Hi, Chris,

I am using VDMSound in Windows 2000 SP 2. I have a Roland CM-32L attached [...] I am experiencing problems with MIDI audio. I have so far tried two games, Space Quest 4 by Sierra, and Legend of Kyrandia by Westwood.

Does the CM-32 complain about buffer overflow(s)? Is your unit in otherwise good condition (proper power supply, etc.) and does it work properly if you, say, try the same games in real DOS (assuming you still have a dual-boot)?

Simply exiting and restarting the game does not fix the problem. In fact, power-cycling the Roland and restarting the game doesn't work either. If I save my position in-game, exit the game, exit the DOS window and open a new one, and then restart VDMSound and the game, the sound returns to normal.

Maybe you can clarify a little: I do not understand how exiting the game, power-cycling the unit and then restarting the game does not fix the problem, but simply restarting the game fixes it?! The two scenarios appear almost identical to me, so a bit of extra detail might help. Do you run VDMS manually (i.e. via DOSDRV.EXE) or via "Run with VDMS"? Also, I think the CM is a "dual" MT and GS synth; IIRC the mode is controlled from a switch on the back or something like that. Am I right?

Without VDMSound, only an extremely limited set of sounds will play on the Roland [...]

Without VDMSound, on Win2k *no* sounds should play at all (unless you're using SoundFX, or unless you're using GIVEIO.SYS in which case VDMSound should not work at all). Can you clarify this as well please?

Thanks,
V.

Hi Vlad,

Originally posted by vladr Does the CM-32 complain about buffer overflow(s)? Is your unit in otherwise good condition (proper power supply, etc.) and does it work properly if you, say, try the same games in real DOS (assuming you still have a dual-boot)?

There's no visible status indicator for the CM-32; AFAIK, there isn't a buffer overflow. And yes, the unit is in good condition.

I haven't got a dual-boot system any more. I was going to set one up to test, and I may, once I find a spare harddrive.

Maybe you can clarify a little: I do not understand how exiting the game, power-cycling the unit and then restarting the game does not fix the problem, but simply restarting the game fixes it?! The two scenarios appear almost identical to me, so a bit of extra detail might help. Do you run VDMS manually (i.e. via DOSDRV.EXE) or via "Run with VDMS"? Also, I think the CM is a "dual" MT and GS synth; IIRC the mode is controlled from a switch on the back or something like that. Am I right?

Power-cycling the CM-32L and restarting doesn't fix the problem (some notes are still misplayed). Restarting VDMSound does fix it. I suppose the confusion is that I start games by using 'cmd', then cd to VDMSound's directory and running DOSDRV.EXE (no arguments), and then cd to the game's directory and run the .EXE.

The CM-32L supports L/A Synth like the MT-32, but I don't believe it does GS. There are no switches on the device. The front panel consists of a power button and a volume knob, as well as two status lights (power and MIDI signal). The back is just input/output ports (midi, power, and quarter-inch audio).
Here's a picture: http://www.synthony.com/vintage/cm32l32p64.html

Without VDMSound, on Win2k *no* sounds should play at all (unless you're using SoundFX, or unless you're using GIVEIO.SYS in which case VDMSound should not work at all). Can you clarify this as well please?

Yes, you're right. I misspoke. I used to run SoundFX, but I have it disabled while I'm using VDMSound. In Windows, if I use Media Player to play a .MID file, it drops a LOT of the notes (seemingly 80% of the instruments). The same MIDI file seems to work fine in DOS under VDMSound, but I haven't tested it in a session after having trouble with a game.

Thanks,
Chris

In Windows, if I use Media Player to play a .MID file, it drops a LOT of the notes (seemingly 80% of the instruments).

That's pretty bad. Try some of the "MT-32" files at queststudios.com (the ones that don't need sysexes, or the ones that have built-in sysexes) in MediaPlayer. Still having problems? VDMSound uses Windows' MPU-401 drivers, so if MediaPlayer has communication problems (assuming it's not just a sysex mixup) then so will VDMSound, so try to isolate the MediaPlayer problem first (assuming it's a MediaPlayer/Windows problem and not a CM32 problem -- hardware *does* age you know). Also make sure your power supply is right (i.e. at least the current required by the synth, usually 800mA or 1A will do).

V.

