn't bother with 19 unless you really have to.
Unless there's a particular feature you really really need, I agree on sticking with 18.04, any flavor. It's a solid base and LTS.

The only exception would be Ubuntu Studio since they have put a lot of work into 19.04, but I haven't tried it personally.
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Tarrasque
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by Tarrasque »

ufug wrote:
sysrqer wrote:I would say Neon, it means you'll get up to date plasma but base of 18.04 LTS. I wouldn't bother with 19 unless you really have to.
Unless there's a particular feature you really really need, I agree on sticking with 18.04, any flavor. It's a solid base and LTS.

The only exception would be Ubuntu Studio since they have put a lot of work into 19.04, but I haven't tried it personally.
If possible, I'd prefer 19:04 in order to have a state-of-the-art system.

Regarding Ubuntu studio, in an older post of mine I've been told that it could cause conflict in audio software with KXstudio. Isn't this the case anymore?
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by Michael Willis »

Tarrasque wrote:If possible, I'd prefer 19:04 in order to have a state-of-the-art system.
As others have recommended, unless there is something specific that you need from 19.04, it is probably better to use 18.04 as it has long term support. KXStudio will give you state-of-the-art audio software. Some variety of Ubuntu 18.04 will likely give you more stability than 19.04. If you want to try a different kernel, you can replace the one from 18.04 with one from Liquorix or AVLinux.
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by glowrak guy »

Tarrasque wrote: If possible, I'd prefer 19:04 in order to have a state-of-the-art system.
Kind of depends on what you do day-to-day, and then your future plans.
Newest and 'state of the art' are not synonymous, and in linux audio,
we are fortunate that many of the new things of value, can be added
to last years more stable base.

For the future, having multiple systems is trivial and cheap once you know your way around.
So you can have bleeding edge, testing, stable, dinosaur, and custom distributions
at your control, and never fear the Muse catching you unprepared or unable 8)
Cheers
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by nikgnomicradio »

KX Studio developer is on a break until later in the year
and there does not appear to have been any updates for KX released since Ubuntu 19.04 came out
so for KX packages may be better sticking with 18.04 LTS

Ubuntu Studio 19.04 has a new package 'Ubuntu Studio Controls' for JACK
appears to be very simple and effective alternative to KX and it can be added easily to any other Ubuntu flavour
This package has even been ported to AUR, but don't expect many on Arch based distro will be keen on something with Ubuntu in the name!

I still prefer using QjackCtl. That is still included by default in Studio, but is not pre-configured like it used to be

One of the Studio developers has recently made comments that adding KX packages will break Ubuntu Studio Controls and they do not recommend or support use of KX

If you really want to use KX packages, AVLinux on Debian has KX repositories already included and all works well on there
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by sprock »

nikgnomicradio wrote:One of the Studio developers has recently made comments that adding KX packages will break Ubuntu Studio Controls and they do not recommend or support use of KX
This is bad news for me; I've just installed Ubuntu Studio last weekend and was about to add the KX repos (and amongst other things I wanted to use Cadence instead of Ubuntu Studio Controls).

Do you remember where you read that? Do you have a link maybe?
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by lilith »

sprock wrote:
nikgnomicradio wrote:One of the Studio developers has recently made comments that adding KX packages will break Ubuntu Studio Controls and they do not recommend or support use of KX
This is bad news for me; I've just installed Ubuntu Studio last weekend and was about to add the KX repos (and amongst other things I wanted to use Cadence instead of Ubuntu Studio Controls).

Do you remember where you read that? Do you have a link maybe?
It's written directly on the website: https://kx.studio/
But I wonder if that really means end of the year.
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by sprock »

(Have you maybe answered the wrong post?)
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by lilith »

sprock wrote:(Have you maybe answered the wrong post?)
Yes, after re-reading I see :D
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nikgnomicradio
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by nikgnomicradio »

sprock wrote: This is bad news for me; I've just installed Ubuntu Studio last weekend and was about to add the KX repos (and amongst other things I wanted to use Cadence instead of Ubuntu Studio Controls).

Do you remember where you read that? Do you have a link maybe?
Erich Eickmeyer from Ubuntu Studio has said it in a few places online
It is Linux and you are free to do as you wish, but Ubuntu Studio will not recognise or support an OS with Cadence installed

Installing Cadence used to break QjackCtl functionality in Studio
It was no big deal if user is happy with Cadence
but was an annoyance for anyone having to rebuild audio stack if didn't want Cadence

my main concern would be no KX developer available to deal with any issues from changes for 19.04
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by ufug »

nikgnomicradio wrote:
sprock wrote: This is bad news for me; I've just installed Ubuntu Studio last weekend and was about to add the KX repos (and amongst other things I wanted to use Cadence instead of Ubuntu Studio Controls).

Do you remember where you read that? Do you have a link maybe?
Erich Eickmeyer from Ubuntu Studio has said it in a few places online
It is Linux and you are free to do as you wish, but Ubuntu Studio will not recognise or support an OS with Cadence installed

Installing Cadence used to break QjackCtl functionality in Studio
It was no big deal if user is happy with Cadence
but was an annoyance for anyone having to rebuild audio stack if didn't want Cadence

my main concern would be no KX developer available to deal with any issues from changes for 19.04
Just a brief comment re: KXStudio repos with Ubuntu Studio:

I had a drive failure last week and had to build a new system, so I took a stab at Ubuntu Studio 18.04 with the backports added. There were a half dozen plugins I needed to reinstall for a current project I am in the middle of, so I added the KXStudio repos to get them (I know a lot of you have no problems building stuff, but it is a royal PITA for someone like me with a 2% success rate).

There were no issues at all. To clarify, I didn't install any KX tools, no Cadence or anything else. Only some plugins. But it seems that the KXStudio repos and Ubuntu Studio can coexist. It would be great to get some clarity on anything besides Cadence that will potentially cause issues. I searched for Erich Eickmeyer + kxstudio but the only relevant thing I could find was this quote on his blog: "What’s next? Len and I agree that we’d like to make it so that nobody who runs Ubuntu Studio thinks they need to add the KXStudio repositories to have a complete audio setup." A goal I hope they can reach. But I couldn't find any explicit warnings.

I will also add that Ubuntu Studio has become a very nice distro overall. I like that during the install you can exclude huge groups of "media" software you don't want, and having everything pre-configured was GREAT. The Ubuntu Studio Controls is a pretty slick way to manage things (I work in Mixbus 99% of the time and for various reasons sometimes I run it with JACK and sometimes ALSA). Cadence always gave me grief with the various bridges working sometimes but not always. I also didn't realize how much I missed the snappiness of Xfce. Theming is low on my list of importance, but they've done some nice work there as well.

Sprock: What did you end up doing?
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by rghvdberg »

Just wanna add that quite a few plugins are gonna be in Ubuntu Studio 19.10.
The maintainer of ustudio talked about it on irc (#lad freenode).
IIRC DPF Plugins, LSP plugins and some more.
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Re: Best current Ubuntu for KXStudio

Post by sprock »

ufug wrote:Sprock: What did you end up doing?
First I thought of installing Xubuntu 18.04, set it up for audio, and add the KX repos. But then I dropped that thought and just left it as is. So I am still using UbuntuStudio 18.04 with Backports-PPA. Mainly for two reasons:

1. I have so many other things to do currently, that I had not enough time/energy.
2. The thought that it's maybe a better idea to wait for KXstudio to be again in full development/support.
ufug wrote:It would be great to get some clarity on anything besides Cadence that will potentially cause issues.
That would be great indeed.
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