Simple Renoise Questions

Help, Support & Bugs Beginners Questions - Renoise
1

I used to have a lot of fun with Med and OctaMed back in my Amiga days (I miss my Amiga). Garage Band with my Mac is fun enough, but I am nostalgic for a Tracker. Piano rolls going sideways always just seemed wrong to me, my mind still thinks in terms of a tracker, I guess. I have a few questions which are pretty elementary, before I buy Renoise:

  1. Can one (easily) use SoundFonts with Renoise? I have sampled some of my own personal instruments over the years, and it would be cool to be able to play them with a tracker.

  2. Can MIDI files be imported?

  3. Can I compose something in Renoise, and then use the program to play the notes through an external keyboard? Something like MIDI tracker for the PC…using a tracker format to input notes that will then be played through a keyboard.

Sorry for these elementary questions.

2

I could be wrong here - but if you google for ‘free vst soundfont’ it seems there are some free VST instruments that play play sound fonts - you install this instrument and select it in ‘instrument properties’. Using VST instruments is quite easy within renoise.

Renoise will play external midi devices - its in the bottom tab, instruments settings… midi properties. Select the output and channel and… bish bosh tosh…

I’ve never tried but renoise seems to have .mid in its list of file extensions…
Which could be fun for remaking some karaoke classics :)

I’m gonna try that now :)

3

Try this vst for example:
http://www.kvraudio.com/get/769.html

I know that there is another one. But I have to dig deeper to find it.

4

You can do all of these things without having to buy Renoise first.

  1. There are a few sampler vst’s that support using soundfonts. RGC:Audio’s free SFZ plugin is one of the most common advertised.
  2. Yes Renoise imports .MID files. Perhaps not always as perfect, but i cannot foresee your level of judgement on what you expect of this import feature.
  3. Yes you can use an external midi device as an instrument, you canplay multiple instruments on your external device if you program them on MIDI channel base.

For the rest i would suggest you just to download the demo and try it. It is not restricted in time, nor in saving. Just the export feature and Rewire features are restricted.
Other than that it is basically the usual free tracker that you get to work with.

5

You are on a Mac? You can just use the built in DLSMusicDevice Audio Unit for your Sound Fonts.

http://www.mjewing.co.uk/gmoogb/article_09.php

It should be in the “Instruments Settings” tab, alongside any other plugins you have installed.

The answer to the rest of your questions is yes, you can.

6

Although it doesn’t help you as your on a Mac just thought I’d mention Cakewalk are giving away SFZ+ for free now

http://www.store.cakewalk.com/b2cus/Produc…35-CWSZ1.40-20E

http://www.store.cakewalk.com/b2cus/Produc…35-CWSQ1.40-20E

http://www.store.cakewalk.com/b2cus/Produc…35-CWF11.02-10E

http://www.store.cakewalk.com/b2cus/Produc…35-CWF21.01-10E

http://www.store.cakewalk.com/b2cus/Produc…35-CWF31.01-10E

7

Thanks for the Tip! Cool! :D
But for their FX Plugins, they ran out of serials:
Free! - Cakewalk Audio FX 1 Download Out of serial numbers 11-28-2009
Free! - Cakewalk Audio FX 2 Download Out of serial numbers 11-28-2009
Free! - Cakewalk Audio FX 3 Download Out of serial numbers 11-28-2009

WTF? :huh:
Nevermind… Google is your friend. And the FX Plugins are DX-Plugins anyway.

8

search kvr for all your needs: http://www.kvraudio.com/get.php

9

Thanks, guys. I’ve downloaded Renoise and will give it a try.

10

If you miss the good old amiga tracking days you will seriously fall in love, mate… ;)