Is MDPro capable of driving a large hardware setup (40+ physical ports)

Question

Hi Rainer,

Valuable contribution you have made there mate!

I have the MKS30,50,70,106 and a load of other hardware synths and effects that need taming 

My idea is to have as many synths as possible acting as one big patch i.e when I manipulate say... filter cutoff, the sysex/cc info is sent to all synths that have that parameter available...

So in theory stacking controller messages, but in present reality with MD  using the Super/Sub method....not sure I want to go there and then have to do it again when stacking is implemented (if I'm understanding this correctly)

The one thing I think is missing from all sysex controllers is a master database i.e someone inputs the sysex code once and is then available to everyone by querying the database. How many man hours are spent duplicating string input to these programs..probably something the MMA should have kept track of since the start of midi.

I have a ton of gear, and countless hours of inputing characters ahead of me...and at the end of the day, can I take that database with me from MD and say...push it to a native CopperLan app...or do I need to do it again and again and.....

I'm not sure that a MDPro is up to the task of controlling a very large hardware setup, given each sysex stream needs it's own midi channel (and with over 40 physical midi ports on patchbays) and thats why I didn't jump on MD going on 2 years ago (Hi Dan, NRPN was a good move)

I'm thinking sysex intelligence/database belongs as a native C++ app within a CopperLan network, because it has all the plumbing for getting info from any device to any other device on the network. Apps like MD and devices such as the LeapMotion controller would act as endpoint controllers for that app. 

Unfortunately, iPAD is an outlier not ready to come inside the network...I would hope developers look at how to get their products talking with CopperLan or risk getiing run over by the likes of China's CME who are coming out with their first CopperLan controller keyboard....with more to come. So were talking real knobs, sliders with a readout of parameters across the entire network.

Is MD flexible/powerful enough to do a serious hardware setup, let me walk with my sysex data...to justify an iPAD Air...I ask myself.

LeapMotion with the Geco app looks great, but he's not implementing sysex..maybe because he knows it's best inside CopperLan.

I reckon the iConnectMIDI4+ would be essential for me if I went MD

Music hardware is set to get a new lease of life I reckon 

Cheers,
Chris

Comments

Hi Chris,

I'll ping Rainer and let him know this question is up here. Hopefully he'll answer you back.

Thanks for this thread. This question is a bit of a mix between hopes, questions, and notes about technology. So that this forum can answer back, can you reduce it down to some specific questions, please?

One answer is that MIDI Designer does NOT allow you to address specific hardware outputs. That might change at some point in the future, but for now it's a limiting factor for your intended use with the iConnect.

Also, if by "let me walk with my sysex data"... well, MD does not allow for sysex librarian functions at all, but we do rock sysex on all levels (most of the Roland layouts use this).

Please comment back or edit the question and we can continue the conversation. Thanks for contributing.

Best!
Dan

Dan Rosenstark
Author & CEO
MIDI Designer
dream | create | play

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Regarding exporting your sysex to another format such as CopperLAN: there are NO export possibilities for MIDI Designer layouts except in our proprietary format, for now.

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Hi Chris! Glad you like the layout and appreciate my efforts!
Regarding your idea "My idea is to have as many synths as possible acting as one big patch i.e when I manipulate say... filter cutoff, the sysex/cc info is sent to all synths that have that parameter available...":
This would create a very long string of MIDI information, that would clutter the rest of the MIDI stream so notes would probably be delayed as well; in any case, MIDI timing would suffer quite badly from it. Even now, when you change f.e. the filter cutoff for the JX-8P with swipes swipes up and down, the MIDI stream on that physical MIDI cable would be overwhelmed with too much Sysex information. I'm sure that MIDI itself will be the limiting factor here... Obviously, with CC it's a different story, and you could use MD to realise it with the Supercontrols.

Regarding your question "I'm not sure that a MDPro is up to the task of controlling a very large hardware setup, given each sysex stream needs it's own midi channel (and with over 40 physical midi ports on patchbays)":
Do you have an 'input switcher' that can route the input to any of the outputs? like a sequencer does when you select a specific track, that it will MIDI-thru anything incoming to the output of that track.

I agree with you that it would be a great idea to have some unified Sysex database somewhere, but the variety of formats and parameters is bewildering, especially with multi-'partial/layer/tone' synths like most modern synths are. I think that fact alone prohibits coming up with a unified structure!

To answer your question "Is MD flexible/powerful enough to do a serious hardware setup, let me walk with my sysex data...to justify an iPAD Air...I ask myself.":
You can see MD - in conjunction with a virtual MIDI to hardware MIDI box - as just another input for your MIDI setup. In that light, it's mainly your hardware setup that needs to be flexible enough to route the desired controls to the desired synths. And recapping my comments about the "all synths with 1 control simultaneously" - I think your MIDI rig will protest greatly against such a big stream of data anyhow, that it's not really feasible to try and go that route.

Cheers,
Rainer

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Thanks for your reply Rainer,

I have 5 x 8 port motu midi patchbays on Win8 with 'any to any' routing being provided by CopperLan. Data between devices can be thinned to 1 channel if desired and sysex gets it's own separate channel 'sys' that can be enabled separately. They have a commercial and Freeware SDK for developers.

I think hands down, CopperLan is the way for end to end midi/sysex communication.

For note information, I have 6 x Korg S3 Rhythm modules that have 8 velocity sensitive buttons and which can be assigned to any note. If you want a laugh, check out it's sysex implementation...keep a month spare to make a template for this thing :) http://www.houseofsynth.com/korg-s3-rhythm-workstation-drum-machine-sequencer-owners-service-manual

"the MIDI stream on that physical MIDI cable would be overwhelmed with too much Sysex information" not sure about that (given thinning available in CL)...I thought maybe the buffer on the physical device would be the limiting factor, which I think can be overcome by converting the midi device to a native copperlan port with an Alex http://www.alyseum.com/product_ALeX.php

I have made the developers of CopperLan and 'Geco on LeapMotion' aware of the MD product so they know where I'm coming from when I'm bugging them about sysex. I'm trying to make the developers of the best midi solutions aware of each other, in the hope we get the best combination. I dont think developers can ignore CopperLan, this is traffic cop for midi!

What I meant by exporting sysex from MD was the ability to export all those strings that have been entered into MD, via a common readable format....Or the ability to import those strings I have entered into a spreadsheet or database i.e I'm guessing you used a PDF manual and copy/pasted into MD or if done by hand, you inputted the info into a spreadsheet/database first, then copy/pasted? Otherwise the hot new MD killer comes along and you need to it all over :(

In a perfect world, the midi database is available via Restful API to all apps of the world...and probably inputted by utilizing something like Amazon Mechanical Turk.


"the variety of formats and parameters is bewildering, especially with multi-'partial/layer/tone' synths like most modern synths are. I think that fact alone prohibits coming up with a unified structure!"

I think the important thing is to have that data available in the first place, a bright young university thing can then decide between rocket science or solving our midi dreams.

You mentioned running VM's to solve some of your problems, take a look at Openstack for where thats going....this project is on the way to killing off IT as we know it. DevOps or NoOps as they like to be called, will soon have the power to totally bypass the IT gatekeepers in an organization. We are close to having the ability of turning a warehouse of baremetal machines to a functioning datacenter in a couple of hours from a laptop!

It's fun to be a dreamer :)

Chris