Abstraction layers, Distraction layers, and EPROMs

[MrKnobs]

The thread about hating Gibson took a turn into hardware vs software recording systems.  Craig's post with his 1980's predictions got me thinking about how computers have devolved since the early days of Macs and C64's - and how they continue to devolve.  This issue is central to the ills of our society in many ways and very relevant to music.  Bear with me while I explain.

First let's talk about computers a little.

Remember Commodore 64s, Apple computers, earlier stuff like PETs, KIMs, Wangs, etc?  You turned them on and they were instantly on.  Seconds, not minutes.  This was possible because their OS was in PROM, the original solid state drive.  All electronic, no moving parts, and not very easily messed with.  There were no viruses yet because it wasn't possible to program one for a machine that had it's entire OS in a solid state chip that could only be changed physically.  You had to have your hands on the chip, use an ultraviolet light to erase it, or a least flip a dip switch so you could electronically write something different on it.

The REAL operating system on the computer you're reading this one is still an EPROM.  I'm talking about the BIOS, the thing that boots up first.  It's fast, it simply works.  What takes the little time it does take is the BIOS spinning up the slow hard drives, waiting on devices to report back that they're there and working.

That's the same way my multitrack hard disk recorder works today.  It's fast, reliable, no viruses, no need for copy protection because copying is complicated and the software is free from the manufacturer to anyone who bought one of the devices.  You turn it on, it simply works.   It's exactly smart enough to do what I need it to do and it does the same thing every time.  I might be tempted to add a bunch of crap to it that I don't need - like you and I both do with our computers - but I can't so I don't.  This machine stays on task and makes me stay on task.

The first Macs (Mac 512s, or Mac minuses as we used to call them after Mac pluses came out) were also the first machines to have viruses.  That happened because it was now possible.  The operating system was on a floppy disk, and it could be easily changed by another program.  No human intervention required.  nVirA and nVirB quickly became a common topic of discussion.  The two versions even eventually "learned" to meet and "mate" inside your computer, creating random variants of themselves just like living organisms do, in order to evade the early virus removal programs.

Why have the OS on disk?  So it could be changed more easily.  Updated or corrupted, two sides of the same coin.  Can't have one without the possibility of the other.  This is where all our problems began.  We wanted more convenience and flexibility.

Now let's talk about abstraction layers.

The first computers gave programmers complete access to the hardware.  You were literally programming in binary, even if it was represented in octal or hexadecimal.  You had a little card with the simple steps the little processor understood, and you assembled a huge number of them together in order to create a useful program.   To do this, you had to understand the hardware, not just the processor but the video controller, the keyboard, the speaker, the tape or disk drive, anything you wanted to control you had to understand on the hardware level.

Assemblers came along to make things a little bit more abstract by letting you name variables and use words for the processor instructions, but you stil had to understand the machine you were controlling.

When the Commodore PET came out, experienced programmers (myself included) learned to make the most of the 4 or 8k (yeah, kilobytes, not megabytes or the gigabytes of today) of memory the simple little machines provided.  The way to make the most of it was to understand and use the prewritten subroutines in the EPROM, simple programs that moved blocks of text, informed you of when the video screen was retracing so you could stick images there between frames, etc.   This was a layer of abstraction between the programmer and the hardware as you didn't have to understand how the graphic chip worked anymore, you just had to know what the EPROM subroutine did and what information to pass to it.

Next, just like on mainframes, higher level languages were introduced on microcomputers so you needed to know nearly nothing about the internal workings of the machine, at least not to do simple things and if you didn't need the extreme speed that machine level programming provides.  The point here is that some of the capacity of the machine was now consumed by not just the operating system but inefficiency of the higher level language in converting your instructions to machine code.  A trade off of capability for programmer time.

Flash forward to Windows and Macs.  The early Macs stayed with the idea that a program folder should contain everything the program needs to run, i.e be self contained.  There was no "registry," no central hive of information that informed the operating system of every aspect of an "installed" program.  In fact, to install a program you simply dragged it to the disk.  To uninstall it, you simply deleted it.  It was gone!  No piles of crap hanging around, bloating the registry, slowing your computer down.

Windows was the beginning of the end. First came the registry, and having to "install" and "uninstall" programs.  At first, any hardware you wanted to add or change on your Apple computer you had to buy from Apple.  IBM, in order to compete, had to make their machine open source so that anyone could make parts for it.  That was a pivotal point in human history, not just computer history.  It was the true beginning of the computer age.

So now, with the registry, we have yet another abstraction layer between the programmer and the machine, between the user and the machine.  If your registry becomes corrupt or erased and can't be restored, all your programs are useless, gone.   If you want to do graphics, likely  your program needs to call DirectX the Windows abstraction layer for graphics.. and on and on.

