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Old 01-14-2023, 02:09 PM   #1
Boogieshoes
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Default Device MIDI Sysex Send or Receive using Reaper?

I have looked through lots of threads on the Reaper forum and I have got lost in the Reaper User guide trying to find the sequence of steps I need to follow to;

1. Capture a midi device sysex dump.
2. Send a captured Midi Sysex dump back to a device.

I would be passing midi via a Roland Octa-Capture audio/midi interface to make use of its built in 5 pin midi I/O to the device that would be sending or receiving the required sysex.

Would somebody kindly point me to a walkthrough to do these things please?

Thank you.
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Old 01-14-2023, 03:39 PM   #2
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Reaper doesn’t offer any special feature for it, it works like any other MIDI hardware recording/playback. Just hit record and trigger the dump from your hardware. To send the message back, you simply play the recorded item back. Obviously the track needs a hardware output to your device. Maybe it’s necessary to set your hardware into a certain mode to get it ready to receive a dump. It’s been a long time since I did SysEx dumps, I’m not sure.

That’s pretty barebone, for example you never really know how long those messages are and there are no warnings if a dump came across faulty. It does work, but a dedicated SysEx librarian application is neater, really. Maybe the devs could be talked into improving the situation, but these days we can call ourselves lucky that SysEx is supported at all in a DAW, even if rudimentary.

If you want to do this more often, say for a preset library, you can sophisticate things a little by finding out what your device expects as a dump request message and enter that message in ReaControlMIDI. That way you don’t need to fiddle in your hardware’s UI to trigger the dump. You can use the project/media bay to collect items with dumps and save those collections there, or simply save them as .mid file into folders on your system.

Last edited by gofer; 01-14-2023 at 03:57 PM.
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Old 01-15-2023, 12:39 AM   #3
mschnell
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BTW.:

- you can take a look at the (SysEx) recording in the Midi editor raw view

- a Midi recording is saved in the Reaper project file. If you want it in a standard file format, you can export as Midi.

-Michael

Last edited by mschnell; 01-16-2023 at 12:17 AM.
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Old 01-15-2023, 02:10 PM   #4
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Thank you both for those replies.

I would not have sussed out where the midi dump was stored without the BTW feedback.

If I am honest I am still a bit vague on it all, especially what happens triggering record and the I assume triggering the device to dump sysex, stop reaper recording.

I assume it’s the reverse to send midi back to the device and presume any ‘lead-in’ time record is disregarded as no midi should have be sent before sysex dump was triggered on the device..

I have an Alesis Quadraverb and a Marshall JMP-1 that I want to dump the sysex from as I think the somewhat old batteries in the devices need replacing. So I want backup what’s onboard each first. I am having and old gear service and repair time and these 2 are on the list, along with getting my 1970’s twin reverb but that doesn’t have the midi complication .
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Old 01-15-2023, 05:17 PM   #5
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Hi,

Just make sure that you use the same tempo for transmitting/recieveing. Otherwise the midi devices may choke.
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Old 01-16-2023, 10:22 AM   #6
Boogieshoes
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LugNut View Post
Hi,

Just make sure that you use the same tempo for transmitting/recieveing. Otherwise the midi devices may choke.
Hmmm interesting.

Given that I am trying to manage System Exclusive (Sysex) midi data. I don’t actually know how much data will be transferred when I do a sysex device dump or upload.

I wonder if the Reaper Tempo setting affects the rate at which data can be received or would be sent when it is sysex?

I am kind of interested in being able to get to the raw Hexadecimal data that is transferred too. But I don’t fully understand how to do that given @mschnell’s reply.

I am somewhat old fashioned and I am afraid to say that Once operating systems started using device drivers and required loads of techy for a person to write programs the can access their computer I/O hardware computers died for me. Give me memory mapped IO and assembly language coding any day. I still have some old 1970’s/80’s computers and often feel I’d be better trying to go back to that kit when it comes to things like this. I last did sysex dumps via a home built Z80 based midi controller I built using salvaged parts from scrap computers back in 1989/90 and using interrupt driven code for the data transfer you never missed a ‘bit’ …. Then windows came along… No pcs are not what they were for home users and people like me.
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Old 01-16-2023, 12:58 PM   #7
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The hex values text us in the RPP file. Just open it with an editor:
Code:
        e 20 90 45 58
        e 960 80 45 00
        e 40 90 44 5c
The first number is a timing spec.

-Michael

Last edited by mschnell; 01-17-2023 at 11:37 PM.
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Old 01-17-2023, 06:22 AM   #8
LugNut
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Hi,

As for tempo, just make sure you use the same tempo for sending and receiving.
I have a bunch of ext midi gear. I been using a program called Soundiver for years. Its a universal midi editor /librarian.
Some ppl say they got it working in 64 bit windows.....I couldn't so I have a dedicated xp machine running it with midi interfaces connecting both computers.
I can get ya Soundiver......long abandoned by Apple...those smucks:-) if you have an xp machine and the two interfaces. I know it supports the quadraverb...I have 2. Not sure about the Marshall, but its easy to write your own adaptation if you have the sysex docs. I've done a few....mostly drum machines....and I can't code period. Its like filling in a spreadsheet.

GL
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Old 01-22-2023, 04:09 PM   #9
Boogieshoes
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Thank for help people.

I have tried to reply 3 times now but each time I ‘submit reply’ the forum takes me to the login page even though I logged in….

Gave up with Reaper, too confusing. Used MidiOX instead.

Anyway thanks again for trying.
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