KVR Audio

asio_ · Post by **asio_** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 1:44 pm

hi, i am using windows xp under virtualbox. I can not hear midi files. those of virtualbox I was told to use a software synthesizer that sounds midi files as normal audio files. where do I start?

BertKoor · Post by **BertKoor** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 2:04 pm

asio_ wrote:where do I start?

In the Config Panel under Audio or Sounds. Besides Audio Playback & Audio Recording you can select a device for Midi playback.

I know nothing of VirtualBox, but I have one Remote Desktop to a virtual machine, and that does not have a soft synth for midi available. Never needed one actually... I doubt you can get that working without glitches at all.

BertKoor · Post by **BertKoor** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 2:04 pm

asio_ wrote:where do I start?

In the Config Panel under Audio or Sounds. Besides Audio Playback & Audio Recording you can select a device for Midi playback.

I know nothing of VirtualBox, but I have one Remote Desktop to a virtual machine, and that does not have a soft synth for midi available. Never needed one actually... I doubt you can get that working without glitches at all. It has to go through a virtualised hardware-emulation layer.

asio_ · Post by **asio_** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 2:13 pm

I tried to change Microsoft gs with Yamaha xg. but the Yamaha xg does not work. I recommend another synthesizer?

BertKoor · Post by **BertKoor** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 2:19 pm

asio_ wrote:I recommend another synthesizer?

Yes, you do that

asio_ · Post by **asio_** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 2:33 pm

pardon me my english..which synthesizer do you recommend to install?

whyterabbyt · Post by **whyterabbyt** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 2:36 pm

asio_ wrote:pardon me my english..which synthesizer do you recommend to install?

Ive got no recommendations as such because Ive never used them, but a google for "software midi synth" returns links headed with this:

http://coolsoft.altervista.org/en/virtualmidisynth

asio_ · Post by **asio_** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 2:37 pm

I have not windows xp sp3

whyterabbyt · Post by **whyterabbyt** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 2:46 pm

asio_ wrote:I have not windows xp sp3

Pertinent information from your side as to such restrictions would probably have been useful in advance.

Or you could upgrade to XP SP3; it is still a freely available download I believe.

asio_ · Post by **asio_** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 3:01 pm

you're absolutely right. but I do not want to download the service pack 3. rather, do you think that would solve the problem by replacing Microsoft gs. I would like to know why the midi files are considered to be different from other types of audio files and are not supported in vbox. that I should ask them.

whyterabbyt · Post by **whyterabbyt** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 3:08 pm

asio_ wrote: I would like to know why the midi files are considered to be different from other types of audio files and are not supported in vbox. that I should ask them.

Its nothing to do with MIDI files being considered differently. And its not VirtualBox that deals with that in the first place, its your installation of Windows, or its drivers.

asio_ · Post by **asio_** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 3:16 pm

to me they told me that virtualbox does not support midi

mystran · Post by **mystran** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 3:28 pm

asio_ wrote:you're absolutely right. but I do not want to download the service pack 3. rather, do you think that would solve the problem by replacing Microsoft gs. I would like to know why the midi files are considered to be different from other types of audio files and are not supported in vbox. that I should ask them.

Virtual Box doesn't support ANY kind of audio files just like normal hardware usually doesn't. It is the software running on a computer (real or virtual) that is responsible for decoding the audio into raw sample data and sending it to the audio interface. Virtual Box has a virtual audio interface, but that's it.

That said, MIDI files are not audio files at all. They are "music files" in the sense that they contain information about notes and other performance parameters, but they are essentially nothing but sheet music for synthesizers. No audio involved whatsoever, all you can do with them is to send them to a synthesizer to "perform it" just like you could give sheet music to a musician if you wanted to hear it.

Now, normally when you play a MIDI file, what happens is that the player application sees that this is not an ordinary audio file, so it loads the built-in software synthesizer in Windows (the Microsoft GS thing) and sends the MIDI contents to that synthesizer, then sends the resulting audio to the audio interface. But the actual MIDI files contain no audio at all; without a synthesizer, there's no way to play it back.

None of this has anything to do with Virtual Box, it works exactly the same on real hardware as well. Note that VBox might or might not support MIDI connections (used for connecting keyboards, synths and such; MIDI is also a hardware standard on what kind of cables and data protocol to use), but that's another thing.. not relevant in this situation.

BertKoor · Post by **BertKoor** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 3:29 pm

XP SP1 was very insecure. Don't know how it is nowadays, but 10 years ago if you connected to the internet with SP1 to download a firewall, you'd be infected before you had finished downloading.
SP2 was better and SP3 is the latest. No software developer would recommend or support another version of XP than SP3.

Other than security issues and countless fixes for bugs, I don't think that the area you're dealing with has undergone any structural change between SP1 and SP3. So you can try to install that VirtualMidiSynth anyway. Trying doesn't hurt...

For an audio file, Windows will route the raw data (after decoding by a codec) to the soundcard.
For a midi file, Windows will route the midi data to the default Midi port. If that is a hardware Midi port, it's played by the hardware synth connected to it. But it also can be the MS GM SoftSynth which is usually included in XP. If that is absent and no other Midi device is found, then Windows cannot play the file.

Oh, I remember back then I tried the Roland Virtual Sound Canvas on Win98. Maybe that still works on XP (if you can find a legit copy)

whyterabbyt · Post by **whyterabbyt** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 3:29 pm

asio_ wrote:to me they told me that virtualbox does not support midi

Who is 'they'?

If that's what 'they' told you, then 'they' are wrong. Its not even up to virtualbox to 'support MIDI', thats not its function.
I gave you a set of keywords as to what to search google for; if you want a solution i'd suggest you follow that further yourself. if you want to insist it cant be done because you're using virtualbox and virtualbox doesnt support MIDI, then your thread was pretty pointless.