But now there is yet another abstraction layer, the Microsoft .NET concept.   More complexity, more distance between the user, the application programmer and the machine. 

Where does it end?  Each new version of, say, Microsoft Word, does essentially the same things (yet with a curiously different interface you have to learn all over again), even each Windows version is 90% the same as the last with a new veneer painted on it.  And each change requires a faster machine to get the same output time and pushes both the user and the programmer farther from the hardware.

Why?  So the hardware and software makers can keep selling product into a saturated market.

Does your refrigerator need a computer in it?  Does it need to be connected to the internet?  Will someone write a virus that spoils your food while you're away on vacation unless you give the virus author your credit card number?  Will putting a computer in your fridge make your life any better? Any simpler?   Probably not.

The bigger picture and how it relates to music.

Not too many people will argue my points above (mostly because few will care or see the liberties I took in discussing operating systems) but now for the point of this:

Are all your computer programs, all your electronics, all your clever effects and devices, all your boutique amplifiers, all your self tuning guitars and pitch transposers and tremolo systems worth the time and money your spending on them, or are they abstraction layers, DIStraction layers between you and the instrument, between you and your songwriting?  How much would you lose (or gain) if you just sold it all and got back to basics, maybe used a little Zoom Q3 video/audio handheld for your recording needs?  What would you do with if you got back all the time and money you spent on all this complicated crap and just sang, played your instrument, and wrote songs?

Are your songs really that much better when you record them on 32 tracks, work on each one for hundreds of hours, pitch correct them to death, add layers of vocals and effects, try a hundred different kick drum samples, agonize over how much early reflection to dial in on your reverb?  Do you think the listener cares as much as you do?  Will any of that matter when you upload it to YouTube where most people listen to music?

A Zoom Q3 has an EPROM operating system.  You just turn it on and it works, boots instantly.  No viruses possible, just press record.  It works every time, no setup required.  It fits in your pocket or loops on your belt. You'll never lose a song idea trying to get it working.  It's the perfect abstraction layer without the distraction layer. 

Just don't leave the batteries in it for too long when you're not using it.

Terry D.

P.S. Yeah, I know. TL/DR.

[blue2blue]

Dedicated, single-purpose devices and systems have luxuries of design that are not afforded to multi-purpose and especially repurposeable systems. But, of course, those luxuries come at a cost going forward: inflexibility. In some applications, the pluses will outweigh the minuses, but, of course, not in all.

To the vexation of some, I continue doing all my music production, video editing, and web/database developing on a basic desktop box that cost about $400 to my door in 2006. (That was sans everything but a DVD-ROM, typically noisy Seagate 80 GB drive, and a cheap keyboard. I quadrupled the RAM to 2 GB and added a TI-chipped FW card to support my MOTU 828mkII and added a TB and change of HDDs.

It runs XP very nicely and is very quiet. (Why shouldn't it be? Single core P4HT CPU  and minimal, integrated GPU.)

But, you know, if I was sample-crazy or needed to do a lot of video rendering, I'd be looking at 64 bits and a bunch of RAM, and, of course, a modern 64 bit OS. (XP 64 was apparently a very good OS -- but it was far from universally supported by other software and HW.)

Now, I haven't used very many dedicated digital 'table top recorders' -- but I could definitely see how they would cramp my style, particularly when I drift away from the acoustic-oriented roots music I've played in recent years and back to my electronica roots. (You should pardon the expression. But I owned probably 7 or 8 synths before I ever owned a banjo or mandolin. So, you know, roots is roots.)

 

[Rudolf von Hagenwil]

For those who live in the past, and/or assuming that all other people have the same moderate demand in technic.

 

Today operating systems are on Solid-State-Drivee, and is ready in about about 7 second.

I have to mix 100+ tracks, sometmes 300 or more in one project, for that we needed four or more PCM 32 track machines in the past.

Even a pop song has 50+ tracks.

I still compose in my mind, most often standing on the terrace or making a walk in the garden. When the idea is together, then it gets played into the computer.

When I record musicians we rehears first and when they don't get it in three takes then I loose my good mood.

Nobody goes on the internet with a working machine, therefor no virus..

In case a computer crashes, then the whole C drive including all installed programs are played back in 17 minutes on a machine with a 5 GB Windows and 400 GB installed programs. or we simply start the machine from another drive.

 

This are some facts how music is produced in a studio.

And yes, I want a refrigerator which goes shopping on the internet, that would save a lot of time.

[MikeRivers]

 

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MrKnobs wrote: Are all your computer programs, all your electronics, all your clever effects and devices, all your boutique amplifiers, all your self tuning guitars and pitch transposers and tremolo systems worth the time and money your spending on them, or are they abstraction layers, DIStraction layers between you and the instrument, between you and your songwriting?  How much would you lose (or gain) if you just sold it all and got back to basics, maybe used a little Zoom Q3 video/audio handheld for your recording needs?  What would you do with if you got back all the time and money you spent on all this complicated crap and just sang, played your instrument, and wrote songs?

