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A highly obscure question about MIDI for old PC games...

A

autobzooty

Member
So I used to play old DOS games on my MacBook Pro using DOSBox.
Games which I own and installed from CD plz don't ban
One of the nifty features of DOSBox was that it could use your OS's General MIDI sounds, or emulate the old DOS MIDI. I tried playing the game using the built in General MIDI for Mac's Leopard OS and I was blown away as my favorite childhood game was pumping out music that sounded like a symphony. Really, Mac's MIDI is just that good.

Now I'm running a computer with Vista though, and I tried the same thing. It really sounds just awful. So my question is, is there a way to install Mac's General MIDI for use on Vista so I can play those old DOSBox games with better MIDI instruments? I don't even really know what the thing I'm looking for is called, and this is such an obscure thing to do that Google hasn't been much help. (Usually Google gives me results for setting up external MIDI devices or different kinds of irrelevant drivers.)

Help me, GAF. No one in my small circle of friends has any idea wtf.
 
Yamaha YXG50

I used to use this with ff7

if you have an external midi keyboard with GM you could use that as well

if you have a soundblaster AWE32/live/audigy/x-fi you can download a high quality soundfont for your midi
 
Mastgrr said:
The Mac's General MIDI soundbank is Quicktime.
Click to expand...
Aren't there better soundbanks out there than QT? I could've sworn some of the Yamaha ones were good, for example.
 
I've got an X-Fi card, and it came with a program called SoundFont Bank Manager. It lets me swap out the midi soundbanks with other ones. It takes .sf1, .sf2, and .dls files.

I don't know if that'll help, but it's all I've got for ya!
 
In vista MS wonderfully removed all midi support (i.e. the ability to select and configure your midi devices) but retains the old MS midi soundfont (which sucks). In DOSBox config file you look for the line mididevice=default and change it to the numerical ID of the midi device you wish to use. Alternately you can leave it as default and get a program like vista midi picker which will permanently set the default midi device the OS will use. Creative's cards have midi synth that is moderately improved over the windows default.

You can then (assuming you have a creative card) download the soundfont manager from their site, then go download a some new soundfonts. You can find a ton at sites like this. There is no "perfect" soundfont so you just have to try a bunch and find one you like.

If you're really enthusiastic about MIDI you could grab an old Roland MT-32 or SC-55 midi module on ebay.
 
incidentally, i'm a musician and i have a pretty nice synthesizer with MIDI output which can readily be hooked up to my computer, but it seems like it'd be way easier to just find a general midi soundfont that i like and set it up, right? i'm not super picky, especially if i can just get the one I used to have on mac.
 
I personally like the retro sound of general MIDI :) it's nostalgic to me just like old console soundchips. No other way to play Monkey Island 2 IMO
 
okay so I have a soundfont now (.sf2) but I dont know how to load it. apparently some software was supposed to come with my soundcard, but I built this computer myself and i know it has no sound card. which confused me at first cos i thought you needed a sound card to play sound...

am i hopeless? can't i just drag and drop the file somewhere? :(
 
autobzooty said:
okay so I have a soundfont now (.sf2) but I dont know how to load it. apparently some software was supposed to come with my soundcard, but I built this computer myself and i know it has no sound card. which confused me at first cos i thought you needed a sound card to play sound...

am i hopeless? can't i just drag and drop the file somewhere? :(
Click to expand...

What card is it?
 
luka said:
What card is it?
Click to expand...

you dont understand...

there IS no card. unless it's built into the motherboard or something like that, i did not put a soundcard in this computer when i built it. but my computer DOES make sound. how can this be?
 
dogmaan said:
Yamaha YXG50

<snip>

if you have a soundblaster AWE32/live/audigy/x-fi you can download a high quality soundfont for your midi
Click to expand...
Both great suggestions, look into these autobzooty. Go the first option if you don't want to add any hardware, or alternatively, look into adding a soundcard that will bring decent MIDI to the table. An oldie off eBay will do fine, as long as you get the right kind.

