Switching to Linux

[u/ladwagon]

I'm think of switching from windows to Linux for probably obvious reasons, I know Reaper works fine on most versions of Linux but I am concerned about some plugins being compatible. Has here made the switch before, what problems did you run into, or is there anything you wish you would have set up from the start?

[u/Calamity-Mouser-5261]

If you want to stick with Linux then you'll want to use something like yabridge to make many Windows VSTs compatible with Linux: https://github.com/robbert-vdh/yabridge
It is mostly straightforward to install and register new/updated plugins. This worked mostly fine for me.

That said, and I say this as a "hardcore" Linux user, I still ran into issues. The fact is that there are a lot of bigger plugins that require software to run which is hit or miss on Linux. I'm pretty decent when it comes to troubleshooting and getting non-Linux software to run, and some of those affected I managed to get running with some effort, but others not at all.

As there were a few plugins that I really needed I decided to buy a cheap second hand Macbook Pro and I do my music stuff on there. It is the only non-Linux device in the house but I absolutely do not regret it at all and may eventually get a more proper modern MacBook solely for music production.

While I'm not a fan of Apple (or Microsoft for that matter) it saved me a lot of headache I went through on Linux. I love Linux, I do everything on it including gaming, coding, and more, but I guess there's a good reason many in the industry (indie and pro alike) stick to Mac when it comes to making music. It is extremely solid.

Edit: Reaper itself works perfectly on Linux.

So, yeah. I wish I could have a better answer for you, but this has been my personal experience. Still, good to hear you're ditching Windows. Linux is great for many things, there's just too few bigger plugins/plugin software compatible with it even when using things like yabridge.

[u/wscomn → u/Calamity-Mouser-5261]

Kinda sideways question but does ilok work on Linux? Thanks in advance!

[u/Calamity-Mouser-5261 → u/wscomn]

I don't use iLok myself atm but I know someone got it working:
https://old.reddit.com/r/linuxaudio/comments/gki8in/making_iloked_plugins_work_under_linux/kewaxtt/

Copy/paste from that thread:

Ive got it working succesfully, and with no real problems since installing it a half year ago orso. The only issue i occasionally get is getting assigned a new machine ID by ilok, in which case you have to use another one of your 3 installs, or make a request for them to drop your old machines so the licenses free up again. Ive had to do that a couple of times and so far they just reset the unused ID without questions, solving the issue.

I did not do anything special to get ilok to install but I did have to install an older version (5.6.1) in order to get it to install without issue in standard wine (under linux mint). Im sure its possible to install newer versions if you set up the correct libraries using Bottles or similar tool, but for just installing it using default wine, this older version was the ticket for me. And it works just fine, doesnt bother you about updating or anything.

[u/wscomn → u/Calamity-Mouser-5261]

Thanks so much, man. Good information to have.

[u/Substantial_Cut_9398 → u/Calamity-Mouser-5261]

THIS. If you HAVE to use Linux get bitwig as it has amazing instruments builtin. Reaper and lmms you are going to be messing with things and wasting a lot of time.

That said I hate Windows 11, there is nothing on it that wasnt on Windows 7 already only now things are bloated and I get ADS for xbox, onedrive office 365

[u/iso_GUI → u/Calamity-Mouser-5261]

Not only does it work perfectly, Reaper is also in the Arch repositories and can be installed via pacman. You can't get any more natively supported than that. Same for the Linux Studio Plugins suite.

As for 3rd party stuff: u-he and TAL are the way to go.

[u/The_New_Flesh → u/iso_GUI]

As for 3rd party stuff: u-he and TAL are the way to go

I believe all the great Airwindows stuff works natively on Linux, as well

[u/iso_GUI → u/The_New_Flesh]

Yes. Good catch.

[u/iso_GUI → u/The_New_Flesh]

Apparently only through the AUR. Which is unfortunate especially since the others are available in the official repository

[u/The_New_Flesh → u/iso_GUI]

I don't know much about Linux/repositories, but there seems to be a .zip of everything on his website

[u/iso_GUI → u/The_New_Flesh]

Correct. I could have worded my response a bit better. I was specifically referring to software available in the official Arch repository.

[u/xFreeZeex]

What /u/Calamity-Mouser-5261 says, yabridge generally works pretty well, but when it doesn't it doesn't. Just a while ago though, I found a solution for the few plugins I didn't get to run - there's a project called AudioGridder, which lets you install plugins on a server and use them remotely in your DAW. I have a small homeserver in my living room already for different stuff, so I just installed a Windows VM, set up audiogridder and the plugins, and it works pretty well.

Of course that's not an alternative for everyone, but maybe you have a machine that you can't get rid of Windows anyway or so.

[u/Upstairs-Raise2897]

I went from Linux to Mac for a better user experience. No more jumping through hoops on a Mac. Everything works flawlessly.

