When talking about recording studios, you can’t avoid two operating systems. One of them comes preinstalled on most PCs and laptops, you can buy the hardware for a few euros at any grocery store, and its name is basically synonymous with “PC”: Windows. The other comes from Apple, is tied to comparatively expensive hardware, and is built on a Unix-like kernel. Usually, producers start out on a Windows PC, then professionalize at some point and switch to Mac. The reason is pretty simple: Mac is stable and doesn’t force updates on you while you’re rendering your 64-track audio.
Mainly because of its widespread use, Windows is the quasi-standard in every smaller studio — and definitely among bedroom producers. But let’s be honest: Is Windows even up to date for studio work anymore?
I used Linux in the studio for many years. Now, as part of becoming more professional as a musician, I had to switch back to Windows. Not because my DAW isn’t available for Linux, but because I rely on plugins that simply don’t work on Linux, even with Wine. This text is a call to Native Instruments, Orchestral Tools, Musio, and all the other brilliant developers who make plugins for Mac and Windows — but neglect Linux.
Stability isn’t a luxury — it’s a basic requirement
The internet is Linux. That’s not an empty phrase — it’s a fact. 8 out of 10 servers run Linux. There are several reasons for that, but the main one is stability. Linux basically never crashes. I mean compared to Windows, it really never crashes. That doesn’t mean Linux is 100% fault-free, but the reason most high-availability services use it is the rock-solid stability Linux provides. Add to that:
ASIO, DirectSound, WASAPI: To get low latency on Windows, you need special drivers. For real-time performance, there’s no way around ASIO. If your audio interface doesn’t have native ASIO drivers, you need ASIO4ALL or FreeASIO to even approach latencies under 10 ms. Linux ships with PipeWire and JACK out of the box. Combined with a real-time kernel, any standard USB audio interface runs more stable and faster than it would on Windows.
Updates only when I want them: Linux might suggest that you should update, but it will never apply updates without your consent. Which means: Your studio session will never be interrupted by an unasked-for reboot.
Security and repositories: Most Linux users get their software from official distribution repositories. Developers can maintain updates much more cleanly and centrally, because a Linux user’s system is updated holistically. Unless you’re on bleeding-edge Arch, the software has been tested by thousands of users and runs stable.
My Studio, My Rules — Privacy and Control
Windows phones home constantly and sends telemetry data. That costs CPU cycles, RAM, and so on. Every byte sent to Microsoft is performance you’d rather use for an amazing delay sound or granular synthesis. A studio PC is an isolated tool, not an ad platform. When I’m making music, I don’t need Candy Crush or OneDrive. I also don’t need an OS wasting resources to take screenshots for some background AI.
Power for Music
If the PC only does what I configured it to do, then my DAW and its subprocesses (plugins) get exactly the performance they need. I can tweak services based on forum posts so that a DAW runs on a 10-year-old laptop almost as well as on a brand-new Windows machine. I’m no longer forced to constantly buy new hardware because the OS insists on stuffing my RAM with telemetry. Plugins get all the resources.
TPM and Legacy
A major reason many studios still use Windows 10 is that their machine doesn’t have a TPM chip — and even though the PC is only five years old, it technically needs to be replaced just to run Windows 11. We all know the hassle of reinstalling every VST, every copy-protection system, every config. Many studio owners aren’t elite IT people. They just need the machine to run. Reinstalling everything is a real burden. And let’s be honest: Microsoft desperately wants everything in the cloud. By Windows 12 at the latest, this will be a serious problem for studios.
VST SDK, CLAP, and the JUCE Framework
Steinberg — probably partly because of CLAP — has finally put the VST SDK under a reasonable license, so the software can be used more broadly. The VST SDK now runs cleanly on Linux, Mac, and Windows. The CLAP standard, developed with smaller studios like U-He and Bitwig, works great across all three platforms. And the JUCE framework is also fully cross-platform. In other words: the foundation is already there.
Cooperation, not just porting
Even Linus Torvalds knows that the sheer number of Linux distributions and the variety of DEB, RPM, or AUR packaging is a big challenge for any developer studio. I also understand that plugin profit margins depend on how many OSes you support. So here’s my proposal to you, dear VST developers:
Work closely with the major studio-focused Linux distros. Talk to AVLinux, Fedora Jam, Ubuntu Studio. Develop concepts for distributing plugins in a distro-agnostic way.
Regardless of whether someone installs a plugin via apt, yay, or yum, the files always end up in the same directories. Plugins live in /usr/lib/vst or in the user’s home directory. Creating a cross-distribution installer shouldn’t be hard.
Reference Platform
If audio experts work together with OS experts, the fastest and most stable audio OS in history could emerge. Bitwig, Renoise, and REAPER have already shown it’s possible. Users are ready to switch: they just want to make music and are waiting for their favorite tools.
You could be pioneers — you just have to sit down with the Linux audio community. They want to help you. Projects like yabridge, Ardour, or Carla prove that it works. These people know their craft, and they’ll help you without needing big budgets.
Start the dialogue with the Linux audio community. And the best part: You don’t even need to go open source. Steam has proven that.
Schreibe einen Kommentar