I picked up a Roland MT-32 recently, it's such a beautiful old thing. It's pre-GM though, so it's probably not the solution you're after here. But if you ever get the chance to pick one up for cheap, do it do it do it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_MT-32-compatible_computer_games
 
the download link on his first suggestion is broken. i'd like to do this without adding extra hardware to my computer as well.

all i need to know now is how to tell windows to use the .sf2 file i just downloaded. after that it's just a matter of hunting down the .sf2 file that i like the best. (incidentally, anyone know where this file is located on a typical mac computer?)
 
autobzooty said:
you dont understand...

there IS no card. unless it's built into the motherboard or something like that, i did not put a soundcard in this computer when i built it. but my computer DOES make sound. how can this be?
Click to expand...

Yeah sorry, i didn't read it word for word :lol

Windows has a default soundfont library it uses, I don't think you can change that at all without actual hardware.
 
luka said:
Yeah sorry, i didn't read it word for word :lol

Windows has a default soundfont library it uses, I don't think you can change that at all without actual hardware.
Click to expand...

ah bugger. well i DO have XP dualbooted on this computer...does that change my predicament at all?
 
Sew said:
No, unfortunately MIDI is consistently shit across all versions of Windows.
Click to expand...

undoubtedly. but i was referring more to the issue of being able to fix it? someone above was saying that it was easier to configure your midi settings in XP or something. if not, i'll just give up and see if I can add OS X to this computer :lol
 
Why not get a sound card? You're a musician, you said it yourself, I would assume you have pretty good ears and relatively nice audio equipment. A sound card will make a notable improvement in audio quality across your entire computer, you'll have a dedicated audio processor to lessen the load on your CPU, more surround sound capabilities, and you'll gain nice bonuses like being able to load MIDI soundfonts among other nice equalizing features. An X-Fi XtremeMusic (I think they're called XtremeGamer now) is less than $100.

You shouldn't expect anything from that free-as-dirt integrated crap.
 
autobzooty said:
undoubtedly. but i was referring more to the issue of being able to fix it? someone above was saying that it was easier to configure your midi settings in XP or something. if not, i'll just give up and see if I can add OS X to this computer :lol
Click to expand...

What I meant was that in XP you still had an option to change what device windows uses for midi playback in the control panel. In vista they removed that option entirely. You could never change the actual sound library it uses though.

I'd highly recommend even a cheapo sound card or external midi module. A decade ago an mt-32 or sc-55 was a pipe dream for most. :lol
 
Don't give up yet!! The Soundfont banks are red herring for getting this problem solved.

The real issue is that under Vista the only MIDI support it has is the FM General Midi. High technology for 1985....
Whereas your mac has Wavetable Synth with a sound bank built into the Quicktime audio engine.

What you need is a Wavetable synth card emulator that'll render the audio with an actual soundbank instead of just cheap frequency modulation.
There's Timidity++ - http://timidity.sourceforge.net
Windows port here (32 bit only) - http://timidity.s11.xrea.com/index.en.html#down
It's basically a virtual WaveTable Synth card driver.

As has been observed, Vista has removed the ability to select your MIDI out device - you can get a program here to select what MIDI device to use - http://akkordwechsel.de/15-windows-vista-und-der-midi-mapper/
(Direct link here if your german is rusty - http://putzlowitsch.de/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/plw-vista-midi-mapper_0_93.zip
So, install Timidity++, select it for the default Midi device, and your game *should* have proper music.
Maybe try playing a few test .mid files to be sure it's setup properly.


Video example of this whole thing here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zax1JZpXDME
 
EtanSivad said:
Don't give up yet!! The Soundfont banks are red herring for getting this problem solved.

The real issue is that under Vista the only MIDI support it has is the FM General Midi. High technology for 1985....
Whereas your mac has Wavetable Synth with a sound bank built into the Quicktime audio engine.

