Subject:MIDI Complaints

Posted by: Bobm1

Date:9/6/2002 12:51:35 AM

I like the direction ACID is heading, with respect to MIDI. However, there are a couple of issues that that keep me from tossing Cakewalk SONAR into the dust bin:

1. MIDI CLOCK: Is there any reason in the world why GENERATE MIDI CLOCK only works when PLAY or RECORD are engaged? My keyboard syncs to external MIDI clocks. Unless I have actually hit the PLAY or RECORD button in ACID *MY SYNTHESIZER WILL NOT MAKE A SOUND*. This means:

A. The Piano Roll is useless because ACID does not GENERATE MIDI CLOCK from the Piano Roll mode. I see no workaround for this problem. Major pain.

B. I cannot simply highlight a loop in the Explorer window and jam along. I suppose I could just move the cursor to the end of my recorded tracks/loops, and hit PLAY and let it run to infinity while I play, but this seems a bit of a kluge.

Couldn't ACID just have a setting that turned on the MIDI Clock and left it running at all times? This seems to be a no-brainer. If there are tempo changes in the song, just adjust the MIDI Clock to the tempo at the cursor's current location.

2. Does ACID *really* send MIDI Program Changes even when the track is muted????? This is how mine seems to work. Am I doing something seriously wrong? If not, this is an ENORMOUS problem.

3. Non-MIDI issues: When I move from loop to loop in the Explorer window, it takes ACID about 1 second to begin playing the loop. This may not seem like a long time, but it's quite a buzz-killer when scrolling through hundreds of loops. I have an AMD Athlon 1800+, 512MB of RAM and a 7200 RPM drive - it seems like the loops should start playing almost immediately (they are *very* fast in Sonar). ACID 3.0 was this slow, also. Can't these files be buffered somehow for faster response?

Sonic Foundry rocked the world with intuitive, fast, and simple products. I buy these products because they don't get in the way of my creativity. I've also turned on several (legally-registered) friends to ACID. You guys are so close to a great product - please don't drop the ball on these key issues.

Thanks,
BobM

Subject:RE: MIDI Complaints

Reply by: Jacose

Date:9/6/2002 8:50:47 AM

I just hope they dont wait until ACID 4.5 to release these features.

that would be unacceptable.

then after 4.5 they should do rewire.

Subject:RE: MIDI Complaints

Reply by: nlamartina

Date:9/6/2002 10:43:55 AM

1. MIDI CLOCK: Is there any reason in the world why GENERATE MIDI CLOCK only works when PLAY or RECORD are engaged?

Bob, why would you want it any other way? The point of having the MIDI Clock out is for Acid to synchronize with another device or program. There’s no point in Acid outputting the clock signal if it’s not going to play along with something else.

My keyboard syncs to external MIDI clocks. Unless I have actually hit the PLAY or RECORD button in ACID *MY SYNTHESIZER WILL NOT MAKE A SOUND*.

Odd keyboard you have there. My keyboard synchs to external clock too, but I can tell it to listen to its internal clock as well. I’ve not owned one such as what you describe, but that could because I’ve never spent over $250 on one. =) What kind is it, and why does it need MIDI clock to even make noise?

This means:

A. The Piano Roll is useless because ACID does not GENERATE MIDI CLOCK from the Piano Roll mode. I see no workaround for this problem. Major pain.

There’s no need to have the clock going in the roll editor. Acid won’t even receive input from the roll editor. A piano roll editor is for painting notes in with the mouse while the project is off-line, not for auditioning something as input in real time.

B. I cannot simply highlight a loop in the Explorer window and jam along. I suppose I could just move the cursor to the end of my recorded tracks/loops, and hit PLAY and let it run to infinity while I play, but this seems a bit of a kluge.

Worst case, you could highlight a blank section in the looper and hit Play, but this still seems like a keyboard issue to me. I’m not even sure any other program out there spits out MIDI Clock while it’s stopped, since that would be pretty useless in most cases, cuz again, there’s no point in sending out a synchronization signal if nothing’s going to be synchronized. Are you sure there isn’t a way to have your keyboard use it’s own internal clock?

