A question about synth sound quality

[lycosa]

Hello everyone..

I've been playing guitar for a bit over 20 years. I've dabbled with piano on and off, but nothing to the point where I could be called a 'pianist'. I could back my own tracks by playing chords which I really didn't practice learning, but would practice the needed chords for the individual songs. Well, recently, I'm attempting to put forth a lot of effort in learning the piano for real this time.

I'm in the market to buy a keyboard with good midi functionality. I don't want a stand-alone controller for DAW only, but rather one that has good stand alone sound coupled with decent MIDI controller options.

I've narrowed it down to Yamaha's MM6, Korg's X50, and Roland's Juno Di. All of which are in my price range. I would like to jump up to Korg's M50, but it's out of range.

Roland's Juno Di seems to have the best of what I'm looking for. Though I may be making a mistake over the X50, but the X50 just doesn't seem to look very durable and some of the reviews about programming the sound make it seem a little daunting for the novice. The MM6 has a few awesome Motif acoustic sounds, but seems rather lacking in the synth and midi department. A good response in this thread about why I might choose other than the Juno Di might be a game changer though if someone wants to argue for their favorite.

Another reason I'm here (and the title of this thread) is to hopefully have a question I'm unsure about answered. I'm wondering what produces the best sound quality for VST's working within a DAW? (I'm using Sonar 8). What would produce the best sound from a DAW, a good soundcard in the computer or a keyboard output such as running headphones out of the Roland Juno Di? I've been working with Line 6's KB37 which is little more than a guitar interface with some keys.. but the quality is fairly good on some things, but not so hot on others such as Realstrat run through Guitar Rig. What would be my best option for reproducing the intended VST sound into headphones?

 

[goz211]

Welcome to the forum.

Hardware keyboard? - any of those three you mentioned are worth owning. I'd be happy to gig/record with any one of them.

Programming your own sounds? - if you want to get into this and you're a relative beginner - scrub the choices above and get something with knobs and sliders. You need to be able to mess about a bit and instantly hear the effect your tweaking has made. Roland Gaia is my current recommendation for this. Of the three mentioned - the Roland Di has some (easy to use) front panel editing knobs.

Best sound from a DAW? - that Line 6 thingy is a good bit of kit. If you don't like Realstrat + Guitar Rig through it - maybe you don't like Realstrat + Guitar Rig. You are an experienced guitarist after all. Your standard of what sounds realistic may well be higher than a non guitar player.

I play guitar too. Best VSTs in terms of being able to play them from a keyboard (my personal choices):

Acoustic: Sonivox's Martin acoustic

http://www.sonivoxmi.com/ProductDet...nfodivcontent,#productinfo td a,activebold,,0

I can play this and make a live recording that my guitar playing buddies approve of.

Electric (clean): some good stuff in hardware keyboards. VSTs I like - the Sonivox Telecaster (try running it through your NI guitar rig)

Electric (dirty riffs): Sonivox's Tele through NI guitar rig.

Electric (OTT lead): NI's "Yngwie's back yard" in the Kore presets. Sonivox's Les Paul.

I was about to list the stuff I've tried - but a lot of these developers are small outfits. Not keen on giving anyone bad publicity when I may simply prefer the ones I've listed. Not saying the other ones I've tried are rubbish.

 

[lycosa]

Thanks Goz, I'll check that stuff out. I did finally decide and ordered the Roland Juno Di. It isn't as good maybe for Midi as a good controller, but it's quite Midi capable and I do like that it has it's own sound bank and features.

I guess maybe I'm not wording my question correctly.

Since I don't have a lot of experience in the Midi synth department, I'm assuming that when I have my keyboard in Midi mode acting as a controller for Sonar, that when I have my headphones hooked up to the keyboard, the VST instrument sound I hear will be replicated by the keyboard itself and it's quality will be determined by the 'engine' of the keyboard.

