As albert wrote, if you have an external musical keyboard that has good sounds
of its own, you will definitely like using that keyboard much better for
entering notes with Lime rather than trying to trigger the internal soft synth
called the Microsoft Wavetable (wave table, that is).
But if you do not have that kind of keyboard but only what is called a MIDI
controller keyboard that has no sounds of its own, you may want to experiment
with a sound font player called OmniMIDI. We do not officially support it but
I have used it myself with Lime and a number of customers have reported good
results. See more about it below followed by a link to directions for
installing it. OmniMIDI is essentially the newest version of a solution called
BassMIDI which some of you may still use. OmniMIDI is definitely a better
choice for Windows 10.
If you need help to install it, we can provide paid support to help you. But
again, we cannot officially support it. The good news is that OmniMIDI is
free. After a Windows update, you may have to reinstall it however.
OK, enough of the fine print. Here is an excerpt from the documentation we
supply and the link to a zipped up collection of useful files including their
installer.
...
High Quality Instrument Sound in Lime Using the OmniMIDI Software Synthesizer &
SoundFonts
***
Updated 2014/4/17 & 2020/4/27
BASSMIDI has been superseded by OmniMIDI; for further information see:
https://officialblackmidi.fandom.com/wiki/OmniMIDI
BASSMIDI has not been updated since 2012 and, moreover, can cause crashes[1] on
later versions of Windows. So use OmniMIDI; it is, after all, recommended by
the BASSMIDI authors.
Introduction
The Lime musical notation editor, together with the Lime Aloud JAWS scripts
from Dancing Dots, have been powerful accessible tools for reading and writing
both Braille and print music for many years. However, in order to best take
advantage of these tools, it has been necessary for users to purchase either a
musical keyboard or synthesizer sound module that is capable of producing
instrument sounds for Lime to use when playing back musical pieces. Without
such a device, Lime has only been able to play musical pieces using the basic
MIDI playback capabilities of the Windows MIDI synthesizer. Not only are the
quality of the instrument sounds that are produced by the Windows MIDI
synthesizer incredibly low, but they are played with high latency. This high
latency means that a request by Lime for the Windows MIDI synthesizer to play a
note is responded to after a lengthy delay. This delay makes it nearly
impossible to play parts in to Lime from a musical keyboard.
Now, through a program that can be freely downloaded and used in combination
with Lime, the above problems can be eliminated. This program, called OmniMIDI
provides Lime with a low-latency General MIDI software synthesizer. This means
that, when using OmniMIDI, and without any additional equipment, Lime can
produce high quality instrument sounds that will respond quickly to requests to
play, making it possible to use Lime with only a simple MIDI keyboard
controller.
Even better, the instrument sounds that are produced by the OmniMIDI program
can be upgraded. The sounds are contained in a type of file called a SoundFont.
SoundFont files contain the information that is required to play many types of
instruments. When used in combination with Lime, you will use a General MIDI
SoundFont. This is a SoundFont that includes the full set of instrument sounds
that are normally found on keyboards and synthesizer modules that are General
MIDI compatible, and is the set of instruments that Lime expects to be
available. While we will direct you to a SoundFont that we feel will work well
with Lime, there are an enormous amount of SoundFonts available on the Internet
that are compatible with General MIDI that you can also use.
...
Here is the link to the zipped archive for OmniMIDI:
www.dancingdots.com/huge/OmniMIDIForWindows.zip<http://www.dancingdots.com/huge/OmniMIDIForWindows.zip>
Bill
From: goodfeel-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <goodfeel-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf
Of albertm13@xxxxxxxx
Sent: Wednesday, August 4, 2021 11:07 AM
To: goodfeel@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [goodfeel] Re: USB midi keyboard latency
The Microsoft wavetable soft synth that in most Windows computers has terribly
high latency. If you have sounds in your USB keyboard, use them.
Albert
---------- Original Message ----------
From: Young Choi <choiyoung7@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:choiyoung7@xxxxxxxxx>>
To: goodfeel@xxxxxxxxxxxxx<mailto:goodfeel@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [goodfeel] USB midi keyboard latency
Date: Wed, 4 Aug 2021 05:14:34 -0700
When I play midi via USB, there is a delay. Can you advise how I can improve?
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[1] BASSMIDI may even crash when releasing it
