How to connect Miracle Keyboard to X1000 (or x5000)

I have a Miracle Keyboard which I used on classic amigas.
Kids learned to play piano (smile)

I would like to attach and use this keyboard on my X1000
I assume this means I have to find a usb to midi device?

Any tested to work?

Michael

Any USB to MIDI device that does not require "special" software should work. We have had "class compatible" USB to MIDI driver for a long while now.
The driver supports any CAMD aware programs.

@LyleHaze

Thanks for the basic info!
I checked on line and there are so many adaptors to guess from..

Any more hints to a name that has been tested working?

Thanks in advance,

Michael

Sorry no, but order off Amazon and return if no good?

@ddni

Not my style..but thanks

@sacc-dude

Sorry for the late reply. The network filters at work are not friendly with this site.
I looked over the popular shopping website, and if a 6 foot lead is long enough, I can recommend the "U2 MIDI Pro" from CME. While I cannot clain "tested", it clearly states "Class Compatible", and it's a reputable company to work with. Cost is about $20.

The big interface I wrote the driver on is no longer available, and wirth eight ins and eight outs, I have enough open ports that I have not needed to buy new MIDI interfaces for a while. Also, much newer equipment is direct to USB, so they just plug in.

Of course, the "extra" software with the interface won't run on Amiga, but I suspect CamdTools can do all that and more for you.

About the "Miracle Keyboard".. If it is the Amiga version, the software will only see the keyboard if it uses camd.library. I don't know the software well enough to tell.

Let me know how things work out!
Lyle

@LyleHaze
Many Thanks! Just what I needed, a name
I don't know CME from adam. but it's nice to hear it (CME) is a name that works.

My Amiga Miracle is neat. It has a serial plug cable that came with it and it also has mini input/output connectors as well

I pulled out my old amiga midi controller. It still works!

When I receive a usb to midi in about a week, I'll report back.

Thanks again

Michael

BTW, what happened to SCORE?

Score is .. stalled.
I have LOTS of excuses. I've been really busy, I've had a major heart attack, I've been caring for my wife as she recovers from stage 3C cancer, I've had two changes of employment. and I'm exhausted 95% of the time.

My Amiga work for a while shifted from MIDI work to the Audio driver for Tabor/A1222(+). It was working great for me but refused to work for most other people, I spent two years trying to figure that out. Turns out that MY board was "to specification", but almost all others were shipped with 4G of RAM, and kickstart was not configured correctly. I had no way to figure this out until I was loaned another board. It only took a few weeks from there to at least figure out what was wrong. Steve worked hard on getting that right for me.

RIGHT NOW I am not doing any more drivers. I AM working on CAMD tools (all weekend, Happy Fathers Day!) I still poke around in Score occasionally, and I am working on a CAMD recorder that would be a great bit of code to add in to Score.

And I HAVE to mention, my wife got me a most interesting MIDI toy today, look up "AeroBand PocketDrum 2 MAX", better yet search it in YouTube.
I've not even connected it yet, but it will definitely make the MIDI recorder a lot of fun to play with.

SO, Score is still a private project, and progress is too slow to describe.
Best estimate: "Two More Weeks".. (sorry, I couldn't resist)

@LyleHaze

HOLY CRAP!! You take it easy and all the best to your wife!! Also Happy Fathers Day too!

Scott P

In anticipation of your new tools, here's a quick start guide.

Download and unpack https://os4depot.net/share/driver/misc/camdtools.lha

Open a shell and run "ClusterList" with no arguments. slide this shell aside where you can keep an eye on it. It will likely say ** CAMD Cluster List **
and not much else.
Now connect your new MIDI interface, If all goes to plan, you'll see two new entries pop up in the cluster list. SOMETHING.in.0 and SOMETHING.out.o

Obviously SOMETHING could really be ANYTHING.. or whatever..

