PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Off-Topic Soundcard and Sequencer suggestions to alleviate my frustration, please!

I’ve been out of the loop for a while and feel like I have to learn everything from the beginning again when in comes to music and computers. I just want to go ahead and write songs like I used to but I am confused about my new win7 PC, soundcards, sounds, drivers, plugins etc…

For many years I used Powertracks on winXP with a SB Live (later X-fi) soundcard. I was mostly happy with the sound cards as I appreciated the ease and comfort of GM soundfonts when sketching out songs in Biab. Later on, however, I was frustrated with the VSTi:s I wanted to use for the final productions as I never managed to play and hear them live and use real time pitch bends and fx on them while playing. If it was due to PT, the soundcards or the drivers, I don’t know. I know I never could get any ASIO-driver to work.

Now I have a Win7 machine with an internal soundcard whose mixer I don’t understand. I also miss my soundfonts. I have downloaded some software soundfont players but can’t get them to work the way my X-fi card worked. I want a full GM-font ready as a default GM-synth for playing midi-files and when writing songs in Biab. I don’t want to configure the individual patches each time. Is there any good alternatives to soundfonts for this purpose? I’m not impressed by the Coyote WT. My Papelmedia and Sonivox GM-fonts sound much better to my ears and with zero latency

I am thus tempted to buy a new X-fi card (a PCI-express one, the one in my XP machine won’t work in my new machine), but I am afraid I still won’t be able to play VSTi the way I want to play them. I especially want to be able to play (and hear!) my You Rock Guitar as a midi controller in real time, with no latency and with a good sounding softsynth (the internal sounds are not up to par)

Should I get another soundcard/interface? Or do I have to buy and LEARN a new sequencer to play the You Rock Guitar? I hope not because I’m really comfortable with Powertracks and fond of PG Music.

I’d greatly appreciate any advice on how to proceed to get a working music making machine out of my new PC. At the moment I still use my XP-machine though it’s been almost a year since I bought my win7 PC! Should I get a new, cheap X-fi PCI-express card or should I go for something else. I don’t need (and can’t afford)any top end stuff, I just want something simple that sounds reasonably good and just plain works and don’t hamper me musically. Right now I am very frustrated and consider picking up the piano instead.

I just discovered this for using soundfonts with Windows 7. I'm using a beta version which works with 64 bits.

http://coolsoft.altervista.org/en/virtualmidisynth

Thanks Susan, seems like a promising option for soundfonts. I hope I'll get the time to try it out tonight.

Hey guys,

I just clicked the link provided and got a stay away from this site from McAfee. Not trying to be a spoil sport but just wanted you to know what happened n this end.

Later,

Danny, works for me.

Susan,

I download and installed, along with most of the suggested
SF2 paks.

I am floored by the quality. Running on a Geekbench about 2900 speed
and no problems at all. The ChromiumRevA demo's are outstanding.

Can this be run as VSTi or DXi ?

Thanks for the share!

VirtualMIDIsynth worked like a charm with my soundfonts, so I guess I won't be needing a X-fi card! I still need to buy some soundcard/soundinterface however as the integrated one I have doesn't seem useful. Any suggestions what I sould buy? My main requirement is to be able to play midi keyboard and guitar with VSTi:s in realtime in Powertracks. Is this possible or do I need to start looking for another sequencer?