Hi there, I'm having trouble with latency between my keyboard and sibelius first. here's the system I'm running Sibelius First, m-audio fasttrack c600, WIndows 8.1, 64-bit 8GB, 2.16 GHz intel pentium chip. Roland RD100 keyboard.
I'm having trouble getting screen capture to work except as an attachment. Can't get it to show up here in the post. However, with 'Fasttrack C600 Asio 64 bit', as the interface on the audio engine options page, with sample rate at 44100 and buffer size at 1024, the latency is listed at 5.24 ms, which I understand to be quite good. However, when I try and play crochets on the midi keyboard in time to the metronome, it comes out a mess of semiquavers and is delayed by a semiquaver. I know there's quantization I can do after the fact but I just wondered did anyone know why the read is so inaccurate. Of course, I could just have bad timing but i hope (and know) that's not the issue! I attach a screen grab jpeg of the way the music comes out. Treble clef is note input so no problem. Left hand (bass clef) is midi keyboard and you can see it's rubbish for someone trying to play mostly crochets on the beat!
With 5ms second latency, it should be possible to keep up with the metronome. You're no doubt playing OK, but remember that you're not a robot and the natural human nuances in your playing and timing can be interpreted as a 'mess' by a computer, which is effectively a robot!
Do also check that the drivers for the Fast Track and the Roland are up to date (assuming that you're plugging the RD100 in via USB).
Let's see if anyone comes up with more suggestions for you.
The latency is in playback: not in the MIDI input. The most important factor in playback latency is the one thing that you have not told us: what playback device is in use? As displayed in the Sibelius screen "Playback Devices".
The way I read that, Robin, he's stated the sample rate and buffer size set in his M-Audio Fast TrackC600 ASIO interface control panel, and the resulting 5.24ms audio latency. I'm assuming that, having set that, he hasn't then changed to another playback device.
HI there, thanks for the quick replies : well 2 things. When I went back into Sibelius to check the stuff you were talking about I found that on the audio engine page the latency time had changed back to 25ms, which is more like the readings I've been getting. See screen snip attached. Which makes more sense of the delay. To be honest the short time today (5ms) baffled me as I've never got a latency that low before and if the latency was that low then I think I wouldn't have a problem..
Also playback device is the fast track c600 external? I'd give you a snip view but still cant get snip into body of text and have already attached audio engine one which I think is more relevant?Also I use the fasttrack as the interface into which I put my midi leads, thinking that this will make things more efficient. I do have a set of midi leads that go straight into the computer by usb but was advised against them when first trying to resolve latency issue..
re: drivers - fasttrack is up to date as in I only bought it a few months ago - although I can double check. ROland is as old as the hills and so no drivers there. I do have another keyboard - more modern, yamaha p 35 and still didn't get a satisfactory latency reading from that.
Question: on the audio engine options page there are a lot of other fasttrack output options - ie DS, WASAPI and MME but they give even lower latency figures. So stuck..
Away for a few days from tomorrow but all feedback gratefully received and I will respond on my return. THanks, Driscoldy
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Sibelius First, m-audio fasttrack c600, WIndows 8.1, 64-bit 8GB, 2.16 GHz intel pentium chip. Roland RD100 keyboard
So all is revealed: you are not using any audio output at all: you are using only MIDI output to the FastTrack. So all the settings and latency figures in Audio Engine Options are completely irrelevant, and unused.
In fact, it looks as if you have never installed Sibelius 7 First Sounds, which would be the only way to get low latency audio output.
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Sibelius 8.1/7.5.1/7.1.3/6.2/5.2.5, PhotoScore Ult 8.0.4, Dolet 6.4 for Sibelius, Windows 7 32-bit SP1 4GB, Windows 8.1 64-bit 16GB.
> I used to have microsoft wavetable synth activated but I tried deactivating it to see if it improved anything.
> No difference. Latency still 25 ms.
The latency figure in Audio Engine Options is a figure only for the audio output sub-system of the operating system.
Player devices (such as Microsoft GS Wavetable Synth) have their own (huge) latencies, which are not accounted for in the latency figure of Audio Engine Options. The Microsoft GS Wavetable Synth is well-known to have unusably high latency, and there is no work-around for that.
> No i'm not inputting notes with flexi time input.
In which case, I'm not clear why you are concerned about latency.
