Certainly I can, but that's all the information that's IN the SynthMT soundbank.

1SoundFont Bank
2    Sample Section
3        User Sample Pool
4            castanets
5            synbasslphi
6        ROM Sample Pool
7            kpianob1
8            kpianog2
9            kpianob4
10            kpianocx4
11            kpianof5
12            kpianodx5
13            kpiano5 #02
14            kpianob5
15            epiano2ms
16            clavc2
17            harpsichordc3
18            asaxc2
19            asaxe2
20            asaxg2
21            asaxd3
22            asaxf3
23            asaxc4
24            ssaxdx4
25            oboecx3
26            oboefx3
27            oboeax3
28            enghorndx3
29            frenchhorng4
30            bassoonc2
31            flutec4
32            clarinetd2
33            clarinetb2
34            brasssectc3
35            brasssectf5
36            htrumpetg2
37            htrumpetc3
38            htrumpetf3

Blah blah blah, et cetera et cetera. If this is more information than your program gives you, I'll finish it, but it sounds like it's not, which makes this a waste of my time.
Let me know.

And actually, it looks like those are GM/GS names. Everything in this file is even shorter -- piano1_MT32, epiano1_MT32, honkytonk_MT32, fantasy_MT32, etc.

Don't look at the instrument names, they don't say much. And mapping to GS as opposed to GM won't do much good, the problem is not there (it's either in the percussion, which is not necessarily well mapped by VDMSound, ch.9, or in custom sounds which can't be done with any mapping).

V.

dnewhous wrote:

Could you make a list in a text file of all the sounds in the synthmt bank? I'm hoping to see helpfully descriptive names. […]
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Could you make a list in a text file of all the sounds in the synthmt bank? I'm hoping to see helpfully descriptive names.

The MIDI software that comes with the Santa Cruz (Digital Orchestrator) has a list of all the sounds in an MT-32 bank, but they're mostly cryptic things like "Elec Piano 1" "Elec Piano 2" that make a GS/MT-32 mapping somewhat ambiguous. And it looks like a map to GS would offer significant advantages. After getting through the first 23 MT-32 sounds I see that GS would offer about 6 sounds that would be lost in GM.

What GS does is extend each of the 128 MIDI banks, offering variable sounds within each bank. Sometimes these sound groupings are quite artificial.

I can see how it would be useful in that if you write a GS midi file it would still run on a GM bank, but some of the sound mappings would be way off.

And the one sound that is not contained in GS anywhere is "waterbells" (GS does have castanets).

I looked it up on google and there really is such thing as waterbells.

Shifting gears a little bit, would a MIDI daughtercard (which they don't make anymore) be able to support all the functionality of the DLS2 specification?

I am considering whether it is worth trying to find one. My sound card doesn't support DLS2, but I don't want to buy a daughtercard if it isn't usable for the next generation of MIDI. And then there's the question if the next card from TB will even have a WaveBlaster connection.

I am assuming that a daughtercard has improved sound quality over a software bank in even considering one.

Unfortunately, no daughtercard has the "waterbell" sound.

dnewhous wrote:

Shifting gears a little bit, would a MIDI daughtercard (which they don't make anymore) be able to support all the functionality of the DLS2 specification?

Microsoft's soft-synth (DirectMusic, Win2k & XP) supposedly is DLS2-compliant. You can even find Roland's DLS GS bank somewhere in the Windows directory, so I guess that in order to use your own you could rename that one and replace it by your own (otherwise you'd have to write your own app to tell DirectMusic to switch banks). Microsoft DirectMusic producer can be found on the web for free -- it can author DLS2 IIRC (and interface with DirectMusic in general).

V.

vladr wrote:

Microsoft's soft-synth (DirectMusic, Win2k & XP) supposedly is DLS2-compliant. You can even find Roland's DLS GS bank somewhere in the Windows directory, so I guess that in order to use your own you could rename that one and replace it by your own (otherwise you'd have to write your own app to tell DirectMusic to switch banks). Microsoft DirectMusic producer can be found on the web for free -- it can author DLS2 IIRC (and interface with DirectMusic in general).

V.

I know about the GS bank in the Windows directory, what do you think I've been talking about this entire thread?!

I need to back up, what does DLS2 offer that DLS1 does not?

Whoa. I only mentioned the soft-synth because, for some reason, you appeared to be looking for a hardware DLS2-compliant solution when there is a software one available.

