Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser

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Posts: 6
Joined: December 9, 2020 - 01:39
Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser

Hi, there.

Personally, I'd rather just replace my winmm.dll with my old win7 winmm.dll, but apparently that's impossible in Win 8.1.
You're the only hope I've got, but unfortunately, MIDIMapper + VirtualMIDISynth don't seem to work, even with other soundfonts I don't want to use.
Direct Music/Microsoft Synth works fine for playing midis in winamp; how can I use your software to get older programs to recognise it?

Thanks for your help and hard work.

Posts: 1972
Joined: March 25, 2012 - 01:19
Re: Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser

CoolSoft MIDIMapper is useful only if the MIDI client (player) doesn't have a configuration option to select output device.
In this case, which was the default for old MIDI programs, it sends MIDI output to device 0, which was the MS MIDIMapper.

CoolSoft MIDIMapper forces its installation as device 0 to be able to receive the output MIDI stream and forward it to the configured MIDI device.

When you open CoolSoft MIDIMapper configurator it checks that configuration is ok, so I think that it's correctly installed as device 0.

how can I use your software to get older programs to recognise it?

You have nothing to do to make it work, it should work just after installed.
Which program is not working?

Posts: 6
Joined: December 9, 2020 - 01:39
Re: Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser

Thank you so much for the quick response - that's already so much more then I've gotten elsewhere. Okay...

Nothing seems to work with the MIDIMAPPER devices, specifically. The programs I'm trying to use are old game development 'engines,' specifically RPGMaker 2000/2003!
Neither has the ability to select midi devices, as you mentioned; they should default to device zero. Just like before, however, they fail to play midi.
Interestingly, if I select midimapper midioutput in winamp (the default device 0 that's replaced Microsoft Output) it doesn't work there, either.

Finally, under default midi device, there's nothing. This is under a fresh install without VirtualMIDISynth. Just an empty white space?

Any further insights would be appreciated. Hope this is a clear and useful feedback. I feel like I'm missing something right in front of me...

Posts: 1972
Joined: March 25, 2012 - 01:19
Re: Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser
notanotherforumillneveruse wrote:
Interestingly, if I select midimapper midioutput in winamp (the default device 0 that's replaced Microsoft Output) it doesn't work there, either.

So you've selected CoolSoft MIDIMapper as output device in WinAmp and then selected other device in CoolSoft MIDIMapper, right?
And the other device does not play MIDI data received by MIDIMapper?

What if you install CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth in WinAmp and select it as its output device?
Does it work?
If yes, now select CoolSoft MIDIMapper as output device in WinAmp, then Virtual MIDISynth as output of MIDIMapper.
It should still work...

notanotherforum... wrote:
Finally, under default midi device, there's nothing.

That configuration parameter is probably read from registry, but that key was removed starting from Windows 8.
CoolSoft MIDIMapper restores it and used it to save its configuration.

Posts: 6
Joined: December 9, 2020 - 01:39
Re: Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser

Hello, sorry for the delay in response time. I don't understand what you mean by installing Coolsoft MIDIMapper directly to a program?
I can only install it to my OS, Windows 8.1... I think?

This is what the the midi output device software looks like from the control panel:

https://i.imgur.com/GXvG58m.png

Posts: 1972
Joined: March 25, 2012 - 01:19
Re: Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser
notanotherforum... wrote:
I don't understand what you mean by installing Coolsoft MIDIMapper directly to a program?

I mean configure that program to use VirtualMIDISynth as its output.
From the screenshot you've attached I see... no MIDI devices at all 🤔.

Try this:

  1. download, install and configure CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth
  2. download and install VanBasco Karaoke player
    It's a really small and powerful MIDI player, and it still works from Windows 95.
    Just remember to right-click on its setup file and choose "Run as administrator", because it won't do it automatically.
  3. run VanBasco and open its configuration dialog (ALT+S)
  4. check that CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth is available into Output Device configuration
  5. play some MID/KAR file with VanBasco and check if it plays through VirtualMIDISynth
  6. now download and install CoolSoft MIDIMapper, open its configurator and set CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth as default output device
  7. open VanBasco again and check if the new MIDIMapper option is available in Output Device list
  8. send VanBasco output to CoolSoft MIDIMapper (which in turn will forward MIDI data to CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth)
  9. you should now hear the same sound as point (5)

Please follow the steps above and report which one fails (if any).

