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Apparently-To: john.smith@gravis.com
GUS Musician's Digest Wed, 5 Jan 94 2:57 Volume 4: Issue 5
Today's Topics:
A way to load custom patches
Cakewalk 256k limit
GUS Musician's Digest V4 #4
Patch-voice relationship
Patcher
Patch Maker
unsubscribe
windows question again
Standard Info:
- Meta-info about the GUS can be found at the end of the Digest.
- Before you ask a question, please READ THE FAQ.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 04 Jan 94 10:02:11 EST
From: Raphael Pungin <RPUN0187@URIACC.URI.EDU>
Subject: A way to load custom patches
While current version of Patch Manager can only load GM patches,
the new Patch Maker can be used to load custom patches in GUS. Just open
the desired patches in Patch Maker and load them in GUS using the
lightbulb (?) icon. They will be loaded in the order that they were opened.
Patch number 0 is the pure tone used for reference in Patch Maker. The other
patches have consecutive numbers starting from 1. Once the patches are
loaded, you may use your sequencer or MIDI file player to play songs with
custom patches. BTW, you can't quit Patch Maker because if you do, the patches
will be cleared from GUS. Since no two applications can use GUS synth at the
same time, have your sequencer output to MIDI mapper configured for Ultra-
sound for patch cache aware applications.
I know this is a pretty quire way of loading custom patches, but it works
fine if you have your custom patches in different directories. For instance
I have separate directories for techno patches, 808 drums, samples, etc...
It would be nice to have an application that would load patches according to
the .ini file which has patch numbers and the pathnames for the patches on
disk. A song with custom patches would have an associated .ini file.
Example of such an .ini file is:
[Melodic Patches]
0 c:\ultrasnd\midi\techno\acidstrn
1 c:\ultrasnd\midi\techno\funbass
2 c:\ultrasnd\midi\samples\jbisdead
etc...
[Drum Patches]
33 c:\ultrasnd\midi\bassdrum
34 c:\ultarsnd\midi\808\hihat
35 c:\ultrasnd\midi\808\sd1
etc...
Just before playing a song just use this app to load these patches.
This of course works fine if you know in advance what custon patches a song
uses. However when you are writing new songs, you need to experiment with
different patches and hear how they sound. For this it would be nice to have
an app that would load a patch from anywhere on the hard disk and give it
a patch number. This way if you do not like how patch A sounds, you may
interactively load a patch B instead of A and use the same patch number.
You may ask: "Why not to create a separate bank for custom patches like A
and B and just use program change controller to try different patches?"
Well, in my opinion the idea of a patch bank is not really appropriate for
a synth like GUS because it can be loaded with an unlimited number of patches.
The only patch bank you need is a General Midi bank so you can play all GM
songs. But if you use custom patches, many times a custom patch is used only
in one song (take speech samples for instance). So why to create a bank with
patches that are used only in one song?
Basically I guess my mind is set to integrating MIDI and MOD file formats on
a GUS. We can use MIDI file to contain the music information and an .ini
file described above to point to the sounds used in the song. The good thing
about this kind of a setup is that the instruments are separate from the
MIDI file keeping it's size small.
This kind of a setup is not intended for distributing the music electronically.
It is for music-making on your own machine and once the final version is
achieved, distributing the music on tapes, or CDs.
I am wondering if anyone want's to write the apps described above. I'd do it
myself, but I lack the knowledge of windows programming. If nobody wants to
do it, then this will be my first windows programming project.
Any comments are appreciated.
__________________________________________________________________
/ ___ ___ )( Computer Science, Univ. of Rhode Island, USA /
/ /__/ /__/ () rpun0187@uriacc.uri.edu, pungin@cs.uri.edu, /
/ /\APHAEL / UNGIN )( br326@cleveland.freenet.edu _______________/
\________________________________________________________________/
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 04 Jan 1994 10:28:53 GMT
From: Clarke Brunt <CLARKE@lsl.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Cakewalk 256k limit
I've only got the demo version of CakeWalk but it works fairly well
with 1MB GUS. It would be hard to imagine a program that was limited to
256k, since the program itself knows nothing about GUS memory - the
GUS Windows drivers handle it.
Is it that you get a rather irritating "There is not enough memory on
your sound card..." because there are program change messages on channel
10 (percussion), or a patch selected in the track window for channel 10?
The message will go away if you remove the program changes, and set the
patch to 'none'. Unfortunately, CakeWalk seems to respond to being told
that is is unable to cache patches for channel 10 by not caching the
melodic patches either - I think this is a problem that 12 Tone should
fix.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 4 Jan 94 13:36:40 CST
From: cowles@hydra.convex.com (John Cowles)
Subject: Re: GUS Musician's Digest V4 #4
Eric Bell, Howling Dog Systems writes:
> Subject: Can I have a sitting ovation, then?
Sorry - I've only got one Ovation, and it was pretty expensive...
