Help-midi Output Timing

General Discussion
1

I’m using a PC 1.7mhz, 256RAM,XP latptop.

All other trackers(madtracker) have been tight in their timing.

Renoise is tight too

except when I use MIDI output.

For some reason, I can program 16 16thnotes, and it seems they are kind of wibbily wobbly in their timing. Can someone help me make the MIDI output of renoise tighter please? it is such a good program…

Micah :(

2

There’s a few things that might help:

  1. if the timing on 16th’s if WELL off - skipping notes, quite random, etc…

then check that your synth is in polyphonic mode… unfortunately, notes triggered right next to each other don’t seem to leave enough gap between Note off, and the next Note on, to retrigger an external MIDI device… you could of course try changing the note length so they stop just a little early, leaving enough time to retrigger…

…some samplers can retrigger the same note in poly mode - others don’t… this can be a problem.

  1. there’s a regular delay that seems to jump down the external MIDI every couple of beats, which seems roughly equal to the latency setting on your soundcard… I find Directsound sometimes has better timing than ASIO… But get the latency on the sound card as low as possible and this should help…

I also find subtle off-timings between different tracks… Sometimes a note on one track will trigger out of sync with another… I usually pull all MIDI delay settings down as low as possible and sometimes this can clear things up a little… But in general, I just don’t use much MIDI any more! It’s fine for pads and things of course, but not so hot for drums or bass lines.

Shame, 'cos I would love to get the Emu sampler triggering beats again - Bring some warmth back!

I would very much like to see all aspects of external MIDI timing worked on in future releases…

Having said that, many sequencers suffer from this problem… Logic, however, seems to have very tight MIDI timing…

3

Apprently, the Mac version of Renoise doesn’t suffer from this. This is because Mac’s MIDI support in the OS is far better.

4

I have same kind of problem, using 1.5.2. I don’t use sampled instruments, only MIDI to control instruments like Roland SC-155 and U-110. When I trigger around seven or more notes at once, some of them (like a piano chord with four notes triggering at once plus drums and bass) get played irritatingly with slight delay. I have the same problem with SB X-Fi Platinum and SB Audigy 2. Does this issue have to do with Windows in general, MIDI interfaces of my SB’s or something else? Any suggestions/workarounds?

5

Wasn’t there some work around using an external app. to send midi timing to renoise or something?

Forgive me if my terminology is wrong, but I don’t use much midi,
however I am interested in this as I am considering adding a hardware synth to my setup.

6

Some additional questions:

  1. When a note triggers, the previous note playing back on the same column goes off immediately. Two MIDI events occur: note off and note on. Is there such adjustment in Renoise that would prevent previous note at same column from going off when a MIDI note on signal comes? That would probably reduce MIDI bandwidth since only one MIDI event would occur, thus allowing playback of some additional simultaneous notes. Natural decay of the patch (especially on percussion!!!) and synthesizers own polyphony cap would take care of old notes left on background.

I know that this effect is probably achievable with just adding columns. Still I’m unsure whether putting note-offs on less-crowded parts of tracker roll would cause only one MIDI event to occur when new note on same column goes on. In this case resolution/desktop real estate will be the concern. Not everyone can afford 1920x1200 LCD’s :D

  1. Does anyone have any idea what is that workaround using external app yank_crime is referring to?