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More => Old Versions => Media Center 11 (Development Ended) => Topic started by: Mastiff on December 11, 2002, 04:04:54 am

Title: What's the big deal about ASIO?
Post by: Mastiff on December 11, 2002, 04:04:54 am

Hi!
I've tried to search a bit here and there, but can't find out what makes ASIO superior to direct sound. Could somebody please enlighten me?  8)

Title: Re: What's the big deal about ASIO?
Post by: bspachman on December 11, 2002, 06:09:41 am

Quote

Hi!
I've tried to search a bit here and there, but can't find out what makes ASIO superior to direct sound. Could somebody please enlighten me?  8)

Not being an expert, ASIO is a another driver model for those Windows OSes that support it. It was designed from the ground up as a low-latency, professional-grade framework for recording and other audio operations by Steinberg.

It's primarily advantageous if you are running WDM-based drivers in WindowsNT and 2000. I don't know about XP. The Windows 9x (& ME) family use a diffferent driver flavor called VxD.

At least in Win2k, the problem with WDM drivers is that it passes all audio information through something called the KMixer. This "wonderful" piece of software would automatically downsample the audio & add latency into the playback. Basically, it downgraded audio quality.

The VxD drivers don't have the KMixer, so audio applications frequently sounded better on Win9x, etc. than on the flagship OSes.

ASIO allows applications to bypass KMixer and send the bitstream directly out of the card. I notice a difference in the sound quality when using ASIO and my M-Audio Dio 2496 on Win2k. Also, it allows uncorrupted bitstreams to pass through--eg. DTS CDs.

There is more information than you can shake a stick at on this subject over at the AVS Forums:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/

Best,
Brad

Title: Re: What's the big deal about ASIO?
Post by: Mastiff on December 11, 2002, 06:35:41 am

Thanks! I'll have a look at the AVS Forum. And then I'll try to see if I can do it, and if the sound is different, with my XP Pro & Audigy 2 setup.  8)

Title: Re: What's the big deal about ASIO?
Post by: Doof on December 11, 2002, 06:37:01 am

Does your soundcard need to support ASIO or is it just a software thing?

Title: Re: What's the big deal about ASIO?
Post by: bspachman on December 11, 2002, 07:19:00 am

Quote

Does your soundcard need to support ASIO or is it just a software thing?

Well, technically it's just a software thing, but the entire chain of software needs to support ASIO: Source App->Soundcard drivers->Soundcard.

I believe any soundcard could support ASIO, but most don't. They need to write a specific driver for it. I know M-Audio does, I'm sure RME does, I'll be that at least some of the SoundBlaster cards support it, but I have no idea which ones...

Best,
Brad

Title: Re: What's the big deal about ASIO?
Post by: Ingo on December 11, 2002, 08:08:49 am

As far as I know only Creativ's Audigy(2) line supports ASIO.
For the live seriews (and PCI512) there are alternative drivers available from http://kxproject.spb.ru/index.php?skip=1
Unfortunately the have some issues with the windows mixer stuff (probably doesn't apply when using asio ;-))....

Ingo

Title: Re: What's the big deal about ASIO?
Post by: phelt on December 11, 2002, 10:42:43 am

In a nutshell, ASIO kicks ass ;) Here's a quick definition:
\http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci213488,00.html

IIRC, Steinberg developed it. Yes, your soundcard needs to support it.