Will Reason support linux in the future.

[jappe]

My prediction is that it will run on Linux in about 5 years. Inside a browser.

That could happen:
https://www.propellerheads.com/blog/run ... on-the-web

[napynap]

If we can't get Reason Compact on Android, which has a huge base on mobile, but similarly fractured OS install base as Linux, then there are many hurdles yet to clear for a full Linux based Reason.

[jjrh]

I don't think I've ever seen an interface whose drivers are supported on a linux box. I just searched and confirmed, of the handful of brands I searched, none list Linux as supported.

Linux has excellent support for USB Audio Class-Compliant devices. The Linux kernel scheduler is better than both Windows and Mac OS, and you can easily run with smaller buffers without glitches. You won't get the manufacturer's control panel interface, but quite a few parameters are exposed in the default desktop mixer software.

I actually helped the ALSA team add support for multi-channel RME, TerraTec, and MOTU devices back in the early 2000s. We had to contact chip makers and get low-level interface documentation, and write custom drivers for each card back then. The current pro USB interfaces are so much easier to get working.

When Linux is setup right for audio it's pretty damn awesome, stuff like JACK is incredibly useful and powerful. Some of the opensource synths and LADSPA plugins are really awesome (but have horrible UIs)

The main issue is actually getting linux setup right which isn't always easy or trivial for even people who are comfortable in linux. There are so many edge cases where shit will just not work and when it does you don't want to look at it too hard. I know people cite existing commercial offerings as supporting linux, but I do wonder what their linux userbase is actually like, or if supporting linux was mostly free - a matter of adding a linux build target and avoiding platform specific libraries.

Things are getting better however by the day. It wasn't long ago you would install and X11 wouldn't even start and would spend ages getting the right magic (and then not even get accelerated video).

I would sure love Reason to run on linux though - only reason I have a windows computer is for Reason and on occasion games.

[valpd]

It's frustrating to see people so unaware of Linux.

As far as hardware support goes.....for devices, I have used audio interfaces from M-Audio, MOTU, EMU, RME, ECHO and Sound Blaster all natively supported in Linux. No need to download and install drivers.

Ardour is a DAW that is as good or better than Protools (I engineered in big studios using protools). I prefer Ardour. Reaper is cool too.

As far as running Reason running in WINE....WINE is not a Virtual Machine. It is a Windows Emulator. There are libraries that allow translation to Linux libraries. Many applications run flawlessly in WINE. I use Photoshop in WINE on a daily basis.

I am an IT Specialist for a living. I support over 125 Windows Desktops and over 150 IOS Devices. Anyone who thinks that Windows or MAC OSX (or IOS) are better operating systems have never used Linux. Linux has MUCH better Processor Management and Memory Management.

Microsoft will be based on Linux in the next 10 years.

For those of you who think that Linux is a fringe OS that no one uses.......Android is based on Linux. Android had an 87 percent share of the global phone market in 2019. MAC OSX is based on FREE BSD which is a form of Linux. Google uses Linux for their Desktops and their web servers. Linux runs Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram and Amazon runs a customized version of Linux on their web server. You can see what OS websites are running at https://sitereport.netcraft.com/

Linux is easier to install than Windows or Mac OSX and has been easier for the last 4 or 5 years. Most printers and scanners are automatically supported without the need to download and install drivers.

If you are interested, I recommend Linux Mint for desktop users and Ubuntu Studio for music producers.

[guitfnky]

the last time I used Linux (a couple of years ago), they were still trying to more or less duplicate the Windows/Mac experience. seems like they’re not going to ever break through to a place where they’ve got a competitive (read: broader) user base without differentiating themselves in ways that appeal to more people. most people don’t need the kind of customizability that Linux is built for. some don’t even need the kind of customizability Windows is built for (i.e. Mac users—and I don’t mean that in a disparaging way—I used and loved Macs for a long time before switching back to PC).

I’d wager Reason has a broad enough user base as it is with the two major OS’.

[TheDragonborg]

Linux's competitive edge is that it's free... and there's distros that work on really low end hardware. It made my POS laptop usable again for basic tasks (web browsing, office type work, some very light gaming (emulators)).

