Re: Sigh... USB-MIDI Interfaces

[Per Boysen <perboysen@gmail.com>]

On 9 jun 2006, at 13.55, Stephen Goodman wrote:

> Of course the one thing I left out of my Great New Machine was a  
> USB-MIDI Interface, having assumed that there'd be the good old  
> joystick-MIDI socket on the new motherboard (which has 24-bit  
> SBLive 7.1 onboard), but no!
>
> I did a search for "USB MIDI" on LD's digest but it brought forth  
> too many posts to check for verity.  So here I am!

I use this: http://www.audiotrak.net/xpmidi.htm
It is dirt cheap and extremely portable. I'm on my second MIDI Mate  
now because a musician friend became so impressed with the little  
thing that I couldn't resist giving it to him ;-)

I use them with both Windows XP and OSX pc's to connect external midi  
gear. No drivers needed, pop it in and use it.



> Comments about lag time/latency in USB MIDI interfaces are as usual  
> welcome, if not also schematics in the absence of other-than-Avid  
> products..  Thanks in advance!

You can neglect latency in MIDI, it almost doesn't exist.

Maybe this is what you've heard:
Timing data can be screwed up if you play a MIDI instrument from a  
MIDI keyboard when you do very big chords with exactly the same  
timing of all notes (not a "guitar/harp-like" chord strum). This has  
nothing with computers to do but happens because MIDI is a serial  
protocol and as such it can only send all those MIDI note-on events  
in a row. So the first note to arrive to the sampler/synth will play  
back first, no matter you actually hit all keys simultaneously on the  
keyboard.

Greetings from Sweden

Per Boysen
www.boysen.se (Swedish)
www.looproom.com (international)
http://tinyurl.com/fauvm (podcast)