However, I can set the audio drivers in Sonar to use my soundcard drivers as an output. What I'ma wondering is.. what would be the best option? Would a good D/A converter in a soundcard produce a more quality sound than the D/A inside a Roland Juno Di for example.. since that's what I've bought.

Right now, the Line6 KB37 audio interface is pretty hit and miss. It does a great job with guitar, but there's a lot to be desired on the Midi keyboard. It works, but I'm assuming that the KB37 is processing my sound since I have it set up with ASIO drivers. I'm also guessing that given that I have it set up with drivers, that it's not using a 'software synthesis wavetable' to convert the Midi to analog sound... but then again, I'm a noob so I'm not positive of anything. lol

 

[goz211]

Doesn't work like that - the VST in your computer will produce audio that will be mapped to whatever you're using to get the audio out. It won't use an attached keyboard to "replicate" anything.

The Line6 keyboard acts as an audio interface too - the computer is doing all the work though.

Does that make sense?

 

[lycosa]

I think I get it.. maybe not. Soo what you are saying is...

When I have my KB37 plugged into my computer via USB, when I hit a note on the keyboard, Midi tells the synth inside Sonar which note I've hit and the velocity.

Then, the synth inside Sonar tells the sound card inside my computer how to convert that digital representation into an analog sound.

Finally, the analog sound is 'routed' through the KB37 into the headphones.

So the quality of sound I'm hearing is still a dependant representation of the quality of my soundcard installed in the computer and not the quality of any electronics inside my KB37.

If that's true then, the sound of the Roland acting as a controller in Sonar will be every bit as dependant on the processing and quality of my soundcard as well.

That sound right?

If so, it's time to go soundcard shopping since my computer has an internal on-board PoS.

Sorry if these seem like idiotic questions, but I've got to start somewhere. lol

 

[goz211]

"When I have my KB37 plugged into my computer via USB, when I hit a note on the keyboard, Midi tells the synth inside Sonar which note I've hit and the velocity. "

Yes.

"Then, the synth inside Sonar tells the sound card inside my computer how to convert that digital representation into an analog sound."

Sort of ... the computer does whatever processing the VST needs. It's all digital at this point. The Digital To Analog convertor stage can happen in your onboard soundcard OR in the DACs in your KB37 (AFAIK)

"So the quality of sound I'm hearing is still a dependant representation of the quality of my soundcard installed in the computer and not the quality of any electronics inside my KB37."

No - if you're listening to it via the KB37 I think the DACs in there are doing the work.

"If so, it's time to go soundcard shopping since my computer has an internal on-board PoS."

Up to you. Not convinced you'll hear something that's much different to than the Line6 box you've got (if you set it up so the Line 6 is doing all the DAC stuff).

Three options to google:

Firewire audio interface (if your machine has Firewire)
USB2 - very common, lots on the market
PCI card (lots of cheap stable options with mature drivers - usually desktop only not laptop).

I suspect what you have should do the job without spending any more money.

 

[davidstvz]

Your keyboard is capable of synthesizing it's own audio and if it can act as a controller, it's capable of sending MIDI notes to the PC (or any other device). It might also act as a module (allowing other MIDI controllers to control it's internal sound hardware). MIDI notes are just brief signals recording when a key was pressed and how hard/fast (and some other related data).

The PC/DAW is capable of taking audio inputs or MIDI input and recording it (possibly at the same time). A well equipped PC and DAW could also act as a MIDI controller (by playing back recorded MIDI).

What you want to do is record the audio streams if you like the way your keyboard sounds, or record the MIDI stream if you don't like the way the keyboard sounds. In that case, you use software synth inside the PC to convert the MIDI to nice sounding audio. At this point the keyboard is no longer involved.

Your initial post seems to be full of misconceptions. Sound card hardware has very little to do with pro audio these days. It's basically just a way to get audio or midi data into the PC. And some sound "cards" come with pre-amps built in (anything with gain knobs like the presonus fire studio). All PC audio processing is done in software and has been for over a decade.