Q : HALion Standalone – How to Autosample Software Instruments?

[Casio del Diablo]

I'm running both HALion 6 and some software instrument / VSTi in standalone mode. Now, I can't figure out how to autosample the software instrument via MIDI, so that I can press each key and have it automapped to zones in HALion. How do I go about that? From my experience, the MIDI goes only to one of the two programs... Does that mean I have to use tome external program such as BOME MIDI to relay incoming MIDI to both of the softwares? (I'd rather prefer a smoother solution.)

FYI: I'm using RME HDSPe AIO as audio interface on a Windows 10 computer.

[WasteLand]

i think they go to both programs.
try midi channels, the software instrument that you want to sample, set it to another midi channel (isn't always possible, i think, don't know). i tried some standalones, no midi channels. not strange in way, if they aren't multi-tembral.

why not in a DAW? i get that standalone works nice, but the DAW you can use in the "background".

[Casio del Diablo]

why not in a DAW? i get that standalone works nice, but the DAW you can use in the "background".

I'm not sure how to get sound (recorded) into HALion in other DAWs than Cubase, is that even possible?

[UltimateOutsider]

A few years back I wrote a 6-part tutorial on autosampling virtual instruments with Sample Robot.

I covered four different ways you can set it up (2 hardware-based and 2 software based). For your setup you might want to look at parts 1-3 (intro plus the two software-based setups).

In the pure software setup I used VB-Cable by VB-Audio for the audio routing and LoopBe1 by Nerds.de for the MIDI routing. Basic idea is you use the virtual audio and MIDI tools as "cables" between your autosampler and your VI. My steps work for standalone virtual instruments or plugins running in a VST host or a DAW.

Even if you're using something other than SampleRobot, the setup steps will be the same.

[UltimateOutsider]

After re-reading your posts I understand you're actually using Halion AS the autosampler. (I own Halion 5, which lacks actual sampling capability, and I didn't know anything about Halion 6's new features until now.) I still feel the software-based setup I describe will work for you, assuming all HALion needs is a MIDI out path to the virtual instrument and an audio in path back to Halion (assuming Halion 6 added an audio in channel).

[Casio del Diablo]

@UltimateOutsider: Thanks for your tips. I’m using this RME HDSPe AIO audio interface that has this excellent audio loopback trick where I can route and record anything that makes a sound in my system (great for quick and dirty sampling from YouTube or anything). So the Virtual Audio Cable software won’t be needed (been there before the RME interface and it was too messy for me). So, up until my initial post in this thread, I had managed to make sound coming in to HALion from my IRIS2 softsampler. The problem I had was related to trigger-record notes within HALion since pressing notes on my keyboard would only trigger HALion itself, and no incoming MIDI NoteOn messages went to IRIS2. Now, after some fiddling I tried one of those virtual MIDI solutions, LoopMIDI if I recall correctly (I’m on my phone so can’t check). The one I tried didn’t need to install any system driver, with the trade-off of only working when its app is open. I believe any of the similar virtual MIDI offerings would accomplish the same thing, but I prefer a driver-less approach since I only need it for note-triggered soft-instrument sampling in HALion. So, to wrap things up: the only thing I had to do was to change incoming MIDI in HALion’s Settings to this new, virtual MIDI signal and, for some reason, that enabled me to simultaneously trigger both HALion and the other standalone instrument (IRIS2 in this case).

(I’m so, so seriously considering buying SampleRobot but can’t afford it right now.)