difference in connectors

[ESPplayer7]

hey guys i was just wondering what the difference is in inputs when it comes to midi, usb, firewire, i know they all transfer at different bits at different ranges of channels, so i was wondering what is the fastest and best and if i use something like say a usb to midi interface (i know usb is the slowest) would that mean i would have the speed of midi transfer rate, or would it mean that i just have the connector. one last question srry to be a pain, what is an ext. clock input for? do certain sound cards already have this installed

[darnold]

USB and midi are two totally different types of data transfer.

what are you trying to do?

danny

[bennychico11]

MIDI isn't a data tranfer technology....it's a digital language. cables that you can buy to send MIDI down vary. a simple 5 pin connector to USB would work fine for anything you want to do.

an external clock input has to do with Word Clock. each peice of gear has it's own internal clock to create electrical pulses so it knows what bitrate to work at. It is used entirely to keep a perfectly-timed and constant bitrate to avoid data errors. However, each clock in each peice of gear is different. If you are trying to use two or more digital devices, it's a good idea to buy a separate external clock device. This way all your gear syncs to ONE clock. Otherwise you may notice audio starting to drift and not be in perfect time with eachother. Like I said, you only really need to worry about it if you have something like a DAT player or a CD player going in digital to your soundcard.

[dgatwood]

Short answer.... MIDI is a shared broadcast bus, USB is a star topology bus with a master controller, and FireWire is a peer-to-peer bus with arbitrary topology and spanning tree protocol support.

Not what you were looking for? Rephrase the question.

I'm guessing the question was whether USB is fast enough to handle MIDI at full throttle. Yes, and a few orders of magnitude beyond. MIDI is 31.5Kbps. Slow USB is 10Mbps (about 32 times as fast, by my approximation).

[ESPplayer7]

my question is if i get one of those Y connectors at sam ash so i can use midi through my usb port will it transfer at the rate of midi? I read somewhere that usb transfers digital data the slowest and firewire is one of the fastest, i dont know where midi falls into place but if im converting it through a usb does that mean i will only get the usb max transfer rate? sorry if im not making sense im new to this stuff. Also one other question, if i get a Y connector does that mean that i can record if just plug the midi end into my v amp pro? or do i need to get a usb interface along with it because a sales person at sam ash i would need the usb to midi conv. plus a transformer (interface) type thing so i can get sound to the comp, what are these things for and do i need one?

[dgatwood]

Even the old, slow USB 1.0 busses are about 30-odd times faster than MIDI. It will have no trouble keeping up with the miniscule throughput requirements of MIDI. However, a Y cable won't adapt MIDI to USB... unless there's some MIDI interface that just happens to look like a Y cable....

Now if your audio card has MIDI built-in, you might need a special Y cable to split that out from a DB-15 or something to a pair of MIDI jacks. That wouldn't be using USB, though.

As for the V Amp Pro, as I understand it, that just allows your computer to control the amp's effects settings via MIDI. It isn't possible to transfer audio information over MIDI, if that's what you were asking. If you are trying to record audio, at the bare minimum, you would need appropriate adapters to hook it up to your computer's sound hardware. Probably little more than an 1/8" to stereo RCA cable and a pair of RCA to 1/4" adapters.

Of course, to get -really good- audio, you might consider looking into either a high-end audio card that's designed for recording or a decent USB or FireWire audio interface, but that's another discussion....

[bennychico11]

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/Uno/

something like this will be more than fine for what you want to do.
and that's all you will need for now.

i'm confused on what the SamAsh guy is telling you. all you need to do is plug the 5 pin MIDI cable labeled out into your out port on the Vpro...and the side labeled in, into the IN port. Then connect the USB to your computer. After installing drivers or whatever needs to be installed, you'll be up and running and your computer software should automatically recognize the device.

[mattamatta]

I think the sam ash guy is telling him he needs something else, because he seems to be wanting to both hook up the midi on the vamp to the computer, and record the audio.

As has been pointed out, to record audio you must run the line outs of the v-amp either into your stock soundcard, or some other kind of audio interface. The midi connections will just transmit data about what the settings on the v-amp are, or allow you to change those settings from the computer, or other such things.