LPC: The past, present, and future of Linux audio

Perhaps not, I don't remember all of the technical details, but I do remember the funnel lock. That was enough to keep me away from it at the time.

And you're absolutely right about the tedious nature of setup on Linux. I too have a MIDI USB controller from M-Audio, and I too got it working under Linux (actually even patched into reFX Vanguard courtesy of dssi-vst). But what I found is that when musical inspiration hits, I want to spend the least amount of time possible getting into working music software, because it generally doesn't survive having to debug some arcane software issue.