[DaveyG]

The Linux problem is simple: There are too many different flavours of Linux.
Imagine trying support a product on all those different distros.
The expense and effort would far outweigh the reward for most DAW companies.

[polysix]

Sorry for my rough English

It feels like running in a cycle. Linux (today for me Ubuntu) gives in some distributions the option for a minimal install. All the power can run in the DAW no service running in the background.
I use Bitwig on Ubuntu it is so simple to setup (Alsa).. And it runs the same way like on windows.
But i do not change...

I spend so much money in rack extensions and plugins there are not able on Linux..

At the end I'm on my windows PC.. It is only the system not the DAW.

[Bjørn Felle]

Does the rack plugin work in Linux? I know there are bridging plugins that allow some Windows VSTs to work in Linux, but would it work for Reason 11? I’m still on 10.4 so can’t test it myself

[Re8et]

What I want is a box that would look like Balance (I love its design), but with Reason (14?) inside, a couple of USB-C ports (OK more than a couple) and multiple high def video outs. And an internet connection or Wifi for cloud back up, updates and license sync, etc.
Always ON. Zero fan noise, just like my faithful 1040 ST.

By Moore's law, in a couple oy years, there could be a raspberry pi running an octa-core as powerful as today ryzen9, half the size of today most little pieberry.
Run ElkOs or any other Linux, in partnership with Behringer, which makes quite handsome audiocards, cheaper and more robustly usb class compliants than Motu can handle.
And you have it. I would then love to access it by the mean of an ethernet - network port, and run Reason through a browser, no internet required! That is not something for a pro.
You want every wi-fi or anything that can throttle your system disabled, even if it's a powerbench with quadrillion's memory multitasking... cloud backup is cool but i'd do it over my own network. I'd be ultrapissed if it was enabled by default. EMI interferences in my studio? No thanks. NO wi-fi. Ever. I know 5g is on the backdoor knocking but... thanks no.
When you make music one thing matter only. And that is LAG. I love Atari cubase. Zero lag. Stunning equipment by today standards.

[Re8et]

It's frustrating to see people so unaware of Linux.

As far as hardware support goes.....for devices, I have used audio interfaces from M-Audio, MOTU, EMU, RME, ECHO and Sound Blaster all natively supported in Linux. No need to download and install drivers.

Ardour is a DAW that is as good or better than Protools (I engineered in big studios using protools). I prefer Ardour. Reaper is cool too.

As far as running Reason running in WINE....WINE is not a Virtual Machine. It is a Windows Emulator. There are libraries that allow translation to Linux libraries. Many applications run flawlessly in WINE. I use Photoshop in WINE on a daily basis.

I am an IT Specialist for a living. I support over 125 Windows Desktops and over 150 IOS Devices. Anyone who thinks that Windows or MAC OSX (or IOS) are better operating systems have never used Linux. Linux has MUCH better Processor Management and Memory Management.

Microsoft will be based on Linux in the next 10 years.

For those of you who think that Linux is a fringe OS that no one uses.......Android is based on Linux. Android had an 87 percent share of the global phone market in 2019. MAC OSX is based on FREE BSD which is a form of Linux. Google uses Linux for their Desktops and their web servers. Linux runs Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram and Amazon runs a customized version of Linux on their web server. You can see what OS websites are running at https://sitereport.netcraft.com/

Linux is easier to install than Windows or Mac OSX and has been easier for the last 4 or 5 years. Most printers and scanners are automatically supported without the need to download and install drivers.

If you are interested, I recommend Linux Mint for desktop users and Ubuntu Studio for music producers.

What about Roland boutiques ACB synths usb drivers?
I read they do not work even under WINE .
Something with the open source-ness architecture of Linux must be scaring them off, if they disabled even VM support for their drivers.

Android is based on Linux but is closed source, and then everything has to run through G-apps for additional security.
Android is far from being a lag free environment.

[bxbrkrz]

What I want is a box that would look like Balance (I love its design), but with Reason (14?) inside, a couple of USB-C ports (OK more than a couple) and multiple high def video outs. And an internet connection or Wifi for cloud back up, updates and license sync, etc.
Always ON. Zero fan noise, just like my faithful 1040 ST.