Well, Vlad, you certainly seem to know an awful lot about Roland synths.
Not to change the subject or anything, but, how about getting that MT-32 emulation finished so he doesn't have to go through all this trouble?? 😉

Hi, Vlad,

So, I tried some things, with rather strange results. I went to sierra studios and downloaded the MT-32 version of the SQ4 opening theme MIDI file, which included a .SYX file.

Scenario 1: Playing SQ4 using VDMSound.
Description: I used the VDMSLauncher program to create a default profile for launching SQ4 (the game itself), and then used that shortcut for every trial.
Result: Most of the sounds seemed to be spot on, but usually only one or two instruments would be wrong. Thing is, after going through a quit game/VDMS, reset roland, load VDMS/game, it would be a different instrument that was screwed up each time... Sometimes several instruments. Sometimes it sounded perfectly fine. Another thing is occasionally it would drop a note here or there... seemingly at random. This produced the most accurate output, but was inconsistent.

Scenario 2: Playing sq4_1.mid using Media Player.
Description: In this scenario, I made sure my computer's sound settings set the MPU-401 device (which is my motherboard's midi port) as the default midi device. Then I used WSysEx to write out the SYX file to the roland. Then, I dragged the midi file (mt-32 version from sierra studios) to media player, and let it play.
Result: The CM-32L seemed to recieve the SysEx commands (it was receiving some kind of midi messages), but then, when the midi would play, it played with the instruments almost entirely wrong. The notes themselves seemed okay (as far as I could tell with the wrong instruments) but the instruments just were wrong. This was very consistent, the same voices used the same instruments every time.

Scenario 3: Playing sq4_1.mid using VDMSound and PlayMid.
Description: I created a batch file which called the DUMP program (from sierra studio's site) to load the SYX file, and then used PLAYMID to play the midi file. I then used VDMSLauncher to create a default profile, much like I did in scenario 1, for that batch file.
Result: The result was identical to scenario 2. I couldn't get the instruments right, but it was very consistent with how it played. I tried to use MIDIEX to load the SYX file, but it wouldn't find my MIDI device, even though it was set to the defaults of IRQ 2, PORT 0x330, and VDMS was loaded any everything. PLAYMIDI had no problems.

Note that I also tried Scenarios 2 and 3 with a .mid file with the SysEx messages embedded in the beginning. I also tried playing the midi files without sending the SysEx commands (after a power-cycle), and it did sound different, so the SysEx was having some effect on the box. Also, I am using the original Roland power supply that came with the box.

Also note that "back in the day," I was using an actual MPU-401 ISA card to connect to my roland. Now, I'm using my motherboard's onboard game/midi port with a game-to-midi cable I got at Fry's for US$25. The Windows device driver claims it's an MPU-401, but I don't know if it's actually MPU-401 hardware compatible, because the old SB MIDI wasn't. (I dunno about the new SB MIDI hardware.) I also have an Audigy in this machine with a game/midi port. I could plug the device into this guy instead, and disable my onboard midi via the bios... I haven't tried that yet.

I think the problem with the other .mid file was that it was a GM mid, so it was writing to all those channels that the mt-32 ignores. I had forgotten about that bit.

Wow, that was a lot... thanks for listening (reading)! 😀
Chris' friend David G.

Weird. Looks like Windows is screwing up the sys-exes ("buffer overflow" problem most likely -- see Queststudios forum). I managed to get "Buffer overflow" on my MT-32 even using VDMSound, so you'd need a program that sneds sysexe's slowly. that might/should fix scenarios 2 and 3. I wonder if the dropped notes and screwd up instruments in scenario 1 are also due to buffer overflow. Can you try the CM on a slower computer (still with VDMSound and/or Media Player?) Or slow down your computer (temporarily) from the BIOS (write down all the old settings!!!) by disabling the cache and/or by decreasing the CPU clock multiplication factor.

V.

Well, I managed to fix the problem by using the Audigy's game/midi port instead of the one on my motherboard. Now it works flawlessly! Go figure. Could there have been some kind of conflict by having two midi devices installed? I disabled the one on my MB via the BIOS. There didn't seem to be an equivalent operation for the Audigy.

Anyway, sorry for wasting any time and energy you might have put into my problem... VDMS is a great program, thanks!

-If

There shouldn't be any conflict when *writing* to the interface, and there shoudln't be any conflict in general if the two interfaces are on different ports. But anyway, all's well that ends well.

V.