Ableton Forum

I stress I'm new to electronic music and midi: can somebody please educate me about what kind of midi device I need to use Live? I have an Echo Indigo soundcard for my laptop to hear things but I'm getting really confused about the whole audio/midi interface thing. Do I even need a midi device? Thanks in advance for taking the time to consider a newbie question!!

Hi,

I can understand the confusion, wihin live there are two types of 'channel strips' audio and midi.

Audio is quite straight forward; you drag and drop a bit of audio and when press play you hear it play

With midi it is different, a clip in the midi channel contains midi messages ( or notes) think of these as messages to an instrument ( synth or drum computer) which tells which note to play and how loud. The sound is generated by the midi device

A midi channel can trigger or play a VST instrument (i.e. a synth being installed on your laptop such as massive from native instruments) a Live instrument such as impuls or an external synth such as a roland juno 106.
To trigger an external synth you would need a midi interface between your computer and the external midi device.

So a midi interface triggers external midi instruments an audio interface generates the audio out of live. For live instruments ( impuls) or VST instruments you do not need a midi interface

Hope this clarifies your question

Thanks for your input Funkazoid. I'm still a little confused about how midi notes are heard via audio. I deleted the Microsoft GS Wavetable Synth (which I believe enables you to hear midi audio(?) because I thought it was an inferior midi device. Do I not need something along the lines of that to hear midi audio?

Sorry, I forgot to add a context to the previous message - I mean in the context of using Ableton instruments.

btw you also need the midi interface to hook up any midi controllers/keyboard to your computer so you can actually play your software instruments. Of course could also draw all the notes in with you mouse but I'd say using a keyboard is preferable

If you play your live instruments the midi notes 'tell'the instruments what to play, what you do need to do is install the appropriate drivers for your echo indigo card, I'm not familair with specific card but I would assume these are asio divers which are better then microsofts audio drives.

Within Live you need to configure the use of the right audio drivers
options - preference - audio

Ooh and while playing the midi clip in session view ensure that monitor is either on auto or off

Is a controller keyboard not a midi interace in itself? What is the significance of the Microsoft Wavetable GW Synth as a default midi device within PC's? These are the issues that are mainly confusing me.

The microsoft wave table synth is meant to playback standard midi files.
So when you dbl click on a midi file in windows you actually hear music.

It is compliant with Rolands GS fore synthersizers, if you google on GS specifications and Roland you get a lot explaination what it is.

The significance is that you can play midi files within windows.
Good example are those horrible pieces of music you used to hear when you opened some websites ( especially years ago when we needed to dial with a modem into the Internet) those were midi files send to your compupter, the midi file take less network resources then actual streaming music.

Most modern keyboards do have a USB interface to connect to the computer and control softsynths, some also act as midi interface meaning you can connect midi instruments to the keyboard and control the instruments through your sequencer.

Please bear with me: so if I don't have the microsoft GS wavetable synth installed and instead have a midi controller/interface installed, that is all I need to use ableton fully?

I have never used microsoft GS wavetable synth within live and I do not believe enabling or disabling will have an effect of whether or not you can use live in full.

Are you using external midi devices or just soft synths?

I plan to use Ableton instruments exclusively and without VSTs.

Though I should add that I have a Line 6 UX1 guitar F.X interface (which has its own ASIO driver) that I want to record in Ableton tracks too. Besides that I only want to stick to Ableton instruments.

(Thanks for your responses!)

you're welcome

(I would just ignore the midi interfaces and microsoft GS wavetable synth)