Don't require a super computer to run them?

My best mate, who doesn't have net access anymore and is a bit strapped for cash (family man and all that) is using an older version Floops as his host.

I sorted him out with some sound fonts but he can't use them cos he hasn't got a player.

I know that there's the excellent sfz player that is freely available, but with just 450mHz under the bonnet, I'm afraid he won't be able to use it. . .

I notice that ther are one ot two Synth Edit sf2 players knocking about but the links to them on this site seem to be out of date. . .

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

odo has sfplay
thats pretty low cpu

Tux wrote:

I know that there's the excellent sfz player that is freely available, but with just 450mHz under the bonnet, I'm afraid he won't be able to use it. . . I notice that ther are one ot two Synth Edit sf2 players knocking about but the links to them on this site seem to be out of date. . .

I'd say to give sfz a try before you bail on it. After all, it only costs a download...

If I remember right, the synthedit soundfont module that most SE players are based on needs a lot of work. And being SE, it may have a higher CPU requirement than sfz.

Doug

Mmm... I already checked the Odo site but he seems to have removed his soundfont player..

I did download sfz as suggested and tried it out on my machine (which is a little quicker than my friends) but every sound font I loaded I was told I didn't have enough memory

How much memory does that thing need!? I never get those kind of messages using sound fonts in Orion's sampler... Never.

Maybe my mate should ditch Floops for Orion!
Ha! Ha! Before the flame thrower is turned on, I can tell you now that there's little chance of that happening!

You did set the mode to "DFD" or one of the PR modes, didn't you? Otherwise it would have attempted to load the entire soundfont file into memory. Also, it converts all samples to 32 bit by default - so even changing to SF16 mode might have made all the difference.

pljones wrote:

You did set the mode to "DFD" or one of the PR modes, didn't you? Otherwise it would have attempted to load the entire soundfont file into memory. Also, it converts all samples to 32 bit by default - so even changing to SF16 mode might have made all the difference.

Er... No I didn't! I guess I expected it to work 'straight out of the box'. It seems to be working ok now.

But on the RGC site it recommends that you have at least an 800mHz machine. . .

I have found the Jeskola XS-1 to be very light on the CPU. If you want to consider it, be sure to give the demo a workout before deciding. I am still using the old, first version, because later versions have invariably caused crashes. But it may have something to do with Windows ME or something else about my machine.

EDIT: Oh shoot...I missed the word "free" in your post. Oh well...anyway, the XS-1 is $50. Try all the freebies though!

I use sfz on a 500mhz laptop. It works fine.
What can you possibly lose by trying it? It's free after all and is about the best SF player out there.

with a computer that slow I'd buy a cheap audigy, or sb live (if he doesn't already have one perhaps) and use its onboard soundfont capabilities. 32 channels of soundfonts for 0% cpu is surely more than you'll ever hope to get off any software sf2 player on such a cpu.

The downside is you have to bounce the midi to audio if you want to apply effects. Probably not that big a deal for a beginner. And there used to be a 32 or 64mb sf2 limit for sblive cards, not sure if thats still the case for audigy1/2.