~ A user-space macOS driver for the M-Audio FastTrack Pro

The M-Audio FastTrack Pro is an old but good USB audio interface. On macOS it works out of the box, but only in a reduced mode: Apple’s built-in USB audio driver limits it to 16-bit audio, plays back only at 44.1 kHz and ignores the S/PDIF input. On Linux, the full device is available. To keep the interface useful on a Mac, I instructed Claude to write a user-space macOS driver for the FastTrack Pro. Compared with Apple’s driver, it offers:

• 24-bit audio instead of 16-bit.
• 44.1, 48, 88.2 and 96 kHz sample rates, instead of only 44.1 kHz.
• 4 outputs, 2 of them at 88.2/96 kHz.
• Analog or S/PDIF input, selectable, at 44.1/48 kHz.
• Software volume and mute that work with the volume keys.
• MIDI input and output.

Installation requires macOS 15 and the Xcode Command Line Tools:

  




  
make            # build
make install    # install and start
make uninstall  # remove, the device goes back to Apple's driver

This effort fits a recent trend of custom drivers and firmware for audio gear. Now that coding is more accessible, vendors see more value in making their gear hackable instead of locking it down. Allowing custom firmware was, of course, always a good idea, but now a much larger group of enthusiasts can actually write it. For example, Akai is opening up the MPC Sample for custom firmware, and Behringer has published the source code of its upcoming KICK sampler and IGNITE sequencer on GitHub. I see this as a good side effect of LLMs: custom drivers extend the life of existing hardware, and because writing firmware is now within reach of many more people, vendors are pushed towards hackable gear.

Check out the FastTrack Pro driver on GitHub. Feedback, bug reports, and pull requests are very welcome.

UGent, Code, Projecten, and Mac OS X