Scott Wheeler wrote:
Just another friendly, geeeky, explanation of what you're seeing -- when you cat everything to /dev/null, that effectively puts all of those samples into memory.
Yes, I'm aware of that :-)
However, that's not connected to CPU performance; it's much more connected to hard drive speed and more specifically how the OS prioritizes different operations and how much of the file system information it keeps in memory.
I know that, too. My point is just my system seems fast enought, I can do 20+ tracks in ardour (which admittedly knows which samples should be played in advance). And my HD is performing ok: ajstrup:~# hdparm -t /dev/hda4 /dev/hda4: Timing buffered disk reads: 122 MB in 3.01 seconds = 40.47 MB/sec It would be nice if chuck had a way of filling a SndBuf in the background, it should be finished when it's ready but should cause no hickups, and an a possibly with an ability to check at any given time if the reading has been completed. -- peace, love & harmony Atte http://atte.dk | http://myspace.com/attejensen http://anagrammer.dk | http://atte.dk/compositions