 

This is one of those "there are two kinds of pepole in this world" things. For some, their songs are really made because of those 75 tracks. For the others, having 75 tracks available (and using them) makes them believe that they're doing all the things that those actually making a living recording and mixing are doing, and all they need is a little more practice and they'll have a career too.

 

The few developed their techniques for keeping large numbers of tracks from gettingin the way and taking advantage of the small edge that they get from six almost-copies of the same guitar solo or rhythm part. The many do it because that's what they read in the magazines, without the benefit of the full understanding of how to use those many tracks to advantage.

But I don't think that's your point. I, too, appreciate things that work, things that don't have easy ways of breaking them, things that are the way the manufacturer intended for them to be when they left the factory. Ny analog console is only going to change if I get out a soldering iron. But the digital console is different with every firmware update. The manufacturer says it's better than the day I got it. I say "hey, it didn't used to work like this. What happened to the Solo?"

I'm just wrapping up a review of the Cymatic LR-16, a box that you plug into the insert jacks of your console, plug in a USB disk drive (or thumb drive if you insist) and bring home a multitrack recording of your show. No computers to hook up, no programs that you use change when you update something else. But it can also connect to a computer and be used as a 16x2 interface. It works fine, but with two out of three Windows XP systems here, the GUI control for its mixer doesn't work. It installs correctly (well, it complained that I didn't have NET Framework 4 on one of them, but installed without complaints after I installed that) but when I put the mouse cursor over the mixer icon on the task bar, the icon disappears and I can't open the mixer, On the third XP machine, it works fine. On the Win7 machine, it works fine. How the heck can I troubleshoot nonsense like that? It's not like I can take out a scope and find the stage in my console where I'm losing the signal in a channel, or where the crackling noise is coming from. I'm sure there's an equivalent tool (a data analyzer) if I only knew what it was, how to use it, and most imporant, how to interpret the results, but I just gave up. There's something different about those "same" computers that I simply can't find.

Is it taking me away from making music? Well, no. Making music is something I do for fun, and I don't let something like a computer stop me from having fun. But if that was my only computer and I needed the device to make music, I'd be frustrated.

[Goobers]

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MrKnobs wrote:

The bigger picture and how it relates to music.

Not too many people will argue my points above (mostly because few will care or see the liberties I took in discussing operating systems) but now for the point of this:

Are all your computer programs, all your electronics, all your clever effects and devices, all your boutique amplifiers, all your self tuning guitars and pitch transposers and tremolo systems worth the time and money your spending on them, or are they abstraction layers, DIStraction layers between you and the instrument, between you and your songwriting?  How much would you lose (or gain) if you just sold it all and got back to basics, maybe used a little Zoom Q3 video/audio handheld for your recording needs?  What would you do with if you got back all the time and money you spent on all this complicated crap and just sang, played your instrument, and wrote songs?

Are your songs really that much better when you record them on 32 tracks, work on each one for hundreds of hours, pitch correct them to death, add layers of vocals and effects, try a hundred different kick drum samples, agonize over how much early reflection to dial in on your reverb?  Do you think the listener cares as much as you do?  Will any of that matter when you upload it to YouTube where most people listen to music?

A Zoom Q3 has an EPROM operating system.  You just turn it on and it works, boots instantly.  No viruses possible, just press record.  It works every time, no setup required.  It fits in your pocket or loops on your belt. You'll never lose a song idea trying to get it working.  It's the perfect abstraction layer without the distraction layer. 

Just don't leave the batteries in it for too long when you're not using it.

Terry D.

P.S. Yeah, I know. TL/DR.

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I think it's a specious argument. 

 

Good musicians are good no matter what they use, and many have a synergistic relationship with new technology, using it to move their art forward (e.g. the piano, the synth, the DAW, whatever)

 

 

And bad musicians suck no matter what they use, and become the cliche bad musician loading up on equipment to distract from lack of decent output. 

 

 technology isn't good or bad, it's just whatever toolset musicians grab at next. 

 

If you're surrounding yourself with gear and not producing songs, taking away the gear isnt gonna help. Just as buying a crapload of gear isn't going to change who you are either. 

[MrKnobs]

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Goobers wrote: 

If you're surrounding yourself with gear and not producing songs, taking away the gear isnt gonna help. Just as buying a crapload of gear isn't going to change who you are either. 

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Not saying that *I'm* one, but I know many amazing musicians who get bogged down in the process of building a studio, recording, technology, etc. instead of letting someone who's into that do it for them. 

Terry D.