Why MIDI? (was Re: Why DIY? (was Re: [sdiy] Another new hard to find part....))

[Paul Maddox]

Cheater,

> *MIDI*
> It's the most awful, crude, proprietary, stupid, unimaginative,
handicapped, etc
> standard that I've ever seen.

not for the time, it was great!

> It's a relict of the past, and was made in the times and possibilities of
computers
> the kind of Atari and Spectrum. We're a bit above that now, aren't we?

yep, and thats why M-Lan is growing and quite quickly..

> Or, take a comparison between an "analog" knob and an "encoder midi knob":
> continuous versus 127 discrete settings? *puke*

damn, you mean you can turn a knob to say, 16bit resoloution?
I mean, in a 270degree turn of knob you can pick out value 43271?

> How about velocity? 127 settings? *puke*

again, you really think you can hit keys with such accuracy that it needs
more than 7bits?

> Or let's take on non-standard scales. *puke*

fair point, but thats a limitation of the fact you're using a keyboard to
start, which implies 12 notes to an octave.

> How about taking a softsynth (like the tasty Arturia Moog Modular) and
making a
> patch between that and another softsynth (like Rebirth). Can you do that
with
> analog? Yes. With software? *puke*

Huh?
Sorry, show me how you can connect an Arturia moog modular to Rebirth with
analogue patch leads, I'm intrigued.
The argument is flawed, as neither of these apps was deisgned for this...
Can you connect a DX7 to a Prophet 5 via analogue?
errr, no, they're not designed for that...

> How about running 100000 cables from a single keyboard to something else:
> take a Kurzweil 2xxx - s/pdif connector cables, input cables, midi, usb,
ethernet
> (no idea if in Kurzweil, but some do have that), then come time sync
cables, ADAT,
> etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, *puke*, etc, etc. Again, *puke*

ok two points, firstly you complain you can't do this with synths, then you
say you want it?
Get MLan if you just want the one data/audio cable.

> How about non-standard patch memories? Everyone has a kink of their own.
And managing
> that is just a big pain in the ass. Come to think of a sound which you
stored and
> forgot what synth it was created on - *puke*

Sorry, again, if we're talking analogue modulars, Whats a patch memory?

> MIDI timing issues? *puke*
> Sending samples down through Midi? *puke*

This is my only issue with MIDI, bandwidth..
And given the time it was made, and what CPUs were around, you can
understand it.
But then, as I've said, thats why people are moving to MLan...

> Interfacing synths with eachother at all? *puke*

Huh?
Don't get what you mean here, sorry...
You mean can you feed the output of DX7 operator into a Prophet 5 filter?
Again, design....

> Midi2CV converters? What the hell is that crap supposed to be? *puke*

Ok, so you're a troll, you entire system is based around pure analogue, no
computers anywhere and you have one patch cable running between everything,
man that must sound interesting, not...

> All in all, I think it's easily visible what I'm pointing at.
> If we want the usability of digital to even remotely compete with the
ergonomics
> of the analog (note, I'm talking about *ERGONOMICS*, *EASE OF USE*, not
> "hey that prophet vst JUST DOESN'T SOUND RIGHT, aww")
>
> WE NEED A NEW CABLE.

you mean like MLan?

The problem is you can't just pick a new cable, there is a HUGE array of
problems, and then you need to get everyone to switch, and THATs the hard
part..

Paul