Buffer size alignment and the audio period

Comments

Anonymous
May 22, 2014
Hi, You say that "The audio engine tries to run at as close to a 10 millisecond cadence as possible". Is this because the user has requested a 10 millisecond period or is it a general rule that the audio engine works best at 10 milliseconds period and 10 milliseconds should be used where possible ?
Anonymous
May 22, 2014
Good question. There isn't really a good reason for the 10ms cadence. Some hardware has a natural cadence corresponding to packet size (e.g., USB is 1ms). Some audio software sources and sinks would like higher or lower cadences, or even a variable cadence. And sometimes Windows likes to shut everything down for a while so it can do something like reprogram firmware in the network card. So 10ms is a good compromise solution. It's fast enough for voice communication but slow enough for the power guys.