Midi Thru on R3 Problem

DaniH · Post by **DaniH** » Tue Apr 26, 2011 4:32 pm

I want the midi thru from the R3 to send midi data to my SH-201. No midi data is sent when I hook this up though. When I use soft thru/midi thru on my SH-201 to my R3 everything works as it should. So why is the R3's midi thru not sending any midi data. I am not really good with daisy-chaining.

I sent the original notes from FL Studio, Reason, and my MC-808 to the R3. I even tried with the SH-201 first and it works fine.

Didn't find much help in the manual unless I missed something.

xmlguy · Post by **xmlguy** » Tue Apr 26, 2011 8:53 pm

So why are you trying to daisy chain them? They both have USB-midi. You can send and receive midi directly to each device from the computer.

Basically, MIDI THRU = MIDI IN. MIDI THRU is a mirror copy output of MIDI in. The R3 doesn't really "send" anything to MIDI THRU. It's not supposed to send anything to it. It's supposed to just be like a Y cable splitter where one output goes to two inputs.

MIDI OUTPUT Device 1 ==> MIDI IN Device 2 ==> (Device 2 Listens Here)

==> MIDI THRU Device 2 >> MIDI IN Device 3 ==> (Device 3 Listens Here)
==> MIDI THRU Device 3 >> MIDI IN Device 4 ==> (Device 4 Listens Here)
==> MIDI THRU Device 4 >> MIDI IN Device 5 ==> (Device 5 Listens Here)

Notice that Device 5 should receive exactly the same signal as was sent on Device 1's MIDI OUT. Whatever device 2,3,4 do in response to what they receive has no affect on what is sent to their MIDI THRU.

So think of MIDI THRU as meaning MIDI PASSTHROUGH. The MIDI IN passes through the device to the MIDI THRU port exactly the way it was received.

DaniH · Post by **DaniH** » Tue Apr 26, 2011 11:24 pm

Didn't mean to say daisy-chain.

I always thought midi thru would pass the data untouched so you could use the keyboard independently without sending notes to the next keyboard/module.

I know they all can be used with just the usb but wanted to disconnect from the laptop, use hardware only for shows. If I have my laptop connected it tends to take over, and I use only software.

I'm not really knowledgeable with midi thru that's why I asked.

axxim · Post by **axxim** » Wed Apr 27, 2011 10:29 pm

DaniH wrote:....I always thought midi thru would pass the data untouched so you could use the keyboard independently without sending notes to the next keyboard/module....

Well usually that is exactly what MIDI does: it passes the data from MIDI-IN to MIDI-Thru without being affected by the device to which they are connected. Only the MIDI-Out data from the first device (master) is chained to the rest (slaves)

Master-Midi-Out ---> Slave1-Midi-In=Slave1-Midi-Thru ---> Slave2-Midi-In=Slave2-Midi-Thru ---> Slave3-Midi-In=Slave3-Midi-Thru --->.....