Good sound card for Soundfonts? (ie. no 32MB limit)

action9000 · Dec 12, 2004, 07:30 AM

Greetings,

I am having a great deal of difficulty locating a sound card for MIDI production. My problem, is the poor quality in larger soundfonts, due to the 32MB hardware limit of my SB Audigy. I have tried Synthfont, which works nicely, except it is so awkward to work on a MIDI in one program, and have to test it in another, very clunky, program.

I would love to be able to have a sound card that supports, say, 64+MB of sample data, as opposed to the wimpy 32MB. Do any of you have any thoughts on this, or can anyone recommend a good card with strong soundfont support?

**dj_stick** · Dec 12, 2004, 07:39 AM

try using a soft synth

but afaik the audigy series can support more than 32mb of soundfonts

action9000 · Dec 12, 2004, 07:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dj_stick

try using a soft synth

but afaik the audigy series can support more than 32mb of soundfonts

Well, technically yes, I can as much soundfont data as I want (I have a 270MB soundfont that I love, and it loads fine into my 512MB of system RAM). However, that is not the issue. During MIDI playback, it seems the audigy can only play back 32MB of data at one time, resulting in dropping of sounds, and premature cutting of long notes, and extended sound (example: a cymbal crash may just cut off immediately after it starts playing, if much else is going on).

The larger the soundfont, the more prominant this issue is. When I want to record MIDIs to MP3s, and perhaps onto a CD, I want the quality to be as good as possible - Nothing bugs me more than a climactic BOOM in the song, and having half the notes drop because the sound card can't play them all simultaneously.

HOWEVER, if I load the exact same MIDI into the Synthfont program (which utilizes the CPU, my Athlon XP 1600+), I can "prebuffer" and play back very complex MIDIs (I wrote them complex, partly for sound card testing purposes), and it performs almost flawlessly (a CPU upgrade would deal with the minor drops that occur in this program, and they are very minor, especially in comparison to using the dang hardware synth of the SB Audigy)

So the problem is, I need a sound processor than can process soundfont information with more data than the audigy, however I have no idea what i'm looking for. Few sound cards seem to advertize this information in the specs, and it is almost impossible to come by.

If anyone can recommend any card (the more specific, the better), I would sincerely appreciate it
Thanks.

**dj_stick** · Dec 12, 2004, 08:39 AM

i really doubt there is such a soundcard available

you could always try bouncing each channel (instrument) at a different time, and then mixing the resultant audio files

Matth · Dec 12, 2004, 05:10 PM

Is the Audigy 2 immune to the 32Mb bug?

If your recording the output, then software synthesis may be preferable anyway - I immediately thought of Timidty++ - it now supports SF2, but not sure if it has a maximum size. Timidity can play or save the output to WAV with no play/record losses.

action9000 · Dec 13, 2004, 10:10 AM

It has been recommended to me to use a software synth to solve the hardware limitation of 32MB sample limit of the SB Audigy. I do have some concerns/questions regarding this suggestion.

First of all, I need to be able to assign soundfonts to the software synth, and I need to be able to select this synth from within my MIDI sequencer (in my case, Noteworthy Composer). I was recommended to Timidity, however it seems to be inferior to even Synthfont. I don't need a player, I need a program that will allow me to assign soundfont data to a software synth, which can be loaded into my MIDI sequencer. On my sequencer, I can select from the following devices for playback of each MIDI channel:

SB Audigy Hardware synth (A)
SB Audigy Hardware synth (B)
SB Audigy SW Synth
MIDI Mapper
SB Audigy MIDI In

I want to add a software synth to this list; more importantly, I want to add a software synth to this list, that lets me assign any soundfont I want to each MIDI instrument (similar to how the hardware synth works on the Audigy). is this possible, and can anyone recommend a program or set of programs to assist me with this?

BTW, if there is a way to edit the sounds/assign new samples to the SB SW Synth, any info would be much appreciated. I am just seeing no evidence that this can be altered.

A appreciate your quick responses on this topic so far, I just need more information.
Thanks again.

**dj_stick** · Dec 13, 2004, 10:14 AM

you can use a program like Kontakt, and use Midi-Ox to create a virtual midi patch between applications

Dec 12, 2004, 07:30 AM	#1
action9000 DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 3 Rep Power: 0	Good sound card for Soundfonts? (ie. no 32MB limit) Greetings, I am having a great deal of difficulty locating a sound card for MIDI production. My problem, is the poor quality in larger soundfonts, due to the 32MB hardware limit of my SB Audigy. I have tried Synthfont, which works nicely, except it is so awkward to work on a MIDI in one program, and have to test it in another, very clunky, program. I would love to be able to have a sound card that supports, say, 64+MB of sample data, as opposed to the wimpy 32MB. Do any of you have any thoughts on this, or can anyone recommend a good card with strong soundfont support?

Dec 12, 2004, 05:10 PM	#5
Matth Flash Banner Hater Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: UK Posts: 3,426 Rep Power: 93 System Specs	Is the Audigy 2 immune to the 32Mb bug? If your recording the output, then software synthesis may be preferable anyway - I immediately thought of Timidty++ - it now supports SF2, but not sure if it has a maximum size. Timidity can play or save the output to WAV with no play/record losses.

Dec 13, 2004, 10:10 AM	Thread Starter #6
action9000 DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 3 Rep Power: 0	It has been recommended to me to use a software synth to solve the hardware limitation of 32MB sample limit of the SB Audigy. I do have some concerns/questions regarding this suggestion. First of all, I need to be able to assign soundfonts to the software synth, and I need to be able to select this synth from within my MIDI sequencer (in my case, Noteworthy Composer). I was recommended to Timidity, however it seems to be inferior to even Synthfont. I don't need a player, I need a program that will allow me to assign soundfont data to a software synth, which can be loaded into my MIDI sequencer. On my sequencer, I can select from the following devices for playback of each MIDI channel: SB Audigy Hardware synth (A) SB Audigy Hardware synth (B) SB Audigy SW Synth MIDI Mapper SB Audigy MIDI In I want to add a software synth to this list; more importantly, I want to add a software synth to this list, that lets me assign any soundfont I want to each MIDI instrument (similar to how the hardware synth works on the Audigy). is this possible, and can anyone recommend a program or set of programs to assist me with this? BTW, if there is a way to edit the sounds/assign new samples to the SB SW Synth, any info would be much appreciated. I am just seeing no evidence that this can be altered. A appreciate your quick responses on this topic so far, I just need more information. Thanks again.