What You’ll Need
The good news is, a fast computer with oodles of RAM is not required to run Csound. Having a fast computer is desirable, of course, and essential if you want to use Csound in real-time performance. Even if you’re planning to render your compositions to disk before you listen to them, doing so on a faster computer will be less tedious. But no matter how old and slow your computer may be, if you can get a compatible version of Csound onto your computer’s hard drive, you should be able to install and run it. With an older operating system, you might conceivably have to compile Csound yourself using a C compiler, a project that is beyond the scope of this book, and you might find that you need to run Csound from the command line rather than using a front-end program. (For a basic explanation of how to run Csound from the command line, see Chapter 4.)
You’ll need some way to listen to your music. That probably means an audio interface and a pair of speakers. The built-in audio output in your computer is usable in a pinch, but you can’t expect to get high-quality sound from it. Modestly priced stereo audio interfaces capable of high-quality sound I/O are readily available from various manufacturers. Most will connect to your computer using USB or FireWire. Features such as built-in microphone preamps, headphone jacks, and S/PDIF digital audio connectors are fairly standard, so shop around. I can recommend the M-Audio Fast Track Pro, which retails for about $200.
Speakers are available at all price points, from dirt cheap to solid gold. In general, you should buy the best speakers you can afford. Csound is capable of producing extremely high-quality audio, and you’ll want to be able to hear it.
I do not recommend using headphones with Csound—not because of the audio quality, though the quality is questionable, but because of the danger to your ears. A simple typo in a Csound orchestra or score can cause your music to play at the maximum possible volume. Ear damage is not a possibility you want to flirt with!
Tip After making any changes in a Csound code file that I’m not entirely certain are innocuous, I turn down my speaker system the first time I run the file. If you enjoy getting blasted out of your chair by unexpected noise, feel free to ignore this suggestion.
If you can afford to treat your music room using sound-absorbent foam, you’ll hear more details and a better representation of the frequency spectrum and stereo imaging than you would in an untreated room. I recently spent $500 on acoustic foam from Auralex and mounted it on the walls. The difference, though subtle, was definitely perceptible.
If you’re interested in real-time music-making, a MIDI keyboard with a built-in bank of MIDI sliders would be a good investment. Other types of controller hardware are also available, including controller apps that run on handheld devices.
You’ll find audio editing software extremely useful when the time comes to prepare your music for online distribution or CD burning. I recommend Audacity (http://audacity.sourceforge.net), a free cross-platform audio editor. Among its other uses, such as adjusting the dynamic range by applying compression, Audacity can convert your Csound compositions to mp3 format.
Caution mp3 is a lossy compression scheme, which means that the sound quality is degraded when an AIFF or WAV file is converted to it. mp3 files can be created at various bit rates, from 8 kbps (kilobits per second) up through 320 kbps. The quasi-standard rate of 128 kbps works adequately for pop music, but for electronic music, in which sonic detail and clarity of tone are important, I recommend 192 kbps at the very least, and preferably 256 kbps. Better sound quality with equivalent file size can be achieved using the .ogg file format, but not all web browsers can play .ogg files. If you want visitors to your website to be able to hear the music, you may prefer to use mp3 rather than .ogg.