PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Help! Tech S.O.S (Off topic) MIDI/Audio Driver Setup and external keyboard

KLB, I can see you're gradually getting there but you don't really understand it. This is normal because midi is very confusing, it's computer code and it has it's own language and terms. I'll try to decipher some of it for you.

First, Bob's Mantra: MIdi is not audio. Audio is not midi, oommmm. What that means is midi is computer code that tells a synth what to play. Midi has no sound of it's own, it's nothing but zero's and 1's as computer code. It's the synth that produces the sound, in this case either your Roland, called a hardware synth or a VST/Dxi called software synths. If you're using software synths, those are installed on your computer and you need to use a driver for them. Hardware is external to your computer so a driver is still required but it's a different kind of driver. In your case it's your Roland's USB driver. If you're using the Roland you're bypassing the software driver so it doesn't matter which one is listed in Biab's config window as long as that Use VST box is unchecked. If you want to use use a software synth, then you have to check that box to use an internal software driver. The only reason the internal software midi sounds cheesy is because it is. It's a freebie given to you by PG to at least be able to hear something from midi when you first use Biab. After that if you want better sounds you need to pay for a good synth either software or hardware.

Now, to explain midi and audio inside Biab. The Real Tracks/Drums are studio recorded audio files, no midi. Therefore any RT's you have selected in a style is coming out of your computer in your case your headphone out to whatever studio sound system you're using. All midi parts are sent to your synth. If it's an internal software synth then those sounds are combined by Biab, synced up for timing and you hear both the RT's and midi parts through your computer sound. If it's a hardware synth then the midi is going through that as you've discovered. In order to hear both through the same sound system your Roland's sound must be routed back into your computer if you want to record it or to an external mixer if you want to just hear both.

Now to the real interesting part. I just went through the Manual for your Roland. Typical Roland, it's not very clear but it says it will play SMF's. That stands for Standard Midi File which means General MIdi. Yet it doesn't have a GM soundset. What that tells me is internally it's doing an automatic conversion of some of the patches so those get called up if it received GM patch numbers from a midi source such as Biab. Try this test. Create a song using an all midi Biab style. Right click on the Drums instrument tab and check the box to use midi drums then play the file and solo each instrument to see if the instruments match what you're hearing from the Roland. If they match then you're good, it is converting it's internal non GM patches to respond to GM program changes. You can still manually change those patches if you want which brings me to:

Pat files. Pat stands for patch. An Ini file that Mike referred to was invented by Cakewalk and stands for Instrument Definition file. It's a text files that lists all the patches in a given synth. Here's a link to the Roland Clan forum that says it's available for your RD800:

http://forums.rolandclan.com/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=51366

I can't remember how to do it but that .ini file can be converted to a Pat file that Biab can use. NOW with a pat file, you can select any patch in your Roland regardless of if it's GM or not by simply scrolling a list of all your patches and you don't have to mess with all the midi LSB/MSB crap manually. The GM selection for jazz guitar for example may only give you one choice but your Roland may have 10 different guitars available so using the Pat file list you can easily audition each one and choose the one you like best for the guitar track.

Finally, using a mixer. I have a Roland Sonic Cell and was using it exactly as you want to use your RD800 as a midi sound source with Biab and it worked great. My problem was when I upgraded to Win 10 64 bit the driver for the SC didn't work. It's for Win 7 only and Roland hasn't come out with an updated driver. That's OK because I've moved on to better sounding softsynths anyway. How I used it was I took the L and R outputs from the SC to my audio/midi interface L and R inputs and took the L and R outs from my interface to the mixer. Btw, an interface is a separate device that has audio and midi inputs that plugs into your computer by USB. They can have from 2 audio inputs to record an instrument of vocal up to multiple inputs so you can record a band into your computer. My studio system uses a power amp to passive speakers. If you're using powered studio monitors then you don't need the mixer, just plug the L into one monitor and the R into the other.

You don't have to use an interface it's just that one, it allow you to plug in an instrument or mic to record and two, it usually has better input preamps and better digital to audio conversion outputs than your laptop does. If you don't have an interface then you take the audio outs from your Roland to a mixer along with the audio outs using a stereo splitter from the headphone out of your laptop to the mixer and then run the mixer outs to your studio monitor system.

Hopefully this clears some of this up for you. There's still more to this but this should get you started with some understanding of how this works.

Bob