Sequoia driver compatibility?

[4damind]

Sequoia is now available... there was always talk that the kernel extensions would no longer be supported in the future. Is this already the case in Sequoia? Has anyone already installed Sequoia and have there been problems with audio interface drivers?

[jamcat]

My first question was if Rosetta 2 was still supported. Here's the answer (according to Wikipedia):

"In macOS Sequoia, Rosetta 2 has been updated to support translating AVX2 instructions from Intel processors"

So not only is it still supported, they've addressed its biggest shortcoming.

As for audio drivers, I didn't know that was even a consideration on Mac OS.
I've never installed a driver. Devices just work when you plug them in.

[BertKoor]

You weren't discussing Magix Sequoia??

[bardaxx]

I’m wondering about UAD compatibility

[4damind]

As for audio drivers, I didn't know that was even a consideration on Mac OS.
I've never installed a driver. Devices just work when you plug them in.

Not even for audio interfaces? Steinberg/Yamaha have USB audio drivers. Presumably they allow lower latencies or smaller buffers instead of the class compliant drivers.

[jamcat]

As for audio drivers, I didn't know that was even a consideration on Mac OS.
I've never installed a driver. Devices just work when you plug them in.

Not even for audio interfaces? Steinberg/Yamaha have USB audio drivers. Presumably they allow lower latencies or smaller buffers instead of the class compliant drivers.

Nope. Often there will be some kind of control panel/mixer software that needs to be installed, but the audio device itself should just work under CoreAudio. I get much better plug-n-play performance from CoreAudio than I ever got on from proprietary ASIO drivers on Windows. I’m talking about rock solid performance at 32 samples.

[sqigls]

i'll stick with RME personally

[PAK]

Sequoia is now available... there was always talk that the kernel extensions would no longer be supported in the future. Is this already the case in Sequoia?

Sequoia still has KEXT support, though this doesn’t guarantee a driver will work. Support will likely be dropped in a MacOS version or two’s time.

It was never going to be dropped with Sequoia as they’ve still been adding features to remove any possible need for KEXT support. EG a user mode File System API, or FSKit as Apple calls it, has been added in Sequoia. It should now allow, EG, Samsung’s external USB-C drives (which include an encryption driver requiring kernel mode) to create a user side driver which allows reading / writing to drives using Samsung’s encryption.

Regarding audio performance, some people appear to misunderstand what KEXT mode helped. It wouldn’t magically make the latency better. What it did was allow the driver to manage resource allocation, rather than Mac OS itself, which meant it could in theory (and in practice with RME’s drivers) better maintain performance even at higher CPU loads. So it allowed you to squeeze more out of your CPU with audio.

EDIT: To clarify the prior paragraph. KEXT / Driver Kit's buffer management (VS a generic class compliant driver) can also help it make lower buffer settings useable. So, whilst there's no way to magically go past a cards physical latency limits, the lower buffer settings can help lower the latency that way, and get closer to those limits!

According to RME their KEXT drivers enjoyed better performance up until Sonoma. From Sonoma (and presumably beyond) their Driver Kit drivers now give equal performance. RME users should probably switch to Driver Kit now - if they’re using Sonoma or later.

For everyone else, most audio devices will work fine with Apple's class compliant drivers. For any, which include a KEXT driver, you should be asking them where their Driver Kit drivers are at this point..

[4damind]

Sequoia is now available... there was always talk that the kernel extensions would no longer be supported in the future. Is this already the case in Sequoia?

Sequoia still has KEXT support, though this doesn’t guarantee a driver will work. Support will likely be dropped in a MacOS version or two’s time.

It was never going to be dropped with Sequoia as they’ve still been adding features to remove any possible need for KEXT support. EG a user mode File System API, or FSKit as Apple calls it, has been added in Sequoia. It should now allow, EG, Samsung’s external USB-C drives (which include an encryption driver requiring kernel mode) to create a user side driver which allows reading / writing to drives using Samsung’s encryption.

Regarding audio performance, some people appear to misunderstand what KEXT mode helped. It wouldn’t magically make the latency better. What it did was allow the driver to manage resource allocation, rather than Mac OS itself, which meant it could in theory (and in practice with RME’s drivers) better maintain performance even at higher CPU loads. So it allowed you to squeeze more out of your CPU with audio.

According to RME their KEXT drivers enjoyed better performance up until Sonoma. From Sonoma (and presumably beyond) their Driver Kit drivers now give equal performance. RME users should probably switch to Driver Kit now - if they’re using Sonoma or later.

For everyone else, most audio devices will work fine with Apple's class compliant drivers. For any, which include a KEXT driver, you should be asking them where their Driver Kit drivers are at this point..

Thanks, best answer and the driver thing makes sense to me too. Steinberg/Yamaha Driver Kit drivers are currently still beta, so it probably makes more sense to stick with the kernel extensions until Driver Kit is officially released.

[uOpt]

Sequoia is now available... there was always talk that the kernel extensions would no longer be supported in the future. Is this already the case in Sequoia? Has anyone already installed Sequoia and have there been problems with audio interface drivers?

Parallels will works with its old-style kernel extensions. Updated yesterday.

I don't have a kext requiring audio interface, sorry. My class-compliant interfaces work fine.

[4damind]

Ok, I updated to Sequoia and there were no problems. Projects, plugins... everything works like under Sonoma.
With the drivers.. I read something from Yamaha (Yamaha Steinberg USB Driver): "We also recommend you to use this driver when you want to try buffer size setting lower than a class compliant driver."
So the drivers are not absolutely necessary but recommended.

[jamcat]

Yeah, I went ahead and updated to Sequoia last night, too.

Then today I got emails from Eventide and Audio Modeling saying not to.

[4damind]

Currently, hardly any music software has been officially tested and confirmed for Sequoia. Neither Steinberg, Waves, Softube, Roland,...
My most used Eventide plugin (Blackhole) works as always... I think this is more of an ‘official’ thing that they can say ‘our plugins are all tested on Sequoia’.

[jamcat]

Eventide said as much, but this is what Audio Modeling said:

We are writing to inform you that we have identified compatibility issues between our products, SWAM and Camelot, and the latest versions of iOS (iOS 18) and macOS (macOS Sequoia 15). To avoid potential disruptions to your workflow, we strongly recommend not updating your devices to these new operating systems at this time.

Our team is working diligently to resolve these issues and ensure full compatibility. We will notify you as soon as updates are available.

So far I haven’t run into any problems.

[aMUSEd]

Does it still support Rosetta 2?