Conference napalm::commusic_v1

It's different.  You do need a special interface card.  It uses an 8-bit
parallel interface, with something like three address lines and two handshake
lines in addition to the eight data bits.

At least on the Apple the card is very simple, mostly interfacing to the
Apple's slot plus a place to anchor the cable.
    John Sauter

Right. 8-bit parallel, NOT RS-232.  I have designed an MPU-401 interface
for the S-100 bus, but since I'm waiting to see an Amiga machine before I
decide to keep my S-100 stuff, I haven't built it yet.  There's very little
that could go wrong, however, unless you don't have an interrupt request
line handy.  The 'old' MPU-401 documentation had a few schematics in the
back for Z80, 6502, and IBM interfaces.  They had removed it by the time
I bought mine, but John's documentation had it (he bought an early one,
I guess), so it is recoverable if you want to build your own.

If you want confirmation that they're telling the truth, they are.
I do think the price of the Roland interfaces is a little steep, but
then if they had had one for the S-100 bus, I would probably have already
bought it to save myself the hassle of building one (you don't save
THAT much on something so simple).

-jim

    I wasn't sure where this question belongs... so here it is. Moderators:
    fell free to move it to a better place if you want!
    
    Does anyone know of a MIDI bus analyzer? I have in mind something like
    a logic analyzer I guess. Something you could program to capture
    classes of messages and update its display whenever something shows up
    on the bus.
    
    An example: I have two MT-32's used in a master-slave setup. I would
    love to put the slave into overflow mode, and have a simple, cheap way
    to  watch for overflowing note-ons, and know which channel was getting
    in trouble. I would want to suppress other messages (e.g. sysex, or
    program changes)...
    
    Is there anything on the market like that? How expensive?

       
       Music Quest cards ship with a trace utility that's supposed to do
       something like this.  I haven't used it, but I saw it mentioned
       in the README.1ST file.

       There might be a market for a product dedicated to this
       application, but I don't think too many club-level musicians are
       going to spend more than a couple hundred bucks for it.  But I
       could be wrong...let's take a survey:  how much would *you* pay for
       a laptop MIDIscope?

              

    I've got two 'scopes' available to me right now - one built into the
    EMAX, and an actual MIDIscope program for the MAC.  The EMAX' version
    doesn't allow any filtering, however.
    
    karl

    re .3
    
    Maybe I should explain what I'm doing. I have a Mac driving the MT32s.
    I am trying to debug both my software and my songs: part of that
    involves wanting to see what spills out of the slave MT32. Maybe I
    should loop the spill-over back into the Mac, and hack a little code to
    watch what comes back. Except I lose my only MIDI IN to my Mac which
    means my controller keyboard can't be connected (only the printer port
    is usable - my driver doesn't do the modem port (may be I need to do that
    (there's yet another project (I seem to get stuck in endless recursion
    sometimes! :-)
    
    I like layering stuff, doubling bass lines, etc. so maybe I use up lots
    of oscillators, but I seem to use up all of them awfully quickly. I'm
    suspicious that something's wrong with my software, or the master MT32,
    or ?
    
    I did try the trick of hooking up a synth to the slave spill-over output
    and setting the synth to omni - it does capture note ons - but I can't
    tell from what channel. Other garbage may be flying by unnoticed.

    rep .4
    
    To reply to the survey question, I suppose $100 would be the max for
    me. Who wants to buy a midi box that makes no sound? Now if it could do
    something else useful as well... 

    I saw such a device advertised in an issue of Electronic Musician or
    MIX or Keyboard or one of those a few months back.  The ad hasn't run
    again since then.  It was for a little box that lit up leds for various
    message types and I think it even had a silo so you could "snapshot"
    the last n messages (for some value of n).
    
    I thought it looked like a pretty neat little gadget.
    
    len.
    

    re .9     This sounds like what I'm looking for!
    
    Does anyone remember this ad? Manufacturer's name? Or how about which
    magazine it may have been in? I guess I'll have to go to a magazine
    store and check out whatever issues of EM, MIX or Keyboard they have.
    With my luck, the issue I need will already be off the racks! Any more
    clues would be appreciated..............

The Studiomaster MA36 is advertised in the February Issue of
Electronic Musician.  According to the ad it is an 36 function
MIDI Analyzer which:

Instantly indicates any MIDI information transmitted or received
on all 16 MIDI channels

Instantly identifies and isolates any faults occuring within 19
different parameters on each MIDI channel being used

MIDI in and thru connections.  Can stay permanently connected in
line with your MIDI system

Operates on a conventional 9V battery or option AC adapter

Is Inexpensive and indispensable.   (no price is given)

The picture which is titled "actual size" shows it to be about
3x6x2.

Contact:
Jim Giordano or Paul Reeve at
Studiomaster, Inc
3941 Miraloma
Anaheim CA
714-524-2227

    thanks for the info
    
    I called Studio Master and ordered literature on the MA36.
    I'll post a summary of the specs when I get them.

    I continued this note in a new note 2374 - since it has nothing to do
    with the Roland MPU401.
    
    Moderator: I guess you were right, I should have started a separate
    note to start with! You live and you learn...