Couldn't ACID just have a setting that turned on the MIDI Clock and left it running at all times? This seems to be a no-brainer. If there are tempo changes in the song, just adjust the MIDI Clock to the tempo at the cursor's current location.

It does this, as long as it’s playing, but again, I can’t see how this is a “no-brainer”, since the point of the clock is to synchronize two things that are playing/recording.

2. Does ACID *really* send MIDI Program Changes even when the track is muted????? This is how mine seems to work. Am I doing something seriously wrong? If not, this is an ENORMOUS problem.

I’ve not seen this, but I’ll check later when I have time. Worst case you can just filter program changes in the list editor until it’s fixed, if it’s broken that is.

3. Non-MIDI issues: When I move from loop to loop in the Explorer window, it takes ACID about 1 second to begin playing the loop. This may not seem like a long time, but it's quite a buzz-killer when scrolling through hundreds of loops. I have an AMD Athlon 1800+, 512MB of RAM and a 7200 RPM drive - it seems like the loops should start playing almost immediately (they are *very* fast in Sonar). ACID 3.0 was this slow, also. Can't these files be buffered somehow for faster response?

I find that the number of loops stored in directory and the amount of memory affects the playback time somewhat. If you have a directory of 200+ WAVs or more, try breaking them down into smaller groups to see if it helps.

Hope this helps,
Nick

Subject:RE: MIDI Complaints

Reply by: Bobm1

Date:9/6/2002 11:17:05 PM

Nicholas,

Thank you for your reply. In the interest of readability, I won't repost our previous exchange. Here are my responses:

1. My synthesizer (Alesis Andromeda A6) has many parameters that can be controlled by *either* the internal clock or an external MIDI clock. These parameters include hundreds of modulation destinations - delay times, distortion depths, apreggiators, pitches, frequencies, pulsewidths, etc. I want these parameters to play back in time with the ACID loops. If I use the internal clock, each patch has its own timing - I don't want to have to reset this parameter to match the ACID tempo *every time I change patches or modify the ACID tempo.* This would be very, very ugly. If the A6 does not receive MIDI clocks from ACID, none of the parameters that are time-based will function. This means, for many patches, that if I hit the key, I either get a short blip, followed by silence, or I get no sound at all.

Imaging this: You have some guitar effect (Pod Pro, for instance). You want the echo to match the timing of ACID so that the echoes return on quarter-note intervals. If you stop ACID for any reason, your echoes stop. You may want to keep jamming - you're in the groove - but your echoes are gone. You've lost the buzz. To keep playing, you need change your POD back to Internal Clock, reset the tempo to match your previous tempo. Then, when you start ACID again, you've got to go back and re-reset the POD back to external clock. This really sucks.

Here's another reason: Both SOFO Vegas and Cakewalk allow *DO* allow you to set the MIDI CLOCK OUT to 'on all the time.' ACID needs to do the same!!!

Now, back to the piano roll... If you read my first paragraph, you'll understand that, in my preferred mode of operation, my A6 requires external MIDI clocks to operate. Imagine I've just recorded a part - it sounded really cool, but I need to make a couple of tweeks in the Piano Roll. I won't be able to hear any of the notes I just played, because MIDI CLOCKS ARE NOT TRANSMITTED FROM THE PIANO ROLL!!!!!!! This is unacceptable.

Hope this clarifies the issues.

Thanks again,
BobM

Subject:RE: MIDI Complaints

Reply by: stusy

Date:9/7/2002 11:29:20 AM

Nice compilation...! Midi-wise, I'll be comparing at least some of the features I've enjoyed with Sonar131 with sonic foundry, but I don't have WDM, don't use soft-synths and such, and if it's too "feature rich", I'm lost...I like the sonic foundry interfaces, and the features, tho simple are powerful...more of a joy to work...