Ableton Forum

Is there a recommended configuration for using Live 7's External Instruments with a Virus TI?

What I'd like to be able to do is assign each track to a MIDI channel within the TI and then use the level slider for the track to control the channel's volume (not the overall Virus TI instrument volume). Is this possible? If so, it would be an absolute godsend.

Gordon

that would be awesome

snowtires wrote:that would be awesome

Don't you think? Obvious as this is, no vendor seems to have sorted it out so far.

Hi,

If your Virus TI (I'm not familiar with it) provides separate outputs for each MIDI channel it can receive, your assumption might be true. The External Instrument device basically is a routing device, working both ways: sending MIDI to a device, and receiving audio from it. It can work with multitimbral instruments, as long as they are able of separate inputs and outputs.

May I move this discussion to the General forum? I guess it will get more attention, and more answers too..

Regards,
Amaury

It doesn't have separate outs for EACH, but it does have a bunch. The main thing we're talking about is that it would be nice if there was a way to control the volume of each channel of the Virus device/plugin. In one instance of the plugin, you can have 16 different patches running and each has its own volume slider (in the plugin). At this point, to change the volume of each patch, you have to go into the track that has the TI plugin, open it, and then change the volume accordingly. It would ideal if there was a way to control those volume sliders with the 'external midi instrument' plugin in live 7, so each midi track would seem more like its own instrument, as opposed to a bunch of midi tracks that are pointing to a VST/AU on another track.

It would be absolutely awesome if there was a way to map the volume fader (Live's volume fader) of the 'external midi instrument' tracks to the volume faders within the Virus plugin. I suppose this would be a helpful feature in programs like Stylus as well.

Also, feel free to move the thread

snowtires wrote:It doesn't have separate outs for EACH, but it does have a bunch. The main thing we're talking about is that it would be nice if there was a way to control the volume of each channel of the Virus device/plugin. In one instance of the plugin, you can have 16 different patches running and each has its own volume slider (in the plugin). At this point, to change the volume of each patch, you have to go into the track that has the TI plugin, open it, and then change the volume accordingly. It would ideal if there was a way to control those volume sliders with the 'external midi instrument' plugin in live 7, so each midi track would seem more like its own instrument, as opposed to a bunch of midi tracks that are pointing to a VST/AU on another track.

It would be absolutely awesome if there was a way to map the volume fader (Live's volume fader) of the 'external midi instrument' tracks to the volume faders within the Virus plugin. I suppose this would be a helpful feature in programs like Stylus as well.

Hi,

Again, I'm not familiar with the Virus TI, so I could be wrong, but here is how it works with other plugins: as soon as you tap an individual output from the plugin into the External Instrument, you can control the volume of that output on the track that host the External Instrument.

But, in Live 6, couldn't you set separate Audio tracks, and set their inputs to receive one channel from the Virus?

Regards,
Amaury

snowtires wrote: It would be absolutely awesome if there was a way to map the volume fader (Live's volume fader) of the 'external midi instrument' tracks to the volume faders within the Virus plugin. I suppose this would be a helpful feature in programs like Stylus as well.

Put another way, it would be great if External Instrument (or some other specialized form of router for multi-timbral synths) could output channel volume to the MIDI device instead of controlling the instrument's master volume. This way, multi-timbral synths would behave properly (i.e. you could automate individual track volume) w/o relying upon having mutliple physical outputs on the device (which many/most don't have).

Gordon

Amaury wrote:

snowtires wrote:It doesn't have separate outs for EACH, but it does have a bunch. The main thing we're talking about is that it would be nice if there was a way to control the volume of each channel of the Virus device/plugin. In one instance of the plugin, you can have 16 different patches running and each has its own volume slider (in the plugin). At this point, to change the volume of each patch, you have to go into the track that has the TI plugin, open it, and then change the volume accordingly. It would ideal if there was a way to control those volume sliders with the 'external midi instrument' plugin in live 7, so each midi track would seem more like its own instrument, as opposed to a bunch of midi tracks that are pointing to a VST/AU on another track.

