Allen MDS-25 Trouble Playing MIDI files created on MDS-15

[allenfrank]

For 15 years I had an Allen MDS-15 and recorded several MIDI files from the organ. The files were recorded using akewalk 2.01 and saved as .wrk files. The registration settings were also saved by dumping the Allen memory and saving it as a SYSX file. I now have an MDS-25 and would like to play the MIDI files recorded on the MDS-15. Using the current version of Cakewalk, Sonar, the files play fine on the MDS-25. However, I am not able to send the saved registration file to the MDS-25.

I tried saving and restoring the registration information using the MDS-25 and Sonar and that works fine. So I believe the organ and the MIDI setup is correct. There seems to be some sort of incompatibility with a memory dump saved on the MDS-15 and what the MDS-25 is looking for.

[myorgan]

Hello and welcome to the Forum. May this be the first of several contributions from you.

I had the same thing happen when switching from one Technics piano to another. Rather than messing with the Sysex data, I simply went to the sections where registration changed took place and changed the Patch/Bank and/or Controller information to match the new instrument. It's a bit of work, but will be worth the effort.

I hope this helps.

Michael

P.S. you may also be able to re-map the channels, but I can't help with that, as I've never done it before--I just know it's possible.

[allenfrank]

Actually I was able to solve the problem. After studying the MIDI dump from the MDS-15 for a couple of days, I saw what the difference was in the MIDI specification between the MDS-15 and the MDS-25. On the MDS-15 the pistons were referenced in the MIDI dump by the MIDI channel for those pistons. Allen uses channel 1 for swell, channel 2 for great, channel 3 for pedal and channel 8 for general pistons. On the MDS-25 general pistons are referenced by 4 instead of 8 in the MIDI dump.

I pasted the MIDI dump from the MDS-15 into a word processor. Since I was only interested in memory 3, that was all I changed. I looked for MIDI messages that started out as F0 00 00 35 00 03 02 07 and replaced with F0 00 00 35 00 03 02 03. I then pasted the changes back into the original MIDI file. In MIDI the numbers shown are 1 less than the actual number. So the 07 corresponds to channel 8 and the 03 corresponds to the 4 that Allen uses for general pistons on the MDS-25.

The 02 before the 07 specifies memory 3. The 03 before the 02 seemed to indicate piston settings. F0 00 00 35 00 is the starting header for Allen SYSX messages.

I am not sure that 03-07 is the only difference between the two MIDI specifications. But the registrations from the MDS-15 now load into the MDS-25, and the MIDI file sounds correct playing back.

[myorgan]

Great thinking! Glad you could solve your problem so easily.

Michael