By Moore's law, in a couple oy years, there could be a raspberry pi running an octa-core as powerful as today ryzen9, half the size of today most little pieberry.
Run ElkOs or any other Linux, in partnership with Behringer, which makes quite handsome audiocards, cheaper and more robustly usb class compliants than Motu can handle.
And you have it. I would then love to access it by the mean of an ethernet - network port, and run Reason through a browser, no internet required! That is not something for a pro.
You want every wi-fi or anything that can throttle your system disabled, even if it's a powerbench with quadrillion's memory multitasking... cloud backup is cool but i'd do it over my own network. I'd be ultrapissed if it was enabled by default. EMI interferences in my studio? No thanks. NO wi-fi. Ever. I know 5g is on the backdoor knocking but... thanks no.
When you make music one thing matter only. And that is LAG. I love Atari cubase. Zero lag. Stunning equipment by today standards.

That's why 'my box' would have multiple USB-C ports. Local hard drives, audio and midi, etc. The wifi part was for updates, Re licenses, etc when I wrote that in 2019. As you said yourself with Mr Moore, who knows how amazing Wifi tech will be.
My ST was never turned off, only the monitors. Very stable tech.

[Re8et]

My ST was never turned off, only the monitors. Very stable tech.

Running some old-school server?? Beautiful stuff

[Re8et]

Does the rack plugin work in Linux? I know there are bridging plugins that allow some Windows VSTs to work in Linux, but would it work for Reason 11? I’m still on 10.4 so can’t test it myself

If you can't install Reason first... then no.
Even so, there's lots of problems with OpenGL crashings GUI's on existing- standalone dll - bridged ones.
I would not expect them to run on Linux in the short terms.

We might see a Linux-windows hybrid Ubuntu creature in the future... who knows...

[Bjørn Felle]

Does the rack plugin work in Linux? I know there are bridging plugins that allow some Windows VSTs to work in Linux, but would it work for Reason 11? I’m still on 10.4 so can’t test it myself

If you can't install Reason first... then no.
Even so, there's lots of problems with OpenGL crashings GUI's on existing- standalone dll - bridged ones.
I would not expect them to run on Linux in the short terms.

We might see a Linux-windows hybrid Ubuntu creature in the future... who knows...

Hmm, the installer might run under Wine but I assume the VST wrapper wouldn’t be able to locate the installed files even if you pointed it at the VST. Well, there goes my tentative plan to switch to Linux from mac OS :p

[Billy+]

Close the thread, you're never going to get some windows-nix hybrid as the code is closed and reverse engineering it is illegal. Even if some proper mad hat hacker managed to pull the full windows source together for a wine like release it would never happen as the Linux community wouldn't be able to legally use it.

It's a shame in all fairness as I love Linux and have used many different distros over the years, far to many to name and I can happily say I would swap to Linux if reason worked on any disttro, the main reason I swapped for widows to mac was the basic backbone of macs is a nix distro which gave it better file size & ram size support but with later version of windows now supporting such features I'm actually considering returning to windows after at least 8 years of not waiting for the studio to boot.

But seriously, just close this thread and make some noise.

[jam-s]

The Linux problem is simple: There are too many different flavours of Linux.
Imagine trying support a product on all those different distros.
The expense and effort would far outweigh the reward for most DAW companies.

That's not really the problem, as all those distributions basically ship the same libraries and applications. Also a dev can statically link their application or even bundle the libraries themselves if they do not want to rely on stable ABI from system libraries. Also if you want to support Linux as a dev you can simply support Debian and maybe CentOS/Fedora and you will have Linux support for >90% of all Linux distributions that are actively used today (as most other distributions can simply use the .deb or .rpm then.

[DaveyG]

The Linux problem is simple: There are too many different flavours of Linux.
Imagine trying support a product on all those different distros.
The expense and effort would far outweigh the reward for most DAW companies.

That's not really the problem, as all those distributions basically ship the same libraries and applications. Also a dev can statically link their application or even bundle the libraries themselves if they do not want to rely on stable ABI from system libraries. Also if you want to support Linux as a dev you can simply support Debian and maybe CentOS/Fedora and you will have Linux support for >90% of all Linux distributions that are actively used today (as most other distributions can simply use the .deb or .rpm then.

