Edirol Posts Beta 64-Bit Drivers

Mar 04, 2005

Edirol announced beta 64-bit drivers for several devices in support of the latest hardware and software for Windows-based computers. Audio devices now offering direct support of 64-bit processing include the world's first and most powerful Hi-Speed USB Audio Interface, the UA-1000 and the UA-25 USB Audio Interface. Edirol has also updated several MIDI device drivers to support 64-bit processing including the UM-880 8x8 MIDI Patchbay/Interface, the UM-1 series MIDI interfaces, and several PCR Series keyboards - PCR-30, PCR-50, PCR-80, PCR-M30, PCR-M50, PCR-M80. These driver updates arrive as Microsoft's Windows XP 64-bit Edition goes into prerelease trials.

In addition, software companies such as Cakewalk are also offering beta versions of their audio recording applications in 64-bit. This will allow Edirol users to use their devices for beta testing as well and ensures that Edirol hardware can take full advantage of the next generation of recording applications and operating system.

64-bit processing allows applications to extend the amount of RAM available for music production on the PC to 1 terabyte (1024 GB), well beyond the current 2 GB limit offered by today's 32-bit applications. This provides users with nearly unlimited potential for working with RAM intensive projects that make extensive use of samplers and numerous audio loops and tracks. Applications such as Cakewalk's SONAR x64 Technology Preview provides users with the ability to load entire, large sample banks, libraries, and audio clips into RAM, thereby eliminating the latency introduced by disk streaming. In addition, 64-bit processing provides better CPU performance by offering more and wider registers - a part of RAM that offers instant access to the CPU - and an improved floating point unit (FPU). When data is not stored in a register, the computer must retrieve the data from RAM, causing the processor to chew up several CPU cycles waiting for information to be retrieved. More and larger registers allows the CPU to run much more efficiently resulting in the ability for the PC to handle more processor-intensive tasks quickly.

For more information, visit their web site at www.edirol.com.