Dear sir, The HTPC market is growing and Linux has a strong presence here via software offerings like MythTV (http://www.mythtv.org/). A significant portion of HTPC users are interested in quality audio such as the one offered by professionnal sound cards. Simultaneously there is a drive to make kill all sources of low latency in the Linux kernel (http://lwn.net/Articles/120797/) to accomodate professionnal audio needs. Large professionnal Linux audio communities already exist (http://jackit.sourceforge.net/, http://www.linuxdj.com/audio/lad/) and the level of interest is high enough to be seen by some as driving the next major release of the Linux kernel (http://www.computerworld.com.au/index.php/id;669959914;fp;16;fpid;0 last ?) Current Linux sound card support is good for mass-market products and high-end (RME, M-audio...) ones but no one has filled the intermediate audiophile/semi-pro/home-studio niche yet. The E-MU 1212m http://www.emu.com/products/product.asp?maincategory=754&category=754&product=2209 would seem to be ideally positionned to respond to this demand on the hardware side, except it has no Linux driver support right now. The Alsa project (http://www.alsa-project.org/) however has expressed interest on working on the problem provided they get an hardware sample. Since Alsa already develops drivers for other Creative sound cards with Creative support cooperating it would seem natural to expand the current partnership to the E-MU sound card family. I hope I made the case for such a partneship clear (I'm no native english speaker) and I'll soon be a happy Linux E-MU customer. Kind regards, -- Nicolas Mailhot
