VOGONS


First post, by adalbert

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Did anyone try routing MPU401 output to DAW software like Cubase and playing general midi sounds with modern virtual instruments?
I did some experimenting with dosbox and loopmidi, but I'm getting some problems.

Cubase receives the MIDI input, but there are a lot of hanging notes.

This is how it supposed to sound - for now I'm using Cubase's built-in Halion sampler, because it can handle GM midi out of the box. I created 16 midi tracks, used input transformer to split midi data to proper channels and assigned Halion instrument.

The attachment halion-tentacle1.mp3 is no longer available

But this is how it sounds like before deleting too long notes manually:

The attachment _badmidi_01.mp3 is no longer available

i attach the screenshot showing bunch of sustained notes.

It's not the most realistic sounding stuff overall (only few gigabytes for all of the instruments), but I think these samples were also used in remastered version of the Day of the Tentacle, they sound similar... It works in realtime and requires no manual settings, that's really nice.
I also have full Composer Cloud library with over 1TB of samples, so I was wondering if there is a way to split midi output into tracks for individual instruments. That way I could for example use Halion's GM capability for some of the less important instruments, and use different VSTs for orchestral strings, brass, guitars, percussion, choir etc.

So there are some points/questions:
1. did anyone try similar solution for realtime music playback?
2. what could I do to fix these sustained notes?
3. is it possible to route some MPU401 instruments into different midi loopback devices? (i'm thinking about using python to do that)
4. is it possible to convert MT32 midi into GM in realtime?

Repair/electronic stuff videos: https://www.youtube.com/c/adalbertfix
ISA Wi-fi + USB in T3200SXC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX30t3lYezs
GUI programming for Windows 3.11 (the easy way): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6L272OApVg

Reply 1 of 2, by MMaximus

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How did you configure Cubase in the first place? I've just tried and Dosbox midi playback through Halion Sonic SE with loopmidi port as an input worked (no stuck notes - I used DOOM as a test game) but I had to choose one track in Cubase and set its output midi channel to "any" as opposed to having 16 tracks with their separate midi channels. I then recorded the input of the loopmidi port on that track but got messy results on playback - timing is all over the place.

Are you trying to achieve anything else than real-time midi playback through Cubase though? To me it seems unnecessary complicated. A simpler option would be to use a standalone VST host (I use the free version of Cantabile). Load your Halion Sonic VST and set it to GM mode (Somehow I had to use the VST 2 version of the Halion plugin because the VST 3 one wouldn't respond to program change messages). Then configure loopmidi as an input in Cantabile and it should work perfectly. I haven't tried this, but I figure you could create a midi filter in cantabile that sends incoming channels to different VST plugins (as opposed to only using Halion), so you could create your own arrangements on the fly.

Hard Disk Sounds

Reply 2 of 2, by adalbert

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Thanks for the answer, I will try with different host. I'm just trying to achive best quality of realtime music playback, although I know it's not that simple because different plugins require different programming and it's not as simple as playing back the notes. Halion manages GM playback pretty good, but I guess using something like Hollywood Orchestra would give terrible results at the beginning (CC midi controllers are totally non standard).

I attach the screenshot of the settings. First just right click- add MIDI track (repeat 10 or 16 times), set channel numbers 1 to 16, attach them to the same instance of Halion and configure everything else like in the screenshot.

Repair/electronic stuff videos: https://www.youtube.com/c/adalbertfix
ISA Wi-fi + USB in T3200SXC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX30t3lYezs
GUI programming for Windows 3.11 (the easy way): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6L272OApVg