MidiQuest any good? Alternatives? Can I do this natively in Bitwig?

The Lounge Other Gear
#1

I’m trying to get my studio organized and my DAW template set up for a new project where I will be heavily relying on my Prophet X.

I like using VST editors simply for the ability to retain and recall parameter settings per project. I used codeknobs vst editors for a while with my Prophet 6 and Rev2 when I had them and I MUCH preferred it to soundtower.

From the looks of it, Midiquest is just a more universal tool for this. It happens to have all of my current synths so it would be nice to use it across my setup.

I know I could save patch on the synth and recall it, but its much nicer to be able to tweak away without saving and just have it recall perfectly the next time I open a project.

MQ is absurdly expensive but if its a flawless tool that just works inside a DAW well with no hiccups or “diy fixed,” I might be interested. I suspect this is not the case.

Otherwise I am curious to know other solutions. I’m not sure if Bitwig has the NRPN support to be able to do something like this.

#2

I’ve had mixed results. However, it has to be said that I have some old and notoriously finicky synths when it comes to SYSEX. I’ve not had much better luck with any other modern options. I keep my Wavestation A/D and K5000 close to hand for editing from their front panels.

#3

had midiquest 9 i think. it was years ago… but i never liked it. developer moaned a lot about apple breaking things any time i asked about updates. but seems they’re still hard at it over there and have new version recently or not too long ago.

read the fine print for sure. i found it to be a pain in the ass with most things i wanted to use it with and faster to edit using the front panel.

if there’s a demo, do try the demo.

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#4

Indeed.

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#5

Yeah I’m usually a “Tweak the actual synth” kind of guy but I’m experimenting with some more recallable setups for an upcoming paid project.

I’m like 50/50 towards just working with audio only and screwing the recalls. Destructive workflow works.

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#6

Good to know. I’ll probably just steer clear.

One of the small pieces of info I did find is that the demo doesn’t work as a vst, which is my main use case.

#7

Just spitballing here, but Max could be another option! I had never used it until I needed to design a SysEx editor for some older hardware and it was the best way to finally learn the damn thing.

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#8

I almost asked about max for this heh.

#9

not sure how you’d get max into a plug in unless there’s a RNBO angle. no idea what ableton does w/sysex these days if a max4live device is the goal.

midierror has a bunch of m4L editors though.

link: www.maxforlive.com - Download Max for Live Devices

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#10

There are M4L devices that send SysEx (this TX81Z editor for one)

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#11

Not cheaper but since you are asking for alternatives and Bitwig support…

The Electra One can be used as a controller for many other things, including Bitwig.

#12

What’s the issue with Soundtower?

#13

I’m 99% sure that Bitwig’s MIDI device sends all of its params (definitely CC at least) when a project with one in it is opened / when a preset of the device is loaded. The only thing is you have to put a few of them together in one chain if you want to control/recall a lot of things and unfortunately yes Bitwig still doesn’t support NRPN (which is kinda bonkers considering how on it they are with hardware integration).

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#14

I use MIDI Quest since years … well it’s not a dream app, but having for my vintage synths (and some more modern ones) a reliable patch-librarian with a acceptable GUI is an advantage for me - compared with other apps. I use it mainly as a librarian, but the editors are okay.

The GUI isn’t pretty IMO but suitable.

They always added a couple of new synths to the library, so the app didn’t get outdated over the years …

Why not check out the demo?

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#15

I couldn’t get it to work via the demo.

Also I like to use the synth in question (Prophet X) as my main midi controller. It gets kind of annoying with this kind of setup.

CodeKnobs VST editors for the other prophets has a setting that helps facilitate this.

To be fair, I highly doubt midiquest had this feature either.

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#16

If you are talking about the ability for application to find the Prophet X in a MIDI studio then, yes, Midi Quest can do it. Its called “Auto Sense…”. Select the instrument in the Studio window, press the “Settings” button to display the Settings dialog. There will be an “auto sense” button there. press it and Midi Quest will find the Prophet X.

You said you couldn’t get the demo to work. Did you read the “Fast Tips” which provides the setup on the Prophet X required so that it will function properly with SysEx?

The Prophet X uses very straight forward SysEx. Nothing complicated. If you followed the Fast Tips steps and Midi Quest didn’t work, the most important question to ask is are you connected through USB or by MIDI interface? If its a MIDI interface then what interface are you using? (There are many MIDI interfaces out there that don’t handle SysEx properly and the companies aren’t exactly up front about this fact. For SysEx, you are far better of using the instrument’s USB)

Just to be clear, Midi Quest 9 was released over 20 years ago. More than happy to clarify the state of Apple back than as well but let’s just say that once they dropped Carbon, their interfaces have been extremely reliable.

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