GigaSampler free with card - what is it?

[AudioWebs]

I am going to be buying the TASCAM US-122 soundcard, and it comes free with gigastudio (32 i presume) and cubasis VST


soooooooo, I've asked alot of questions here on VST and learned nothing because for some reason I'm not getting things to work.

1. Site says gigastudio basically handles MIDI. So I presume I put midi tracks into it, or track them live from a keyboard (I don't have one).

2. Then what? What formats can I use to assign the finishing touch sounds. VST? soundfont?

and whats the comparison and contrast with gigastudio to cubasis VST?

Thanks

 

[AlChuck]

soooooooo, I've asked alot of questions here on VST and learned nothing because for some reason I'm not getting things to work.

You have? I don't remember seeing them. There was the question on the Cakewalk board about VSampler or whatever, but that's DirectX.

1. Site says gigastudio basically handles MIDI. So I presume I put midi tracks into it, or track them live from a keyboard (I don't have one).

Gigastudio is a software-based sampler. It responds to MIDI messages like a hardware sampler would. I'm not sure what sample file formats it reads. Its claim to fame is that instead of loading the soundset into RAM, it streams it off the hard drive. Therefore, it's somewhat resource-intensive and many people run it on its own computer rather than try to run it together with Cubase or whatever on the same box. (It also does not run as a plug-in in either VST or DirectX formats, if I'm not mistaken.)

You don't put MIDI tracks "into it," you use it as the sound source to play MIDI messages being sent by a MIDI sequencer )Cubasis, for example). So the MIDI tracks get loaded into Cubasis and it sends the MIDI messages to Gigastudio.

2. Then what? What formats can I use to assign the finishing touch sounds. VST? soundfont?

A very confusing question. What do you mean by "assign the finishing touch sounds"? Are you talking about effects? Then VST plug-ins would be what you would use with Cubasis. SoundFonts are not effects, they are sound sets for compatible samplers.

Or are you asking what kind of sounds can you use with Gigastudio? They have their own native format; I don't know if they can load SoundFonts or Akai format files or any others. VST is not a sound set format. VST is a plug-in architecture that allows software add-ons -- effects or softsynths -- to be used within a compatible host program. The Cubase family supports it -- Steinberg invented it. SONAR and Cakewalk Home Studio use DirectX, another such architecture which requires, you guessed it, DirectX plug-ins or softsynths. They can also work with VST plug-ins using a DirectX-to-VST "wrapper."

and whats the comparison and contrast with gigastudio to cubasis VST?

If you didn't already get this from the earlier discussion, Cubasis is a MIDI and digital audio recorder/sequencer that supporst the VST plug-in architecture. Gigastudio is a software sampler that responds to MIDI messages by playing sound sets that it streams off the hard drive.

 

[AudioWebs]

Ok - You say giga responds to midi message, and I can use giga to apply gigasounds (the giga format) to the midi tracks.

Good.

Now - what if I am not using a real time device (like a keyboard) to do the midi?

What if I have a midi file I want to bring into giga and then assign gigasounds to the tracks....

and/or can I make the midi tracks using a piano roll IN giga?

In other words - if giga assigns sounds then can I use it to make the midi information....

the whole vst thing is blah. Basically I understand it, it's just I can't get the program to work and don't really understand it. but let's stick to giga for now!

 

[AlChuck]

You say giga responds to midi message, and I can use giga to apply gigasounds (the giga format) to the midi tracks.

Gigastudio is a MIDI instrument. Like any MIDI instrument, if you send it MIDI messages, it responds to them by playing sounds. You don't "apply gigasounds to the MIDI tracks." You route the MIDI messages from the tracks to Giagstudio.

Now - what if I am not using a real time device (like a keyboard) to do the midi?

It doesn't really matter to Gigastudio where the MIDI messages come from. If you have a MIDI file, when you play it back, if the tracks are sending MIDI messages to Gigastudio, it will play the notes its being told to play.

