The Lowdown On Latency--usb Brand, Please: just the facts, ma'am... Options

[Levon River]

Can anybody provide any real-world yardstick stats on USB-audio latency under OS X.x? I'm all agog for the answers.

How many ms with what device? What role do the Core Audio services play in all this? How "device dependant" is it (are some better than others)? If it's so gawdawful, *why* are *all* music hardware manufacturers (nearly) filling the shelves and shopping carts with such devices? How does the best of USB stack up against A) PCI card interfces, and B) firewire interfaces, in ms?

Finally, is there really a Santa Clause?

(No, I'm not Virginia.)

[damann]

next you'll be wanting to know how many times a week the queen of england gets "serviced"!
this is information that's just too worrying for us, sometimes ignorance is bliss.
more seriously, osx's core audio/midi takes control of latency and promises lower latency than previously available, and usb is c#@p, usb2 is already available, and actually measures up against firewire rather well.

of course, there are no known plans for apple to adopt the usb2 standard(it competes directly with their own firewire!), don't look in the bargain basement for anything important to you!
you wouldn't look for a partner for life in k-mart, right?
oh yeah, santa has sworn me to secrecy, but says if i take it like a man, i'll get a nice present at christmas...

[Levon River]

Thanks for your reply, damann. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I felt like I should have paid for it.

Now, about the Queen...

[damann]

you're welcome.
i do appreciate your supremely humourous and valid input too!
we all know about queens don't we?