What you need is a Wavetable synth card emulator that'll render the audio with an actual soundbank instead of just cheap frequency modulation.
There's Timidity++ - http://timidity.sourceforge.net
Windows port here (32 bit only) - http://timidity.s11.xrea.com/index.en.html#down
It's basically a virtual WaveTable Synth card driver.

As has been observed, Vista has removed the ability to select your MIDI out device - you can get a program here to select what MIDI device to use - http://akkordwechsel.de/15-windows-vista-und-der-midi-mapper/
(Direct link here if your german is rusty - http://putzlowitsch.de/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/plw-vista-midi-mapper_0_93.zip
So, install Timidity++, select it for the default Midi device, and your game *should* have proper music.
Maybe try playing a few test .mid files to be sure it's setup properly.


Video example of this whole thing here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zax1JZpXDME
Click to expand...

Oh wow, thanks! I'm on Vista 64, so i'll have to switch to XP and give this a shot tomorrow. Hopefully that will do the trick, because those glorious Apple MIDI sounds are the thing I miss most about my Mac. :D
 
Years ago, when I upgraded my PC to run Cubase (in late '96) I also played Dark Forces on it was pleasantly surprised to hear the music coming from the Roland Sound Canvas module I used at the time. It sounded infinitely nicer than ad-lib stuff at the time.

I didn't realise Vista was so MIDI crippled
 
Yeah, if you have a creative card, just load up a good 64 or 128MB soundfont. You'll have to search the net for them. The best ones are pay but there's a lot of good free ones as well. Gabriel Knight Sins of the Fathers sounds awesome with a soundfont as opposed to FM GM.

As far as integrated sound is concerned, a lot of them support soundfont like Midi banks but sometimes they use a different format. You'll have to install the software that goes with your integrated sound card.

Vista Midi picker
http://software.bootblock.co.uk/?id=vistamidipicker

Allows you to pick the default midi sound device.

Synthfont
http://www.synthfont.com/index.html

A software synthesizer that allows you to use soundfont banks without a creative sound card.
 
I realize that this is fast becoming the wrong message board to ask these kinds of questions, but I've decided to give it a shot anyways since some of you seem to know your stuff.

I decided to go ahead and see if I can use the GM voices on my synthesizer (it's a Yamaha MO6, in case you're wondering). Using hardware I already own for music recording purposes, I've got the synth hooked up to an M-Audio FireWire 410 box via a MIDI cable, which then plugs into my computer via firewire.

My synth has a number of built in voices, and it also has GM support. Given the equipment I have now, is it possible for windows to use the GM voices in my synth to playback MIDI? I've been scouring my synth's manual, but again, this is a rather obscure thing I'm doing. I know you guys probably can't give specific instructions for my equipment, but do you know if something like this is even possible?
 
"Obscure"? No, I think that's pretty much what a synth with GM sound bank capabilities and MIDI in is intended for.

Just install all the drivers, and then use the Vista MIDI chooser to set the external MIDI synth as your default MIDI device. It should work.
 
Bumping very old thread...

OP here. I'm finally gonna get around to buying a new soundcard, but before I spend the money, I wanna make sure I know exactly what I want. I've reread this thread a few times to absorb all the information again, and I've made a little checklist...

For my purposes, my new soundcard will need:
-To be a Creative brand card
-To come with or be compatible with Creative's SoundFont Bank Manager for the purpose of using soundfonts that I download
-Be compatible with Wavetable MIDI, as opposed to Frequency Modulation, for much higher quality MIDI sound


Is that all I need? If so, can anyone recommend me a card that I should buy? Do pretty much all Creative sound cards have all these features? Also, when searching for GM Soundfonts to use, how will I know which soundfonts are FM and which ones are Wavetable?

I really wanna make this happen, but I wanna be extra sure that I'm buying the right thing before I spend a bunch of money. Can anyone help?
 
One thing to keep in mind, not all old games even support MIDI. Most of them support standard Sound Blaster FM Synthesis, but many don't support MIDI (and many only support very specific MIDI devices, like the Roland MT-32 or Gravis Ultrasoind).
 
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