Derek Holzer wrote:
And this is possible because ProTools only allow you the use of very specific hardware for which they have created closed, proprietary drivers. Expecting *any* other app to behave in a similar way to ProTools is very unrealistic unless the same kind of software/hardware lock-in relationship exists.
Good point. At least on a Linux platform, jack does actually start to approach this with certain firewire hardware (thanks to a well understood standard that has enough speed and bandwidth for good performance, some well done userspace drivers that avoid the legacy issues of oss and alsa, and some co-operative hardware vendors). I am not sure if this applies to platforms other than Linux though.
Sadly the industry seems to be moving away from firewire and toward usb2, and usb2 has no implemented standard and very little vendor co-operation with open source developers.