As for the difference, DLS2 allows more fexibility (more envelope stages, more LFO's, etc.) Go on the MMA's site where you'll find the full DLS1 specs (.pdf) that you can then compare against bits and pieces of DLS2 infromation from the DLS2 .h file (that describes the sysex'es that you can actually send to a DLS2-compliant synth).

V.

dnewhous wrote:

I know about the GS bank in the Windows directory, what do you think I've been talking about this entire thread?!

I need to back up, what does DLS2 offer that DLS1 does not?

Did anyone ever make an MT-32 daughtercard?

Yeah, the LAPC-1.

Snover wrote:

Yeah, the LAPC-1.

dnewhous, the only, or at least most visible (audible?) improvement you may get in hardware as opposed to software would be the reverb. But there are other ways of dealing with that without having to find a daughter-card. 😀 And yes, LAPC-1 is essentialy an MT-32 on an ISA board. I bought one about an year ago. I also purchased a SoundCanvas board at that time, and cvompared it to the Microsoft GS SoftSynth. Didn't notice a particularly "noticeable" difference (other than reverb, and maybe some different volume settings here and there), which is not so surprising given that both the SCC and the MS DLS were made by Roland. 😀

I think you may find on the MMA site a list of manufacturers that support DLS2, though I'm afraid not many (if any) produce daughterboards. Many manufacturers are going "soft" anyway (e.g. Yamaha).

Cheers,
V.

What's the RAP-10? I just noticed it in the list for sound cards in the HMI sound system.

http://babelfish.altavista.com/urltrurl?url=h … lp=pt_en&tt=url

Someone mentioned the award winning sound of Space Quest III. Those of you who haven't seen it

http://www.queststudios.com/quest/sierrap1.html#MainMenu

There is a download for Space Quest III SysEx.

Umm... If you guys still need the 2.0 version of the MT-32 soundfont bank... here it is. Works great for me 😀

Enjoy!?
Digimortal

"The ROM samples used in your SoundFont bank are not compatible with those on your selected sound card. Playback of ROM samples will be disabled."

I could convert the SoundFont myself, BTW.

Can't you extract the ROM samples to RAW/WAV and then re-import them in Vienna, hopefully fixing the problem?

vladr wrote:

dnewhous, the only, or at least most visible (audible?) improvement you may get in hardware as opposed to software would be the reverb. But there are other ways of dealing with that without having to find a daughter-card. 😀 And yes, LAPC-1 is essentialy an MT-32 on an ISA board. I bought one about an year ago. I also purchased a SoundCanvas board at that time, and cvompared it to the Microsoft GS SoftSynth. Didn't notice a particularly "noticeable" difference (other than reverb, and maybe some different volume settings here and there), which is not so surprising given that both the SCC and the MS DLS were made by Roland. 😀

Cheers,
V.

Would you say that the MIDI synth on a Live/Aduigy with the 8MB soundfont sounds better than a daughtercard or the SCC-1? Cause it certainly sounds better than the GS softsynth to me but it surprises me that an old midi card wouldn't sound any better than the mediocre GS softsynth.

Soundfonts make all the difference. The 8MB soundfont is pretty good. Fluid soundfont is the best, but you need to use SBDyn! in order to get it loaded on Live/Audigy cards.

Which other 3rd party soundfonts have you tried?

How many instrument patches and how many drum kits does synthgm.sbk have? (Note that is "gm", not "mt")

In particular, did it have a "castanets" patch or a "castanets" sound in any of the drum kits?

I am trying to decide which castanets sound to use in my default MT-32 soundfont (which I have constructed with the trial version of Awave Studio).

Note: I have an SB Live! Value OEM and I cannot install Vienna.

http://www.soundsite.net

They have soundfonts in the HUNDREDS of megabytes. Some of them QUITE nice. Using the latest Live! 5.1 drivers, I have a 63MB custom soundfont loaded with no third party software, and it sounds great.

As for an MT-32 soundfont, one of the Monkey Islands had one that was close to 50MB at one point. The guy who made it (and the site) pulled it due to "compatibility issues" with alot of games. IE: It just didn't sound RIGHT. He said he wouldn't put it back as you "just can't emulate the full features of an MT-32 in a soundfont". He also pointed out that a good soundfont will almost ALWAYS have better individual sounds than an MT-32, which is a bit synthy.

Fluid rocks, BTW... I used bits of it in my custom sound font :->

Hee hee. Wrong site 😄

http://www.thesoundsite.net

There.