baffled by midi hookup

[jcastronovo]

PEOPLE OF MIDI

my world is an analog world and i really, really REALLY need help with your technology. here's my setup. i have cakewalk 8.0 with a gina box. i've been recording analog to my computer. i've been recording analog to my tascam deck. i bought a motu pocket express to handle my smpte midi conversion. i also have a studio logic sl-161 and a roland jv-1080. by hooking my keyboard up to the sound module and using my analog outs from the module i can hear my roland. fine. but i can't get the midi hookup right. i want to record virtual tracks from my roland onto cakewalk. given the following diagram can anyone tell me what i need to do.


Keyboard - MIDI OUT ONLY

Roland jv1080 - MIDI IN
MIDI OUT
THRU

MOTU EXPRESS CHANNEL A
MIDI OUT
MIDI OUT
MIDI IN

CHANNEL B
MIDI OUT
MIDI OUT
MIDI IN

when i hook up my sound module from midi out to in on the motu, i'm not getting a midi message light. thus i have no signal going to cakewalk. and with all of this talk of "downloading sounds" do i even need a sound module? do i need sound definitions for my module? is my sound module actually passing any sound information to my pc? or should i just get back on my ship and head home to Analog?

kind regards,

jr castronovo

[drstawl]

You have shown this MOTU Pocket express as having 4 MIDI outs and 2 MIDI ins. Sorry that I don't know it personally; I use the MusicQuest 2Port/SE. Can you fill me in on the missing cable? How do you get your MIDI signal into (or out of) a CW .wrk file on your computer? And doesn't the JV-1080 have analog line outs or line ins as well as MIDI connectors? How do you use your TASCAM deck in this chain or do you at all? The reason I ask is that a useful way to organize this stuff is to draw a schematic diagram showing and labeling each and every input and output as to:

Device boundary (each box shown as a separate rectangle)
I/O types (what type of signal)
I/O connector types (actual connector used)
Signal path (direction) for each usage configuration.

I was gonna do this in QuickCAD as a puzzle
solution but I lacked the full dataset to see the whole picture.

[This message has been edited by drstawl (edited 06-24-1999).]