So, I just got my new Dreamblaster X2. So, thought I'd relive the 90s a bit and play some MIDI files I'd downloaded. Nope. I remember MIDI enough from the 90s not to have high expectations, but this sounds broken. The general sound is that of a department store Casio keyboard playing in demo mode, or a bad wedding cover band using such keyboards. There's even occasional pitch and tempo issues, and some instruments seem too soft or loud. Some tracks are almost beyond recognition, instruments seem missing or are just so wrong. I installed Softsynth on my modern PC, and it's a night and day difference. Like, it actually sounds like instruments are playing and the instruments mostly sound like the original instruments on the CD recording. That 's just with the default 4MB bank included.

I'm running the Buran bank as the card shipped. I know that MIDI file playback is not the primary intent, and I will use this with DOS games, but I want proper wavetable multimedia in Windows too. Many more casual games depends upon this too, not just music.

Is there something I should check or I might be doing wrong? Do I need to use the standard CleanWave bank or Roland bank for music playback? Should I have just bought the Dreamblaster S2 instead of being all fancy?