Posts: 6
Joined: December 9, 2020 - 01:39
Re: Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser

SUCCESS!.. Sort of.

Let me relay what happened, in the interest of helping out further development/other people who may have similar problems.
Before I followed your instructions I checked to make sure my soundfonts were installed; I wondered if something might be wrong, decided to remove and reinstall them, using fluid as a base.
Certain that I'd installed everything, well, I decided to do a clean install of VirtualMIDISynth, MIDIMapper, and VanBasco's player (which I hadn't tried, it seems super flexible).

I got to step 5, and nothing played, despite VanBasco recognising VirtualMIDISynth, and clearly 'playing', registering the notes etc.
Feeling thwarted, I tried resetting fluid - that's fluidr3 gm for anyone else at home - by removing it and resetting it as my soundfont chain in VirtualMIDIMapper.

And... That's it. Scratching my head, here, but it's suddenly working entirely as planned? In everything? Ah, there's one downside, which is the sound isn't the same 'quality' as I recall and love best, Windows terrible default... :P
It's quite better, but I'll have to see if I can't find something that sounds 'chunkier' for lack of a better word.

But the most important thing is that it /works/. Thank you for your patience stumbling through this with me. It's been a bit hard for everyone, but things like this are always appreciated.
Do you have a preferred method of support, or are all about the same, in what you can keep? c:

Posts: 1972
Joined: March 25, 2012 - 01:19
Re: Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser
notanotherforumillneveruse wrote:
...But the most important thing is that it /works/.

Should be great to know how you got to that non-working situation, just to exclude VMS-setup issues or missing cleanups.
Anyway, I'm glad it now works; thanks for reporting it 👍

notanotherforum... wrote:
Do you have a preferred method of support, or are all about the same, in what you can keep?

Scratching my head trying to understand... what you mean? 🤨

Posts: 6
Joined: December 9, 2020 - 01:39
Re: Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser

Yeah, I'm trying to recreate the original situation, right now. I'm thrilled that it's working but confused as to why it didn't work in the first place, what step(s) I did wrong..?
If it's all right, I'll update this if I find anything potentially useful.

To answer your question (sorry, I'd block quote you, but my html seems to be getting eaten):

Some donation services take a 'cut' of the donation, so that the donation goes 80% to the person, 20% to, say, paypal or similar.
I always want to give the largest amount to the person or people I'm donating to.
I was wondering if a direct donation, or going through the 'buy me a cofee' option'd be better?
Or if there's no real difference...

One last thing, filewatcher looks great, I'm gonna try putting it together in Waterfox. c:

Posts: 1972
Joined: March 25, 2012 - 01:19
Re: Force MIDIMapper to use Direct Music/Microsoft Synthesiser
notanotherforum... wrote:
I'm thrilled that it's working but confused as to why it didn't work in the first place, what step(s) I did wrong..?

There could be some pre-existing status not detected by the setup, but can't imagine what it could be.

notanotherforum... wrote:
(sorry, I'd block quote you, but my html seems to be getting eaten)

...select the part of the post you'd like to quote and press the quote button.
I'll change it to make it more intuitive 😉.

notanotherforum... wrote:
I was wondering if a direct donation, or going through the 'buy me a cofee' option'd be better?
Or if there's no real difference...

Go straight to Paypal if you can; it takes about 4-5% of the donation (with a minimum of 0.5€).
Yes, it's a huge cost for a non-business account, but it's the safer and easier way to get support.

BuyMeACoffee is a PayPal partner that takes an additional 5% of the donated amount.

notanotherforum... wrote:
filewatcher looks great, I'm gonna try putting it together in Waterfox

Great.
FileWatcher is fully opensource (on GitHub), so feel free to post a PR once you've completed the porting.

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