Re: Re[2]: mLan and MacOS X
Re: Re[2]: mLan and MacOS X
- Subject: Re: Re[2]: mLan and MacOS X
- From: Michael Ashton <email@hidden>
- Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002 17:58:22 -0700
On Thursday, November 21, 2002, at 04:28 PM, Mikhail Matusov wrote:
MA> Just remember: if we don't get FireWire going for pro audio, USB
will
MA> take over the world.* And _we don't want that_. (Well, at least I
MA> don't.)
Hey, Michael, just from looking at your email address, how about the
TI
role in all of this ?^)))
I was wondering when someone would ask me about that ..
I do work for TI, but actually I work for the part that used to be
Burr-Brown. What I say on this list has zero to do with my job, my
opinions are my own, etc. etc. etc.
Now, you've noticed that my e-mail address is a TI one. Originally I
was subscribed under my IEEE forwarding address, but unfortunately I
couldn't get Mail and Apple's Mailman to agree to let me post from my
TI account. So I resubscribed on my TI address, 'cause I've got my IEEE
stuff forwarded to TI right now (temporary until I get my server back
in the colo station).
I know TI has a large chunk of the FireWire silicon market, but I don't
work for that side of the company, nor do I really know all that much
about its internals. I was a fan of FireWire long before I came to
Burr-Brown, and my interest in it is mostly personal.
I applaud your thoughts on secrecy, etc. I am sick of that too. But
unfortunately, the problem is not only with the mLAN, but rather with
all the 1394 related stuff. There is too much politics and conspiracy
attached to this technology. I have already expressed my thoughts on
this on another mailing list. I think the problem is in the turn-key
solution business model adopted by the main players in this game.
You are absolutely right; and the reason it's done that way is because
the guys buying 100k/year don't want to have to design anything - they
want the silicon maker to design half their system for them, which,
given the quantities involved, the silicon maker is frequently happy to
do.
There is no good silicon fitting pro audio requirements (AM protocol)
that
would be freely *open* for use by independent developers.
Yamaha has some stuff going with Fujifilm Micro, but good luck getting
your hands on it. No, I think the best way to do AMP is not to worry
about hardware support, but to do it in software using general purpose
LLCs; and that's certainly doable right now.
That said, I too would like a PHY+LLC+I2S device, maybe with, oh,
sixteen I2S lines. Eight in, eight out. And everything's handled for me
already. (The Yamaha chip is actually pretty close to that.) Oh, and
how about eight or nine UARTs too? And an ARM7TDMI. And I'd like that
in a TQFP or PBGA. And I'd like it for less than $5 in onesies. From
Digi-Key.
<sigh> Well, a guy can dream ... :)
Look at what
the cover page of the TI ice-Lynx datasheet says?
Yep. Bugs the crap out of me, too. I will say that there are surprising
reasons for being coy with some of this info - and it's not all about
trade secrets. Not that I agree with the reasons. (Hint: it's mostly
laziness.)
(An aside: I've been assured by certain of the TI FireWire types that
the GP2Lynx is the (TI) chip to use for embedded pro audio type stuff.
The iceLynx is for consumer-electronics weenies. Yeah, you have to hook
up a PHY to the GP2Lynx, but that's really quite easy to do.)
... You know there is a
better silicon from another company but with the similar strings
attached. I am all covered with NDA's, so sorry I can't talk absolutely
openly, unfortunately....
I think you're absolutely right about 1394 in general, and everybody's
to blame to some degree. Apple started it by trying to charge
exhorbitant licence fees; although they belatedly saw the light, the
whole thing's still wrapped in patents and garbage like layers of duct
tape, and it's generally been a crappy situation. It's getting better,
maybe, but we should have had FireWire everywhere five or six years ago.
And all this secrecy and, well, greed has had an interesting side
effect. 1394 is a big spec, but it's actually not that difficult to
understand, at least from a high level. But the "big iron" feel of the
way it's been deployed has, I think, convinced a lot of people that
FireWire stuff can only be implemented by a team of people with
unusually large foreheads and lots of money; whereas there are so many
books, tutorials, and blather on USB that everybody figures it's easy
(which it's not - especially not the HID(eous) stuff).
However, it seems that nobody is really interested to make this
technology mainstream for anything except camcorders.
It's well to remember, though, that camcorders are the number one
reason that FireWire still exists. Without them, we'd be bitching about
USB 2.0 right now. (Can you tell that I don't like USB?)
Pro audio is too
small for most of the silicon companies to bother, so they don't care.
For 1394 silicon, this is all too true. The 1394 silicon makers don't
seem to want to talk to anybody who's ordering less than 100k/year.
This is, well, kind of dumb, IMHO. Never mind, though; all we need is
data sheets, and MindShare has a very nice book on the standard itself.
I never call support lines unless I'm bored or desperate :) And yes,
you can order 1394 silicon from DigiKey. 'Nuff said.
I guess the only way around this would be if either Cirrus Logic or AKM
decided to get in the game. Their attitude towards pro audio is
probably better.
<burr-brown-semi-propaganda>
We're direct competition for them in pro audio, and definitely
involved; and even TI at large is starting to notice the audio market.
We at Burr-Brown are more than aware of the pro-audio world - we're
doing some really cool stuff in it. Unfortunately, we don't do FireWire
chips here in Tucson ...
</burr-brown-semi-propaganda>
(sorry, I know I said my emails here have zero to do with my job ..
well, I'm not in the audio group anyway ;) )
Sorry for this hardware talk on the software list, but all this is
somewhat related to the issue.
Sure is.
Despite my ranting, I still think 1394 kicks major butt, and that it's
the right way to go for pro audio. We just have to settle once and for
all on protocols; and I'm becoming convinced that waiting for "the
industry" to do it in a satisfactory manner is an exercise in futility.
----
Michael Ashton <email@hidden>
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