The Hardware Instrument plugin's MIDI is only aligned for direct or hardware monitoring - it's behaving like a plain old MIDI track. On average, MIDI notes complete transmission ~2.63ms ahead of audio at the same position on the arrange timeline. A MOTU MIDI Express 128 was used in this test:
![Image](http://rand.me.uk/Audio/Forums/KVR/Bitwig/Hardware_Instrument_-_MIDI_Mis-Aligned_for_Software_Monitoring/BW_SoftMon_Late_MIDI.png)
When monitoring via the Hardware Instrument plugin, the MIDI should be sent to the external synth at least one roundtrip earlier, 10.79ms in my case. An offset (+/-) should also be used to make final adjustments for each synth's MIDI response time. If you try to use the Hardware Instrument plugin for monitoring via Bitwig, your audio coming from the external synth will be around one roundtrip late. The higher your roundtrip latency, the later the audio. Increase your buffers, and your synth's audio will be even later.
When direct or hardware monitoring, the MIDI will be roughly on time, but if you try to monitor via the Hardware Instrument plugin, instead of your interface/mixer, that audio will be heard around one roundtrip late.
I discussed some of this in a previous thread.
I also propose adding a switch to the Hardware Instrument plugin to allow switching between software monitoring or direct monitoring. If the MIDI timing was also fixed for both scenarios, this would mean Bitwig handles external synth alignment and workflow better than every other DAW. Couple this with hybrid tracks and you'd have something very special indeed...