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        MIDI-OX >> Mapping Questions >> MIDI-OX For Dummies
        
(Message started by: RubberCrutches on Jun 24^th, 2009, 3:42pm)

Title: MIDI-OX For Dummies
Post by RubberCrutches on Jun 24^th, 2009, 3:42pm

I use Cakewalk (similar to Sonar) to create standard midi files.
I put the midi files in a folder on my laptop computer.
My laptop operating system is Windows XP Pro.
I go to the control panel, choose "audio", and select my
DGX350 Yamaha Piano Keyboard as the external device
to play my midi files.
I use the library feature in the Windows Media Player to select my midi files and play them in the play list.

My computer went to the great computer land in the sky.
It died on me.
I got a new laptop.
Vista.

I'm screwed.

Vista won't let me choose my Yamaha keyboard as an external midi device to play my midi files any more. The
Windows Media Player (ver 11.00??) will only send my midi
files to the soundcard on my laptop and not out the USB
port to my Yamaha Keyboard (A-B midi connection).

I contacted a Yamaha Corp. rep, and he referred me here.

I'm old, and the technical terminology of computers is not much of a part of my vocabulary, I'm afraid. So, when I
read a lot of the descriptions on line about this software there
is much I don't understand.

Could someone please simply tell me if the Midi-Ox software
is able to fix my problem so that I can use the Windows Media Player, under the Vista Operating system, to, once again, send my midi file information out the USB port of my laptop to the input of my DGX350 Yamaha Keyboard ?

Thanks for your patience and any kind replys.

Title: Re: MIDI-OX For Dummies
Post by Peter L Jones on Jun 24^th, 2009, 6:43pm

If you don't start at Windows Media Player or try to use the OS for MIDI routing, you will probably avoid your problems.

Unfortunately, I don't know anything about Vista - I've luckily had no reason to install it.

If you install MIDI OX, it comes with a small application called "MIDI Bar". If you run this and click the second icon on the toolbar, it will list all the MIDI Outputs your computer knows about.

You're in luck if the port your keyboard is connected to is listed. If it isn't, you're out of luck. I'll assume it's listed.

Select the port your keyboard is connected to and click "OK".

Then click the third icon to select the MIDI file.

Then click the fourth icon to play it.

That should "just work" (tm).

(However, I just tried it on WinXP. Unless I go through "Default (Mapper)", it sounds like half the MIDI data is getting eaten somewhere... So good luck!)

Title: Re: MIDI-OX For Dummies
Post by RubberCrutches on Jun 24^th, 2009, 7:31pm

Peter,

The "Cakewalk" software that I use "will" address the USB port and play a midi file in Vista if I tell that particular software to send the midi file to the piano keyboard. So,
I'm sure that the port is listed.

The problem, of course, is the operating system.
It will simply not allow me to choose that port as the system default for the use of external midi devices... namely, my piano keyboard (synth). It will only allow a midi file to be sent to the sound card within the computer itself, and nothing else.

I'm an old musician, a one man band, and the midi files that I create are basically my backing tracks on stage and my livelihood. That is why I was using Windows Media Player because of it's "library" feature. It allows me to view all of my midi files in a folder on my hard drive, but play one file at a time while the Windows Media Player stayed minimized in the system tray... as opposed to one "run on" playlist as so much of the software packages out there do... where once you start a list playing...it will not simply play one song and stop there. It streams the entire list.... and that doesn't work so well on stage.

The Yamaha company, as do most other piano keyboard manufacturers, honors the standard midi sounds...but they have their own collection of sounds they like to refer to as
"XG" sounds. So, the midi files have commands in them that
address the processor in the piano keyboard to produce those sounds. However, the Windows Operating System does not recognize the "XG" commands/sounds. Therefore, when the
midi file is sent to the soundcard on the laptop...those sounds
are altered. For example, drums on channel 10... may come out like a child hammering on a piano instead of a standard drum set....and so on.

In short, I was simply hoping that Midi-Ox would end up being a "work around" the Vista Operating system and I might be able to use it to change the default for the midi output for the entire system. .... guess not

I have more time and money invested in my midi files, keyboards, and the ability to play the midi files one at a time
from a list... than I do in the Vista operating system from
Microsoft.

Thus far, from what I can see, perhaps then the shortest "work around" the problem is simply to scrap
Vista and go back to XP on my new laptop.

It just makes me wonder, however, about when Microsoft
created Vista..... what were they thinking?

Thanks again for your response. I really appreciate the opinions of people who are in the know on such subjects.