Subject:Converting my harware studio to Acid/MIDI Help

Posted by: wiseguys12

Date:2/19/2005 1:24:29 AM

What's up everybody? My name is Justin, from VA. Past two years I've just been strictly hardware, and I just copped AP 4 & Sound Forge 7, so I'm ready finally to put this computer to use. Here's my set-up Casio CTK-518 Keyboard (Old school, but got some crazy sounds), Roland BOSS SP-303 Sampler & DR-660 Drum Machine, old Numark turntable, and your basic 4 channel mixer. My decision to finally get down with Acid & Sound Forge was when I saw these cats using it that this studio session. I was told that Midi was gonna be the best thing about going w/ Acid. So I need alot of things clarified for me a bit. So I purchased a ESI 4x4 Chnl USB Midi Interface and a bunch of midi cables from the my local music shop. So how do I go about playing a melody on the keyboard, a pattern on the drum machine, a sample from the turntable that I have loaded in the sampler, etc. and having it record and be able to edit in Acid? Do I need still need to have my hardware instruments running through my mixer & stereo setup to hear the music, or would I be able to preview the sounds from the drum machine in Acid before actually recording them? I realize I need the MIDI out from my instrumental to the Midi in on my interface. My boy also told me something about how my the channels on the interface? He told me Patch 10 is normally for your drum channel. As yo go into MIDI sequencing you can assign your instruments to individual channels (example keys- channel 1, bass channel 2 and a synth sound to channel 3 etc.) I'm sure I need to set up the preferences in Acid properly first and work from there. Another thing that I've heard alot about since deciding to step it up was to get a new sound card for my PC. I have a Creative SB Live! Series. I was told a new & better soundcard and some new monitors were a must for putting it together w/ quality on a PC. So any help I can get with this situation would be greatly appreciated. I'm hoping to link up with somebody who's willing to help a brother get through this whole new set-up thing w/ some details, but any advice I can get will help as I'm clueless to the whole software thing.

Subject:RE: Converting my harware studio to Acid/MIDI Help

Reply by: JohnnyRoy

Date:2/19/2005 6:39:05 AM

Hey Justin,

Welcome to the forum and to the ACID community. All this stuff does seem a bit overwhelming at first but just as you learned all the knobs and dials on all that hardware you will get use to their software counterparts.

Hardware setup:
ACID will allow you to control all of your outboard MIDI gear but you still need to keep it all plugged into your mixer so you can hear what’s going on. The MIDI OUT on your keyboard controller should be plugged into the MIDI IN on your 4x4 MIDI interface, and the MIDI OUTs on the 4x4 interface should be plugged to the MIDI IN’s on the Casio, BOSS, DR-660, etc. If you set each of them up to respond to a different MIDI channel, you can play them with the MIDI keyboard controller set to that channel. You will eventually need to plug the audio output of your hardware MIDI device into your PC so ACID can record the real sounds during rendering but while you are composing, you only need a MIDI connection.

Software setup:
In ACID you go into Options > Preferences > MIDI to set up the ESI 4x4 as both your MIDI IN and MIDI OUT interface. When you record a track, your MIDI keyboard controller channel will control which MIDI device is being played. When you play back a track the MIDI data should be sent back to the same device you recorded with. If not you can always go into the MIDI data stream and change the channel number to the channel of the device you want to send it to. Yes, channel 10 is reserved for drums.

As for a sound card, the least expensive Pro card I’ve found is the M-Audio Audiophile 2496 ($99). It’s an excellent card for the money. You might also want to look into M-Audio’s external USB/Firewire solutions if you plan to record vocals and need a preamp. Since you already have a mixer, it sounds like you may have this covered and just need something like the Audiophile 2496. The Echo Mia MIDI is also a nice card but its more expensive ($199) and you already have a MIDI interface. I'm using the M-Audio Studiophile LX4 2.1 speakers and they are awesome. If those are too expensive, the DX4's are also nice. (same speakers without the subwoofer)

All of this is covered in the new book Instant ACID that was authored by myself and Iacobus (another forum member here). There is an entire chapter on MIDI Recording that starts with what hardware to select and it even has wiring diagrams to show you what device to plug into which interface. It was written for people like you who just need to know how to get started quickly. (and it’s only $15 at WalMart.com. That’s around the price of one monster MIDI cable) ;-) Here’s what’s in the MIDI chapter. You can read the whole table of contents at my web site.

Instant ACID Chapter 11: Recording MIDI
- MIDI Recording Hardware
- Selecting a MIDI Controller
- Selecting a MIDI Interface
- Selecting a MIDI Output Device
- Plugging It All Together
- VST Instrument Setup
- Multi-Port VST Instruments
- Making Your MIDI Recording
- Using the Metronome
- Selecting the Recording Device
- Recording
- Working with Track Properties
- Heads and Tails and What To Do About Them
- Strategy for Recording MIDI Loops
- Tracks and MIDI Channels
- Routing to MIDI Devices
- Addressing Multi-Channel MIDI Devices

~jr