What if I have a midi file I want to bring into giga and then assign gigasounds to the tracks....

No, you're still not getting it.. Gigastudio is a MIDI instrument, not a MIDI sequencer or recorder or editor. You bring the MIDI file into Cubasis. You assign the track outputs to Gigastudio. Then you play the MIDI file in Cubasis, and Gigastudio makes sounds in response.

In other words - if giga assigns sounds then can I use it to make the midi information....

Now you are really spiralling off into never-never land.

I'll say it again. Gigastudio is a MIDI instrument. It responds to MIDI messages. It does not make MIDI messages.

the whole vst thing is blah. Basically I understand it, it's just I can't get the program to work and don't really understand it.

LOL. You basically understand but you don't understand it.

but let's stick to giga for now!

In essence it's the same thing, just different in some details. If you don't understand the VST thing, you won't understand the giga thing. But then, when you do get the giga thing sorted out, then the VST thing should fall into place too.

Good luck.

 

[AudioWebs]

Ok Al - let me see if I get this right.

In MIDI there is the piece that makes the "note-on message" information - and the cable it sends the information out on, and then the piece that plays the appropriate sound.

gigastudio as the piece that plays the sound. It recieves a message in MIDI and plays the sound the MIDI (and giga) are set to play.

so now if I have a midi file *.mid file, that contains my song (I already have experience physically making a midi file from written music or other ways)........

.......what is the process of taking the midi information file and not just playing it using the gigastudio sounds, but recording the result into something I can make into a wav or mp3....

is this what you are saying cubasis does? plays the midi in cubasis and uses the gigastudio sounds and records the result?

How do I get the result recorded, is my question.........

 

[DavidK]

How do I get the result recorded, is my question.........

Same way sou would record a hardware synth:

Arm a track. If the gigastudio is on a different puter, take the outputs of the soundcard, stick them into the inputs of the soundcard on the recording computer.

Press record.

 

[AlChuck]

You seem to be on the right track... (no pun intended)

If it's on the same computer, you do the same basic thing. In this case the Gigastudio is already using the soundcard's audio stream to play back its MIDI sounds. I would suspect that you would just arm an audio track in Cubasis, hit record, and the audio being played by the Giga will get recorded in the track. Note that after you do this you should mute the MIDI track or else you have two tracks playing the same part and you're likely to get comb filtering effects from interference. Once you have the audio track you can do all the ususal stuff with it -- EQ, compression, reverb...

For the details, I'm sure the Cubasis help file tells you just how to do this withing Cubasis.

 

[BluesMeister]

Well done AlChuck,

You explained the whole Giga thing with great patience and eloquence.

The file format is a proprietary *.gig format. However, there are now some software sequencers that can import *.GIG files AND stream from the hard drive. Two that I know of are Kompakt and VS3.

GigaStudio32, rather like the aging GigaSampler that I have, is really just a foretaste of a very expensive piece of software. Once you hear those wonderful giga samples though, you're hooked.

And it takes some real computer grunt to run GigaStudio to its full potential. The sample libraries can be expensive, although there are free gigas available if you know where to search (I'm not talking pirated Gigas - I'm talking genuine freebies).

So to sum up for Mr AudioWebs:
GigaStudio is a sampler into which the Gigasamples are loaded. The samples are triggered either by a MIDI keyboard in realtime, or by a sequencer such as Cubasis VST.

If you trigger using a sequencer you will need to open a MIDI file to trigger the samples.

You will need a fast HDD to stream those samples without audible glitches.

It's fairly common for serious Giga users to have the sampler on a dedicated machine and the sequencer on a second PC.

--
BluesMeister

 

[AudioWebs]

Thanks Meister (almost called you BM )

I'll load up giga soon and check it out. Probably won't be actually using it for recordings for a while, and by then I plan on getting a fast as hell computer in perhaps 6 months or less.