Newbie questions - please help!

[Al Murphy]

Hi,

I'm wondering could you help me please. I'm a bit of a newbie to the
world of electronic keyboards/midi technology burning CD etc - so I
have a couple of questions that probably seem a bit thick to ye bu
would greatly appreciate it if you could help me with please.

Q1: Could you please recommend some free software for converting midi
files to wav files please?

Q2: What format do audio files have to be in to burn onto a CD to play
in a normal CD player?

Q3: What format are the audio files found on a mini-disk?


Once again everyone - would greatly appreciate you help on these
questions. Apologies if they seems too simple.

Thanks,
Al

[Jim Higgins]

On 24 Aug 2003 17:26:07 -0700, in
<a23daf3f.0308241626.37048bbe@posting.google.com>,
almurph@altavista.com (Al Murphy) wrote:

>I'm wondering could you help me please. I'm a bit of a newbie to the
>world of electronic keyboards/midi technology burning CD etc - so I
>have a couple of questions that probably seem a bit thick to ye bu
>would greatly appreciate it if you could help me with please.
>
>Q1: Could you please recommend some free software for converting midi
>files to wav files please?

Play the MIDI file while recording "what you hear" with Windows
Sound Recorder. This assumes you have Windows.

More information on things MIDI at the URL in my signature.

>Q2: What format do audio files have to be in to burn onto a CD to play
>in a normal CD player?

Depends on the software you use to do the burning. A WAV file
recorded in 16 bit stereo at 44.1K/sec sampling rate should work
with everything.

>Q3: What format are the audio files found on a mini-disk?

Assuming you're referring to one of those small 3-1/4 inch CDs
it's the same format as used by on a regular sized CD. They're
just a 210 MB version of the larger 650 or 700 MB discs. The
format is called "red book" digital audio. It's what your CD
burning software burns when you burn an *audio* CD. You can
Google for the details.

>Once again everyone - would greatly appreciate you help on these
>questions. Apologies if they seems too simple.

You're welcome, but if you feel the need to apologize, why not
try Googling for the answers next time. You'll run into a ton of
good information along the way. I say that to be helpful, not to
complain.


--
Jim Higgins, quasimodo AT yahoo DOT com

alt.music.midi FAQ - http://home.sc.rr.com/cosmogony/ammfaq.html

[Barry Graham]

"Al Murphy" <almurph@altavista.com> wrote in message
news:a23daf3f.0308241626.37048bbe@posting.google.c om...
> Hi,
>
> I'm wondering could you help me please. I'm a bit of a newbie to the
> world of electronic keyboards/midi technology burning CD etc - so I
> have a couple of questions that probably seem a bit thick to ye bu
> would greatly appreciate it if you could help me with please.
>
> Q1: Could you please recommend some free software for converting midi
> files to wav files please?

If your using Nero 5+ you can record your MIDI file direct to wave using
Nero's wave editor.
Set it to record and play your MIDI file.
The output can be saved as wav or mp3 - you'll need wav to burn the file to
a CD.

--
Barry Graham
Top Brass Events Band
Melbourne, Australia

[Kenneth Rundt]

Al Murphy wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm wondering could you help me please. I'm a bit of a newbie to the
> world of electronic keyboards/midi technology burning CD etc - so I
> have a couple of questions that probably seem a bit thick to ye bu
> would greatly appreciate it if you could help me with please.
>
> Q1: Could you please recommend some free software for converting midi
> files to wav files please?
>
> Q2: What format do audio files have to be in to burn onto a CD to play
> in a normal CD player?
>
> Q3: What format are the audio files found on a mini-disk?
>
>
> Once again everyone - would greatly appreciate you help on these
> questions. Apologies if they seems too simple.
>
> Thanks,
> Al

Q1: There are several approaches, but if you want you can always
download my free tool developed for exactly this purpose. The tool is
called SynthFont and can be found at www.synthfont.com. What you need to
know is that it relies on SoundFonts, so you also need to download some
SoundFonts from various places. I have links to several of these places
on my web site. If you need more help with SoundFonts, don't hesitate to
send me an e-mail (directly). NOTE that you don't need any particular
soundcard (or any soundcard at all, actually) to use SynthFont.

Q2: All CD burners should *at least* support Microsoft's standard audio
format with extension *.wav. SynthFont creates *.wav files.

Q3: I think you got this already.

