At this year’s Qualcomm Snapdragon Summit, Microsoft introduced a range of new features designed to improve audio creation on Windows, targeting musicians and audio pros. The key highlight? Windows will soon support MIDI 2.0—a long-awaited update for musicians needing precision and more nuanced control over their setups.
MIDI 2.0 is a new standard for musical instruments that offers several improvements over MIDI 1.0, including increased channel capacity, higher resolution, a better system clock, enhanced controller capabilities, and backward compatibility. These enhancements provide musicians with a more versatile, expressive, and reliable platform for creating and performing music.
The addition in Windows comes with backward compatibility for older MIDI 1.0 devices and APIs, keeping workflows smooth for existing hardware. Windows is also set to feature an all-new USB Audio Class 2 driver, which has been developed in collaboration with Qualcomm and Yamaha.
Microsoft’s driver will improve real-time audio processing with low latency, a must-have for any professional-grade music production setup. The update will first roll out on Arm64 devices but will later come to x86-64 devices as well, ensuring that both traditional PC users and those on newer platforms benefit from these upgrades.
Music Software Comes to Arm64
Microsoft isn’t stopping at drivers; it’s expanding the software options for musicians using Arm64 devices. Steinberg’s Cubase and Nuendo, both leading digital audio workstations (DAWs), will soon be available in preview on Arm-based Windows devices. Cockos Reaper is also getting a preview release, and Reason Studios Reason will follow early next year.
As more DAWs make their way to Arm64, users will experience improved performance, allowing them to produce, mix, and edit audio without being tied down by traditional hardware constraints. Pete Brown, a principal software engineer at Microsoft, emphasized that these enhancements aim to ensure a smooth experience for musicians, adding that the collaboration between hardware and software is crucial to make it all work seamlessly.
USB Audio Hardware Ready for Arm64
On the hardware front, Focusrite and Steinberg/Yamaha are both planning to release their own native ASIO drivers for Arm64, set to roll out by early 2025. These drivers are optimized for USB audio interfaces and are expected to provide low-latency, high-fidelity audio recording and playback, which is vital for musicians working with multi-track setups.
Focusrite, known for its popular Scarlett series of USB audio interfaces, plans to support both ASIO and non-ASIO applications running on Windows Arm devices. Focusrite’s CEO, Tim Carroll, remarked that their aim is to make sure their products work efficiently with Windows’ new USB audio drivers, enabling users to get started quickly without complicated setups.
Yamaha, too, is on board with this shift, bringing its Steinberg-branded USB audio interfaces to Arm64 devices, offering both standard and optimized drivers to ensure top performance.
Real-Time Audio Gets a Boost
One major pain point for musicians using Windows has been real-time audio performance, something that the new ASIO drivers will tackle head-on. Traditional USB audio drivers in Windows, built for consumer audio needs like streaming music and playing videos, are not optimized for the demands of real-time audio processing.
For musicians, latency—or the delay between input and output—needs to be minimized. Real-time audio requires multiple channels of audio to be processed simultaneously, often in sync with external equipment like guitars, synthesizers, or drum machines. The introduction of ASIO support in Windows will ensure that music producers can have low-latency, multi-channel audio without the need for third-party solutions, such as ASIO4All, which has often been a workaround.
By creating a new USB Audio Class 2 driver specifically for these use cases, Microsoft is making it easier for musicians to connect their hardware and get right to work. This update will allow Windows to handle higher input-output counts, with less overhead, and deliver the kind of precise audio performance needed in a professional setting.
Musicians Won’t Need Third-Party Drivers
One of the more frustrating aspects of setting up a DAW on Windows has been the need for musicians to manually download and install drivers from the manufacturers’ websites, which can be time-consuming and occasionally confusing. Microsoft’s new approach is designed to eliminate this hassle.
The built-in ASIO driver will work out-of-the-box, offering a plug-and-play solution for many devices, while still allowing manufacturers to create their own optimized drivers. Additionally, the new USB Audio Class 2 driver will support Windows’ power management features, addressing one of the long-standing issues with audio hardware on laptops.
In the past, some audio devices have struggled with power management, causing users to tweak system settings to prevent their audio from cutting out or distorting when a laptop tries to conserve battery power.
Last Updated on November 7, 2024 2:23 pm CET