So why is Linux so badly supported by almost all of the mainstream audio app devs?
I'll help you out. It's because it's a market that can never pay back the investment. Linux is dominated by open source and free applications. The only way it will ever change is if a MEGA-PLAYER (Amazon/Google/Apple/The-One-You-Have-Not-Heard-Of-Yet) releases a killer distribution, and by "killer" I don't just mean killer application, I mean something that kills off the also-rans of the Linux world. We know that Google and Apple are not going to do that, because they already have their own flavour of it. Ubuntu is the closest, but it's really not that close. If it was going to happen, it would have happened by now.

I imagine there are a few commercial studios that are Linux-based. But they are edge-cases, the exception rather than the rule. Simples, mate.

[avasopht]

So why is Linux so badly supported by almost all of the mainstream audio app devs?
I'll help you out. It's because it's a market that can never pay back the investment. Linux is dominated by open source and free applications. The only way it will ever change is if a MEGA-PLAYER (Amazon/Google/Apple/The-One-You-Have-Not-Heard-Of-Yet) releases a killer distribution, and by "killer" I don't just mean killer application, I mean something that kills off the also-rans of the Linux world. We know that Google and Apple are not going to do that, because they already have their own flavour of it. Ubuntu is the closest, but it's really not that close. If it was going to happen, it would have happened by now.

I imagine there are a few commercial studios that are Linux-based. But they are edge-cases, the exception rather than the rule. Simples, mate.

That's a bit of a non sequitur.

There are lots of applications from high players on Linux, just not music production. Unity and Unreal have Linux support. BitWig. Experimental Reaper.

In any case, omission does not imply it's because it's too difficult to support.

And no, commercial studios wouldn't be running Linux because right now there are very few solid Linux based solutions. But that doesn't mean it would remain that way if Linux had a strong selection of DAWs and plugins.

[shani]

Does the rack plugin work in Linux? I know there are bridging plugins that allow some Windows VSTs to work in Linux, but would it work for Reason 11? I’m still on 10.4 so can’t test it myself

Are you saying you're using 10.4 on Linux? I'm on Reason 11 (also got 12 through Reason+ but haven't switched yet) and recently installed and configured Manjaro to my liking. And while I'm planning to stay on a dual-boot config for now, if I ever wanted to make a full switch, being able to use Reason in Linux would be the only roadblock for me.

We might see a Linux-windows hybrid Ubuntu creature in the future... who knows...

you're never going to get some windows-nix hybrid

I'm not saying it's definitely going to happen, but with how Linux-friendly Microsoft (and in particular, Windows) has become in recent years, I could definitely envision a (potentially Windows-flavoured) Linux distro made by Microsoft in the future.

[Billy+]

Keep wishing but it's not happening, both windows and mac os have taken from Linux over the years but they will continue to build their vision of an operating system.

[ltbrunt00]

I doubt it. It's about devoting developer resources to an OS that is a small minority.

Well, it's a vicious circle - small user base, because there's no software.

I actually made a poll about that once for Bitwig and - surprisingly - the split was 47% / 26% / 27% for Windows, OSX and Linux respectively!

https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopi ... 3#p7271553

I am not on the Bitwig forums that much but I do use Bitwig on Ubuntu. Works rather nicely, no issues.

[madmacman]

I think the basic problem of Linux supporters (and I have such colleagues in the office as well) is that they choose the operating system according to ideological reasons and then look at what applications are available for their needs.

But it's the other way around: I consciously choose a certain application and then check for which platforms it is available. If I want to use Logic Pro X, I cannot have it with Windows - it's that simple.

Quite frankly, I have no desire to be limited by the choice of operating system to a narrow selection of software that is not "commercially available". I rather prefer to support the proprietary market leaders.

[bxbrkrz]

To me the bigger issue is the lack of Linux driver support for pro audio cards. Reason going Linux would not matter that much for me if I can't use my RME cards. Maybe somebody already pointed to that obvious problem in the thread.

[aeox]

After being unable to reinstall windows 10/11 on my laptop, I was basically forced to switch to Linux/Reaper. Switching back to windows isn't looking like an option any time soon, either is Reason support on Linux!


Still have not figured out a way to get reason rack running on linux.. though I didn't put much effort into it.