Cheers
Kenneth

[S - E - A]

> >Q3: What format are the audio files found on a mini-disk?
>
> Assuming you're referring to one of those small 3-1/4 inch CDs
> it's the same format as used by on a regular sized CD. They're
> just a 210 MB version of the larger 650 or 700 MB discs. The
> format is called "red book" digital audio. It's what your CD
> burning software burns when you burn an *audio* CD. You can
> Google for the details.
>
> >Once again everyone - would greatly appreciate you help on these
> >questions. Apologies if they seems too simple.
>
> You're welcome, but if you feel the need to apologize, why not
> try Googling for the answers next time. You'll run into a ton of
> good information along the way. I say that to be helpful, not to
> complain.
>
>
> --
> Jim Higgins, quasimodo AT yahoo DOT com

Perhaps this guy is talking 'Sony mini-disk' in which case he will have to
record them into is computer via line in from his mini-disk player.
Sony use a compression system to squash the audio down to fit on a
mini-disk, kind of similar to MP3. Recording it back on to CD will not make
it sound better!

[Laurence Payne]

>Q1: Could you please recommend some free software for converting midi
>files to wav files please?

The most simple is Windows Sound Recorder. Play the midi, pick an
appropriate soundcard Record source (What-U-Hear on SoundBlaster
cards) and press Record.

If you have a system without a good midi synth - maybe you're hearing
the Microsoft Synth which is part of Windows - you may be pleased with
the improved quality you get from one of the midi > wave convertors
that use a SoundFont. Look at MidiSyn:
http://futalgo.planetaclix.pt/midisyn/index.htm
It's not free, but quite affordable.


>
>Q2: What format do audio files have to be in to burn onto a CD to play
>in a normal CD player?
>
CD stores uncompressed audio in a format almost identical to wav
(though the headers and maybe other details are different). CD
burners work on wav files. Though many of then now will accept a MP3
file and make the conversion transparently to the user.


>Q3: What format are the audio files found on a mini-disk?
>
You'll find much more than you want to know about MiniDisk at:
http://www.minidisc.org/ieee_paper.html

As far as I know, all you can do with a minidisk is record or play it
on a mini disk machine, which accepts a digital or analogue audio
signal. So knowing about the internal audio format won't do you much
good.

What IS of interest - minidisk, unlike CD or DAT, uses a lossy
compressed audio format. You don't get out precisely what you put in,
and copying from and back to minidisk will cause serious degradation
in a very few generations.

CubaseFAQ page www.laurencepayne.co.uk/CubaseFAQ.htm

[Fabio Aragao da Silva]

=09Timidity++ is my choice... it's free... it's really fast, and it's
quite impressive...=20

_____________________________________________

Silva, Fabio A.
Icaro Technologies - Campinas - Brazil
+55 (0XX19) 9731-5298 (mobile phone number)
+55 (0XX19) 3288-0522 (residence number in Campinas)
=20
http://www.ic.unicamp.br/~ra991723
Universidade Estadual de Campinas - UNICAMP
Instituto de Computa=E7=E3o =20

On Mon, 25 Aug 2003, Laurence Payne wrote:

>=20
> >Q1: Could you please recommend some free software for converting midi
> >files to wav files please?
>=20
> The most simple is Windows Sound Recorder. Play the midi, pick an
> appropriate soundcard Record source (What-U-Hear on SoundBlaster
> cards) and press Record.
>=20
> If you have a system without a good midi synth - maybe you're hearing
> the Microsoft Synth which is part of Windows - you may be pleased with
> the improved quality you get from one of the midi > wave convertors
> that use a SoundFont. Look at MidiSyn:
> http://futalgo.planetaclix.pt/midisyn/index.htm
> It's not free, but quite affordable.
>=20
>=20
> >
> >Q2: What format do audio files have to be in to burn onto a CD to play
> >in a normal CD player?
> >
> CD stores uncompressed audio in a format almost identical to wav
> (though the headers and maybe other details are different). CD
> burners work on wav files. Though many of then now will accept a MP3
> file and make the conversion transparently to the user.
>=20
>=20
> >Q3: What format are the audio files found on a mini-disk?
> >
> You'll find much more than you want to know about MiniDisk at:
> http://www.minidisc.org/ieee_paper.html
>=20
> As far as I know, all you can do with a minidisk is record or play it
> on a mini disk machine, which accepts a digital or analogue audio
> signal. So knowing about the internal audio format won't do you much
> good.
>=20
> What IS of interest - minidisk, unlike CD or DAT, uses a lossy
> compressed audio format. You don't get out precisely what you put in,
> and copying from and back to minidisk will cause serious degradation
> in a very few generations.
>=20
> CubaseFAQ page www.laurencepayne.co.uk/CubaseFAQ.htm
>=20
>=20