It would be absolutely awesome if there was a way to map the volume fader (Live's volume fader) of the 'external midi instrument' tracks to the volume faders within the Virus plugin. I suppose this would be a helpful feature in programs like Stylus as well.

Hi,

Again, I'm not familiar with the Virus TI, so I could be wrong, but here is how it works with other plugins: as soon as you tap an individual output from the plugin into the External Instrument, you can control the volume of that output on the track that host the External Instrument.

But, in Live 6, couldn't you set separate Audio tracks, and set their inputs to receive one channel from the Virus?

Regards,
Amaury

The problem is that the Virus only has three stereo output pairs, so you can only automate three MIDI channels this way (similar situation for the Roland V-Synth, with only two output pairs, and countless other multi-timbral synths).

It would be infinitely more useful to have a router that sends MIDI channel volume for the MIDI channel that it's assigned to, instead of master volume. Then you could have independent control of all 16 MIDI channels. Seems like this should be pretty easy.

Hi, I don't know if this helps, but I'm using my virus ti with ableton 7's 'external instrument' and love it (external instrument rules and I use it for my mult-timbral vsts such as stylus rmx).

The thing is with virus control, there are only 2 stereo digital outs (that go through the usb), but I use 1 stereo and 2 mono so I have 3 seperate tracks that I can control volume with (using ableton's volume sliders) and have different external effects on.

If you have a good soundcard, you can have another 3 stereo or 6 mono tracks (or any combination thereof) going thru the audio card giving you a total of 5 stereo or 10 mono tracks or any combination that each have their own track with volume, pan, vst effects, etc...

Thats good that people are using ext instrument fine. I've tried half a dozen times to get my Korg ES1 working with it, and its such a bitch to keep in sync. Each time I add a new VST or device to Live, I have to re-adjust the sync delay.

It works fine with the virus ti. The thing is 'external instrument' doesn't do anything you couldn't do before, it just makes it more convenient. It just allows you to have the midi and audio track on the same track where I had to have a track for midi and another track to process audio for effects or mixing before. I love it though...

jeffb01 wrote:Hi, I don't know if this helps, but I'm using my virus ti with ableton 7's 'external instrument' and love it (external instrument rules and I use it for my mult-timbral vsts such as stylus rmx).

The thing is with virus control, there are only 2 stereo digital outs (that go through the usb), but I use 1 stereo and 2 mono so I have 3 seperate tracks that I can control volume with (using ableton's volume sliders) and have different external effects on.

If you have a good soundcard, you can have another 3 stereo or 6 mono tracks (or any combination thereof) going thru the audio card giving you a total of 5 stereo or 10 mono tracks or any combination that each have their own track with volume, pan, vst effects, etc...

Hi Jeff,

Yes--that does work. The point I was trying to make, though, is that if Ableton gave us a volume control that sent MIDI channel volume on a track (a) it would be far less kludgey and (b) we could have all 16 tracks that a multi-timbral synth could offer. Seems really straightforward to me--I don't understand why they don't do it.

This is the kind of thing that drives me nuts about music technology--the seemingly obvious, straightforward things that never seem to be addressed.

Gordon

Have you suggested it to them?

gvh wrote:
Hi Jeff,

Yes--that does work. The point I was trying to make, though, is that if Ableton gave us a volume control that sent MIDI channel volume on a track (a) it would be far less kludgey and (b) we could have all 16 tracks that a multi-timbral synth could offer. Seems really straightforward to me--I don't understand why they don't do it.

Gordon

Cubase does this and it works really well. You have a volume slider for each midi track just like audio, where it sends anything between 0-127 (min to max volume). All that Live would need is a volume slider on a MIDI track to do this...

Then again you could just use CC7 to set the volume for each channel for each Virus track if you don't have a fader, but that's more tedious than going into the Virus Control plugin to set the volume there.

Ken