Would you settle for "Gee, he doesn't seem like a bad guy..."?
John
--
John Cowles cowles@hydra.convex.com CompuServe: 72074,451
Convex Computer Corp. 214 497 4375
3000 Waterview Pkwy
Richardson, Tx. 75080
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 4 Jan 94 5:15:42 CST
From: chuth@lonestar.utsa.edu (Cornel H. Huth)
Subject: Patch-voice relationship
> One concern I had in making this new version was what voice number setting I
> should use in the ultrasound window driver. Envelope times are a function
> of the number of voices selected. A setting of 32 voices will result in
> envelope times more than twice as long as with a setting of 14 voices. It
Like you said, if the volume ranges (envelope offsets) stay the same, the
rate values for 32 voices compared to 14 is about 2.3 times longer.
> was tempting to choose a voice number somewhere in the middle, such as 24,
> as a compromise and since that's about where I normally set it. However,
I don't know why you want to do this. The "voices" parm in the patch header
is so the _software_ knows what to base envelope volume* and rates to. Just
develop/tune your patches using 14 voices on your patch-making setup. There-
after, that patch can be used in a 14-, 15-, whatever-voice GUS setup.
There's no reason to set this patch header value to anything but 14, unless
_you_ actually developed/tuned the patch, and hence have based the envelope
volumes* and rates, for another voice count (say, 24). Since there's probably
no real reason you _need_ to develop a patch using more than 14 active voices,
this really ain't much of a problem. Know what I mean?
> all the Gravis/Eye&I patches have envelopes created using 14 voices. So I
> reluctantly decided to create envelope times with the window driver set to
> 14 voices. If you use a higher number, the result will be abnormally long
> decay and release times. Some people may actually prefer this effect.
It really shouldn't matter. The software should (at least, mine does) read
the "voices" parm in the patch header and base adjustments to that. If the
current setup has an active voice count different than what's in the patch
header, then there's a bit of math that needs to be done to make sure volumes
and rates* are realistic.
* Actually, the voices parm is used mostly for the rates, though volumes do
become involved in calculations if you use any volume-level controls. So, you
really should be doing all your developing in 14-voice mode, just to avoid
any possible incompatibilities. The software takes care of the rest.
--
chh
Internet: chuth@lonestar.utsa.edu
Fidonet: 1:387/800.8
BBS: The 40th Floor;V32b@1(210)684-8065;M-F:5pm-9am,WE:1p-9a CT
------------------------------
Date: 04 Jan 94 14:37:44 EST
From: Erick Christgau <ECHRISTG@OSBORNE.MHS.CompuServe.COM>
Subject: Patcher
This program is now available on epas in the submit directory.
I'm working on the next version that will edit patch banks as well as employ
saving and loading setups.
Please let me know what you think.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 04 Jan 1994 10:26:03 GMT
From: Clarke Brunt <CLARKE@lsl.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Patch Maker
Some comments on yesterday's message about new Bosendorfer patch...
>Since Patch Maker Lite has no envelope control features, I plugged in the
>desired envelope parameters into the patch file with a hex editor.
I haven't downloaded Patch Maker Lite yet, but does it REALLY have no
envelope control. I would have thought that this was one of the more
necessary requirements of a patch maker - I certainly had some fun
experimenting with envelopes with the intractable patch.exe!
>One concern I had in making this new version was what voice number setting I
>should use in the ultrasound window driver. Envelope times are a function
>of the number of voices selected. A setting of 32 voices will result in
>envelope times more than twice as long as with a setting of 14 voices.
Surely this isn't right. I appreciate that the parameters actually loaded
into the GUS registers need to vary with number of active voices, but
surely the Windows driver adjusts the parameters stored in the patch file
according to how many voices you have selected - I assumed that this
was one reason why changing the number required Windows to be restarted.
Correct me if I am wrong...
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 04 Jan 1994 23:51:24 -0600 (CST)
From: "WILL HATCHER, AKA SILIKON" <WCH1965@tntech.edu>
Subject: unsubscribe
unsubscribe
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 4 Jan 94 13:36:20 EST
From: dmcintyr@muselab.ac.runet.edu
Subject: windows question again
As usual no one paid any attention to my question. I will ask it once more.
Is there any way to change the default MIDI and .WAV volumes with the new
Windows drivers? In previous versions there was an area in the Setup
dialog where you could adjust these. This is gone now, and it always
defaults to about 3/4 from the top, requiring me to load up the stupid
mixer every time and manually change this to be able to even hear the .WAV
sounds.
Certainly by now someone else has noticed this problem with the new
Windows drivers (the ones included in the .zip with Patch Maker Lite) and
can offer some insight.
At the least I would appreciate some sort of reply.
--Michael-- << dmcintyr@muselab.ac.runet.edu >> <<dmcintyr@vt.edu>>
------------------------------
End of GUS Musician's Digest V4 #5
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