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Sibelius 8.1/7.5.1/7.1.3/6.2/5.2.5, PhotoScore Ult 8.0.4, Dolet 6.4 for Sibelius, Windows 7 32-bit SP1 4GB, Windows 8.1 64-bit 16GB.
Hi there, thanks for your replies. I am a novice at this. I will install sibelius first sounds certainly and if that gives me low latency audio output - then that's great. I suppose to be fair, I have no idea what a low latency audio output is - or how it relates to midi. I see that I assumed my midi problem (i.e. delay) was linked to the only thing that mentioned latency in the screens in front of me. Also, I did access the tech support - at the beginning of my purchasing period and was not enlightened in any way - and the only place they checked was the audio engine options and that was about it.
All I'm concerned about is getting an accurate representation of the notes I play on my midi keyboard on the score in sibelius. I care nothing for playback, or really the audio output - just that I want the notes that I play on my keyboard to be accurately represented on the screen. I am a composer primarily and bought sibelius for this reason only.
I don't know much about midi and I don't know that much about how sibelius works. However, I thought that midi was a series of data sent to the computer from a musical device that was reinterpreted by the computer into musical notation.
The audio output page means nothing to me and I don't understand how midi is set up within sibelius.. I just hoped I'd get lucky and the notes would appear accurately.
If anyone could explain to me what I need to do to make this happen I would appreciate it very much. As regards flexi time input, maybe I'm losing my mind but I thought that was where you defined durations and pitches separately perhaps using a piano keyboard but equally a computer keyboard. What I'm trying to do is real time midi input. I press record, play the piano, and computer records it as notes.
Help?
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Sibelius First, m-audio fasttrack c600, WIndows 8.1, 64-bit 8GB, 2.16 GHz intel pentium chip. Roland RD100 keyboard
OK, I have read taming the flexi time beast post - I will try these things. All other pearls of wisdom still gratefully received. Thanks.
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Sibelius First, m-audio fasttrack c600, WIndows 8.1, 64-bit 8GB, 2.16 GHz intel pentium chip. Roland RD100 keyboard
> If anyone could explain to me what I need to do to make this happen I would appreciate it very much.
1. Install Sibelius 7 First Sounds;
2. In "Playback Devices", select "Sibelius 7 First Sounds";
3. connect speakers to the speaker outputs of the FastTrack Pro.
Play.
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Sibelius 8.1/7.5.1/7.1.3/6.2/5.2.5, PhotoScore Ult 8.0.4, Dolet 6.4 for Sibelius, Windows 7 32-bit SP1 4GB, Windows 8.1 64-bit 16GB.
You must first unzip the Sounds Installer into a folder of its own, open that folder in Windows Explorer, and then try to launch the installer. It looks as if you are trying to launch from within 7-Zip, which is not going to work.
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Sibelius 8.1/7.5.1/7.1.3/6.2/5.2.5, PhotoScore Ult 8.0.4, Dolet 6.4 for Sibelius, Windows 7 32-bit SP1 4GB, Windows 8.1 64-bit 16GB.
Hey Robin and all others. It worked! Thanks so much, am very happy and appreciate your support. Taming the flexitime beast and all other contributions very helpful. Best, Deirdre
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Sibelius First, m-audio fasttrack c600, WIndows 8.1, 64-bit 8GB, 2.16 GHz intel pentium chip. Roland RD100 keyboard
Hi there.
I seem to have tried everything ( reinstalled my audiodriver; installed sibelius sounds; installed asio4all, tried an external soundcard) but still get latency even after playing around with settings.
From other posts I have seen, it looks as though an external sound card ought to be a solution and someone has suggested a miditech audiolight).
Using a midi keyboard didn't ought to be as difficult as this. I get no latency at all inputting from my midi keyboard into the SoundTrap programme.
> I seem to have tried everything ( reinstalled my audiodriver; installed sibelius sounds;
> installed asio4all, tried an external soundcard) but still get latency even after playing around with settings.
Most of the things you list are irrelevant. You need to identify what playback configuration you are using when you hear latency problems.
Please show us a screen-shot of the following Sibelius dialogue windows:
1. "Playback Devices";
2. "Audio Engine Options"
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Sibelius 2020.1/7.5.1/7.1.3/6.2/5.2.5, PhotoScore Ult 2020.1, Windows 10 64-bit 16GB. Desktop, and Microsoft Surface Book.
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