Connect interface IN to Keyboard OUT, connect interface OUT to keyboard IN.
power up the keyboard. in another shell type
midiwatch SOMETHING.in.o
details: cluster names are case sensitive, and if there's any spaces, put quotes around it.

play the keyboard, you should see a lot of text flying by.. this is a really good sign.

Run "ShowKeys" from shell or mouse. Click on the largest gadget across the top, select "SOMETHING.in.0"

Play the (real)keyboard again. you'll see your playing drawn in ShowKeys, and if you left the MidiWatch shell open, you'll still see it there too.


Now we have fully tested the IN. _IF_ the miracle keyboard also supports MIDI to Audio, then you can test it by downloading CamdPlay, select SOMETHING.out, and play a few MIDI files.. I don't know what the miracle keyboard supports there.

You can unstall Timi from the extras disk and use it as a soft synth if you like.

Details: It IS possible to "alias" friendly names in place of whatever your interface calls itself.. Somewhere deep in the readme or ask if you'd like.

ClusterList puts almost ZERO load on the system, it literally wais for a signal from CAMD that triggers only when the list should change. So leaving it open is a great way to see what's currently connected.

ShowKeys can show any combination of 1 to 16 channels, can be run multiple times to show different instrument parts, different MIDI streams, whatever.

There's also a "Midi Active" tool that shows instrument activity per-channel.. Useful for watching a MIDI file play.

There are lots more tools than what's in CamdTools. I write new ones and rewrite old ones all the time. If you have requests or suggestions, just ask. I might well have it already.

Have Fun!

Edit: ClusterList is not included. The old "ShowClusters" is there instead.
It only shows what's there when it runs, I don't think it automatically updates.
I need to update and submit new tools one day.
Just getting everything organized could take a good part of a day.
Might as well wait until I have the Cluster Requester replacement that I'm working on now ready too.

Edit2:
https://os4depot.net/share/driver/misc/clusterlist.lha
Clusterlist is a separate submission. Throw out ShowClusters, use ClusterList

@LyleHaze

Wow! Thanks for all that!

the interface arrived, it works as I worked thru your memo

In clusterlist I get five things
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
nemo.in.O
nemo.out.O
U2MIDI PRO.in.O
U2MIDI PRO.out.O

when I power on I do not get lots of letters
but the output window shows ANYTHING.in.0

sigh


It's so much I have to learn

Your tools leave me just testing my playing

More later!

Michael

This is good news.
So far, the biggest failure is my instructions.

The point I failed to explain is that I don't know WHAT your interface would call itself. I used SOMETHING and ANYTHING as examples to be replaced with whatever you find. But I failed to explain that clearly.

I see that you have installed the nemo CAMD driver. _IF_ the original MIDI cable that shipped with the Miracle keyboard fits the serial port on your X1000, then this driver should work. I didn't mention it, my mistake.

Let me try again:
type into a shell the following line
MidiWatch "U2MIDI PRO.in.0"

If you got the capitalization exactly as you saw it in ClusterList,
you'll now see stuff flying by as you press and release each piano key.
Note the quotes, needed because of spaces in the name.
That last character is a ZERO, not a Letter o.

If you DON'T spell it right, you'll see a new cluster with your
misspelled version show up at the bottom of the list. Ctrl-C
in the shell to exit and try again.


Whether or not that works.. here's a no-typing test;
Run "ShowKeys", and select
U2MIDI PRO.in.0
from the largest gadget on the top.
Play piano, watch the showkeys window.

Put simply, the notes you play on your piano will arrive
at "U2MIDI PRO.in.0"

And IF your miracle keyboard will convert outgoing MIDI
to audio, it can be played at "U2MIDI PRO.out.0"

If you ever add another identical interface, it will show up as
"U2MIDI PRO.in.1" and "U2MIDI PRO.out.1"

There IS a way to make it show up as MiraclePiano.in
and MiraclePiano.out. But we will save that for another day.

