Skimming the documentation, looks like megaem would make the GUS emulate other MIDI devices rather than give it a port to another device?

There's a description of a MIDI circuit for the GUS here:

http://www.gravisultrasound.com/files/documen … tion/GUSFAQ.txt

so maybe you do need that breakout box. They've been on ebay uk a few times this past year, for what that's worth.

Edit: in fact that faq says:

"The game port can be changed to MIDI in/out/through ports by
means of an adapter available from Gravis. "

Skimming the documentation, looks like megaem would make the GUS emulate other MIDI devices rather than give it a port to another device?

normally yes but there's options in the menu for GUS MIDI (as opposed to GUS Synth, which is the card's onboard wavetable - setting to GUS MIDI produces no output) and MPU-401 (which complains that it can't find a real MPU-401 in the system)

hmmm ok so I definitely need that breakout box? I assume this is what I need?
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/MIDI-Joystick-Adapter- … c2#ht_904wt_911

seems rather pricey...

I've had a look at that FAQ and I guess I could build that circuit... one thing t he FAQ isn't clear on is the purpose of the 'Generic Midi Out/In/Through Circuit' - do I need to build this as well as the Gravis Ultrasound circuit?

....looking closely at the diagrams it appears that the generic circuit is in fact a part of the Ultrasound circuit, so I should only have to build the one and fit it into a breakout box... can someone confirm?
Seems like a lot of effort 😒

That item: the fact it's supposed to work with other sound cards suggests it's just an adaptor cable really, no electronics in there? In which case any other midi/joystick cable ought to work. But that's the thing I've seen before, around £20 in the uk but probably only one seller had them.

I've never been able to get my GUS Max midi port to work - whereas the same simple breakout cable worked fine on an SB16.

My setup has the MM401 driving the SC55, with the SC55 midi-thru port then going to the MT32, as you'll know, the SC55 is easy to mute with one button press if you only want MT32 output.

The SB16 + XR385, GUS Max, SC55 and MT32 all have a dedicated pair of inputs on a small 'soundlab' 8-channel mixer, with the combined mixer output going to a pair of Creative T40 speakers.

It's very similar to this:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Nady-MM-242-4-Channel-Ste … =item27b91e8757

Getting hold of an external mixer is definitely a worthwhile purchase

I agree, you need to have one of external mixers. I have Roland M-10MX. It also helps to improove sound quality, because Input ports on old cards are not so good.

I've never been able to get my GUS Max midi port to work - whereas the same simple breakout cable worked fine on an SB16.

Were you using something similar to the box I linked to on ebay above? The cable I'm using at the moment is just a DB15 -> 2x 5 pin DIN.

I will consider getting an external mixer but in the meantime, any way to get the Ultramix program to work?

I just had a simple joystick extender / midi in/out cable, like this: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/MIDI-Interface-5-Pin-Di … =item45f95b877e

Sorry, I can't comment on using Ultramix; back in the day when I had the GUS and a (different) SB16 in a contemporary PC of the time (a DX2-50 and then subsequently a Cyrix 6x86 P166+) I routed the GUS output to the SB16 input, as the creative mixer was a little easier to use 😀

Well I bought the Ultrasound MIDI adapter listed here: http://cgi.ebay.com.au/MIDI-Joystick-Adapter- … c2#ht_904wt_911

Attached it to the GUS, and my Sound Canvas SC55, set up MegaEm's MIDI in/out device for 'GUS MIDI port', and tried to play a couple of games using GM port 330.
The SC55 flashes very quickly 'NO DRUM SET' before displaying the instruments, but all the instruments are wrong. Sounds terrible.
The MIDI adapter is flashing the OUT LED.

I plugged the adapter into my Sound Blaster, which has its MIDI port configured as 300, changed the game config to that port instead and it works perfectly.

Other options in MegaEm for MIDI in/out are Gravis Synth (which uses the gravis onboard wavetable) which works, and MPU-401 MIDI Port which complains that it can't find a real MPU401. So I assume this option is to redirect MegaEm's output to a different MIDI card.
If I don't load MegaEm nothing will work and game setup will complain that the MPU401 was not found.

So how do I make the SC55 work with a GUS? does the GUS Classic simply not have a fully functioning MPU401 port even in UART mode?

EDIT: further fiddling- ROTT and Monkey Island sound wrong but DOOM and Colonization seem to work ok... however I can't use my CT2800 for digital effects (I have sb emulation disabled in MegaEm). However... if I set MegaEm's MIDI in/out device to GUS Synth then the CT2800 works fine.

Seems like its not that I've done something wrong, or a misconfiguration, it looks like its simply some sort of game compatibility issue. Sigh.

So how do I make the SC55 work with a GUS?

As far as I know, the GUS cards were never MPU401 compatible, so you can't use SC55 + GUS combo to games from DOS. I was shocked when I realized this, because this is a very basic feature...

You can play midi only from Win3.11, using DOS.