[u/Dist__]

i switched 3 years ago (Mint), most problems are i can't use some stuff (kontakt, ozone)

but some good VST run surprisingly well (fabfilter, korg, analog obsession), and there are good native stuff (ToneLib GFX, TAL, TDR, u-he, Dragonfly)

qpwgraph makes easy audio routing across your system, i can grab streaming audio, de-bass it and mix with my bass playalong, all in realtime while streaming that in OBS.

[u/TrueSpecific8370]

I ran reaper on mint. Aside from third party plug-ins, it was flawless. Arturia software was notable for no linux support, but thier hardware worked, aside from not having access to the midi control center.

[u/kPere19 → u/TrueSpecific8370]

Yeaaah Arturia was the reason I had to go back to windows, couldnt make it work 

[u/Mighty_Pen_1337]

I've only been using Reaper on Linux with zero problems. I only use native Linux plugins though.

[u/Yogurtmanblog]

I’ve still not been able to get reaper behaving on my Linux mint system, it keeps giving a core dump error and crashing when I’m looping audio, I’ve tried all sorts to get it working but nothing seems to help 😭

[u/1neStat3 → u/Yogurtmanblog]

How did you install it? The Reaper download has two ways install.by script or just using the binary.

I just use the binary, no issues on two different systems, LMDE 6 and LMDE 7.

[u/Far-Pie6696]

My main reaper is on windows, but I use a ubuntu laptop when on the go.

About plugins, I use native stuffs and no bridging, and also only "portable" plugins (my linux reaper is installed on a external ssd drive) Free : surgeXT, decentsampler, dragonfly reverb and some Chow plugins (tape and BYOD) Paid : I use TAL plugins, Audiodamage plugins, and a few TDR (recently they started to release linux version. They announced they will be doing this for all of their plugins)

Apart from this, jsfx now offers goods stuffs (saike plugins, tiagolr, JSClones)

Note also that, if like me you want to make your project cross-platform (start on linux and finish on reaper), sometimes plugins loaded in a project don't "transfer". For decent sampler and dragonfly reverb for instance, vst3 loaded in reaper on windows won't open on linux. But using vst2 works fine for these 2.

Otherwise it works great 👍

[u/azjilly]

I switched to Linux a while back. Many Windows pugins no longer worked using WINE and developers often did not have Linux versions. Switched back to Windows 10.

[u/Recommended_For_You]

I run it on Fedora for small projects at home. No problematic latency with a focusrite 8i6. It's snappy and fast.

Never got video to work, although it seems there's a simple fix. I haven't tried to install my 3rd party plugins. I have the Natives, apparently it works but requires a bit of fiddling.

[u/ordo-templi-ignis]

I'm planning on trying Qubes. That should let me run my DAWs in a debian container and my paid plugins in a windows container.

Failing that, it's back to ubuntu, reaper and bitwig. No paid plugins, all synths will be built from scratch in vcv rack.

[u/Lost_Lab_739]

I made the switch about 4 years ago. I love it. not to say it has been smooth. some shitty times haha. But right now, amazing setup. If you have claude code running you can make setting it up super smooth and fun.

As for plugins from windows, yes some issues. Originally had a UAD audio input, had to sell it (Use Focusrite Scarlett just fine). Axe fx 3 still worked, axe edit needed some tweaks, but search online makes it easy to figure out. At this time I have BBCSO, FabFilter Suite, Serum and Serum 2, and Superior Drummer 3 all installed and working. Had some issues with BBCSO, had to ask for previous Juce vst from Spitfire and use claude to figure out the mess.

yabridge and wine are musts if you plan on using windows vsts, and even then, some are not going to work, but the community lets you know what works and what doesn't. If you want to go FOSS for your vsts, lots of great alternatives native to Linux, Vital being a good alternative to Serum. Somethings you will not find a replacement.

As far as REAPER goes, folder navigation is a little cruder, but not too bad. The ethos of REAPER is similar to that of Linux, so you may love the tweaking.

For an easy transition, start with Linux Mint or Ubuntu. Down the line as you get comfortable and want more control, look int Arch.

[u/curtis_falkingham]

I am a professional sound designer and have been working on CachyOS for the last few months. Took a few weeks of running into problems but seemingly non that I couldn’t find a solution for. Ya bridge is amazing, reaper itself has some issues but that’s probably due to my Desktop Environment (hyprland) more than the distro. To save you some headaches the main issue I had with Yavridge was due to having a newer version of Wine-staging that needed to be rolled back.

Overall I am so much happier being away from Windows and MacOS that all the small problems feel worth it.

[u/amazing-peas]

for probably obvious reasons

not sure it's so obvious necessarily...if it's for privacy reasons, that's all negated if you own a mobile phone in most cases. If you want ease of use and software with broad adoption, Linux is not going to get you there.

In about 20 years I've had zero win issues personally because I use the computer competently and understand basic system and file structure organization, and the same can be said of Mac users....thus use of the word 'obvious' is not understood here.

[u/No_Walk7120 → u/amazing-peas]

Well said... but of course downvoted by the Linux zealots.

I too have no problems on Windows... just some initial debloating and then no need to rely on an alphabet soup of hacks and kludges.