Here's my ClusterList, always open on my workbench:

** CAMD Cluster List **
MIDI IN 1
MIDI IN 2
MU90R1 response
EDIROL UM-880.in.3
MU90R2 response
EDIROL UM-880.in.5
EDIROL UM-880.in.6
MBMixer response
UM-880 response
MIDI OUT 1
MIDI OUT 2
MU90R1 Bank 1
MU90R1 Bank 2
MU90R2 Bank 1
MU90R2 Bank 2
EDIROL UM-880.out.6
MBMixer control
UM-880 control
UMC404HD 192k.in.0
UMC404HD 192k.out.0
VU
mix
HD404
out

Right now the piano and (new) drumkit are not connected.
SOME of these are their branded interface names,
SOME are translated to what is using them, like the
two MU90R Synthesizers, with two banks of 16 each.
And some are NOT interfaces, but just meeting points
for programs to combine and share MIDI controls, like
"mix", which combines MIDI controls from a bunch of
different places, and routes them all to my MIDI controlled
audio mixer. (MBMixer Control).

My point is that CAMD can do a LOT of neat stuff, WAY
more than just connecting to a MIDI interface.

I'm SURE the U2 MIDI pro will work, because the driver
has accepted it and put it in the list. Sorry for the confusion,
I hope this has sorted you out.

edit: corrected "U2 MIDI PRO" to U2MIDI Pro"

@LyleHaze

I Thank You
that was the clue that released the interface.

got all the text and could watch the keys being pressed.

Now.. to work on the software from the Miracle package.
I know it was from "Blue Ribbon SoundWorks, Ltd"

and.. so the serial port (added by AmigaKit) for use with reporting on (in my case Term) can be used as a serial port?

I just read about the second serial header on the mother board.

I also just added a led to the hard drive header but have no idea where to lead it to on the front of the case Fractal Design R3.

learning,

Michael

Excellent!
I have details.
First, I truly regret confusing you. My instructions were poor.

The "Nemo" camd interface is NOT the serial port, it's the "second" serial port header on the motherboard.. That was also my mistake. Using that requires a small circuit, just a couple resistors and an optocoupler.. but the result is a CAMD in and out, which you have now already with them USB MIDI interface.

If the Miracle driver "hits the serial port directly" things get a bit tricky. If it writes at the "device level" it just MIGHT .. but there's a lot more questions first. Deeper than I should dig right now.

"Blue Ribbon Soundworks" was Todor Fay. In his earlier career he wrote Soundscape, then opened Blue Ribbon and wrote Bars&Pipes. He was eventually bought out by Microsoft and did considerable work on their multimedia layers. I believe his latest company is "True Blue", but I could be mistaken.

I was able to download the miracle disks (3). I was able to run disk 0 ONCE, it locked up at the banner.. I was never again able to unpack the ADF files. Apparently I have no idea what am doing.

BUT HERE"S THE GOOD PART: If the Miracle software, or ANY program tries to open ANY camd port, IT WILL SHOW UP IN CLUSTERLIST.
That's your HUGE indication that the program is CAMD capable. And yes, we can easily "patch" from and to any way we want.

Finally, if at any time you'd like to rename "U2MIDI Pro" to "MiraclePiano", or just "Piano", or anything else, I'll send you a file that will make the change for you. Just tell me what you want.

Suggestions:
You need to figure out if the Miracle Keyboard can be used by a MIDI player. It MIGHT also work as a sound module, OR it might only be an input device.. Easiest way: Download CamdPlay, and download a few MIDI files. Open CamdPlay, select "U2MIDI Pro.out.0" as the destination, then open a MIDI file and press play.
I read Somewhere that audio out is only a metronome click.. I don't know. That seems like an odd choice. But then, who knows?

Congrats on getting connected. There is a public "BArs&Pipes" with camd connections, and "Horny" is another sequencer. And if you need a sound module, Timi is free and works fairly well too.

Don't be afraid to email me personally if you have questions about CAMD.. lylehaze at gmail dot com