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Thursday, 16 December 2004

Studio 5 on OS X ::

Last week Gil Sicuro of Brazil sent me a nice screen shot that put me in a bit of a time warp:

Compare to my OMS studio setup document (I last used this rig in 2000):

MIDI gear came and went, the icons were black and white before about 1994 or so, but that studio setup goes back to 1990 when were developing OMS and the Studio 5 at Opcode. I moved from NY to California, left a lot of gear behind (including my 2 Studio 5's), and started using Mac OS X before there was even any music software for it. In 2002, in response to a steady stream of questions from Studio 5 users about Mac OS X compatibility, I wrote that I didn’t foresee there ever being a full Mac OS X driver for it (one that would support its editing application, Studio Patches Editor). But I did outline a way to make it work.

Gil provided some details of how he did just that, and gave me permission to tell the world... (I just fixed a couple of typos):

The funniest part is that this setup was on a Power Mac 9600 with a G3 upgrade running OS X 10.3.4. It can boot to OS X thanks to an utility called XPostFacto.

I used the freely downloadable Stealth Serial Port MIDI Driver- so AudioMIDI Setup could look the serial port for a MIDI interface. The Stealth port is a serial port that can be plugged in the modem slot of the new-world G3, G4 and G5. One equivalent is the GPort [Griffin].

Either the Stealth or the GPort drivers recognizes the 9600's built-in ports - so I can say that I got lucky! Of course, I recommend to use the GPort or the Stealth on a supported Mac, but the driver did the job for me, and the interface worked perfectly, with precise timing (tested with Digital Performer).

So here’s what I did:

1- in OS 9, I opened OMS Setup, called the Studio5 menu and set it as “MTP Emulation” mode.

2- in OS X, I installed the Stealth MIDI Driver (not the serial driver, since OS X already recognized the serial ports). GPort MIDI driver would do the job as well.

3- Opening the driver’s application, I set a 15-port interface connected to the modem port (could be printer in my case, or Stealth/GPort on newer Macs). As far as I remember, I set the speed communication as 1x.

4- I opened AudioMIDI Setup, and the 15x15 interface appeared. So I added the modules according to my setup.

5- The final touch was adding my custom icons, which were placed in the /Library/Audio/MIDI Devices/Generic/Images folder. So, I could choose my icons within AudioMIDI Setup (I can send you an OSX-ready Studio5 icon if you like).

Digital Performer 4 worked perfectly with this setup. I had no chance to test the analog SMPTE input to see if any MTC would be sent to the computer.

Thu, 16 Dec 2004, 22:29 PST
[ Opcode ]
<< Logic's default quantization 2004 > December Careful what you wish for >>

40 comments

  1. Any idea if the studio 4 will work using the same method???
    Thanks
    Lief...

    – Lief, Tuesday, 1 February 2005, 04:53 PST

  2. The Studio 4's a lot simpler—it just uses the MIDI Time Piece protocol. I’ve heard of people getting it working, though there are reports that Fast mode (4X) is unreliable for receiving sys-ex. If this happens, 1 MHz should work.

    – Doug, Tuesday, 1 February 2005, 04:56 PST

  3. I wonder...

    Will a Studio 4 work in OS X on a new Powerbook using the Keyspan USA-28X (*) USB-Serial adaptor in conjunction with the Stealth midi driver? ;)  (Also, would anything stop this from working with Logic 7?)

    [* this is the revised working model number - the original did not work with midi interfaces at all, even in OS 9]

    I’m hoping that the fact the Stealth drivers will work with legit non-Stealth serial ports, will also mean they will work with the Keyspan adaptor.  Obviously, because I’m using a new Powerbook I can’t install either OS 9 or a Stealth interface.

    This would be awesome and save my Studio 4 from Ebay!  Has anyone tested this and can you confirm whether or not it works?

    – Marcus, Tuesday, 1 February 2005, 08:30 PST

  4. I have no firsthand experience, but last I knew, the Keyspan adapters did not support external clocking (required for MIDI) in their OS X drivers. This information is about a year or two old.

    About a month ago someone on opcode-users said that the Keyspan was still not viable for MIDI on OS X.

    – Doug, Tuesday, 1 February 2005, 11:00 PST

  5. The problem is there are two versions of Keyspan adaptor (USA-28 and USA-28X).  The latter does support external clocking and will work with MIDI devices in OS 9, as explained in the FAQ on their website (see below).

    So what are the chances of it working with OS X using the Stealth drivers?!  Anyone have one to test it with?

    From www.keyspan.com:

      Difference Between USA-28 and USA-28X
      Question
      What is the difference between the USA-28 and USA-28X?
      Answer
      The major difference between the USA-28 and USA-28X is a hardware based feature called ‘External Clock’.
    Our first USB to Serial adapter, the USA-28, did not support External Clock.
    When discontinued the USA-28 and replaced it with the USA-28X, we added the External Clock feature to the new USA-28X adapter hardware.
    Functionally, the USA-28X supports every device that the USA-28 supported. Due to the added benefit of External Clock, the USA-28X also supports more serial devices (such as certain HP Deskjets, Apple LaserWriters, MIDI, etc).

    – Marcus, Wednesday, 2 February 2005, 03:37 PST

  6. To clarify:

    I’m aware the Keyspan FAQ also makes it clear that MIDI via the USA28X is not supported by it’s drivers under OS X.  However, this appears to be a lack of driver issue - the same reason the serial ports on upgraded beige macs will not work with the Opcode interfaces; unless, as reported above, the Stealth driver is installed.

    The fact that the Stealth driver is for a rival product, suggests that even if this does work, Keyspan are unlikely to be upfront about it! ;)

    – Marcus, Wednesday, 2 February 2005, 03:51 PST

  7. I’m having  hell of a time getting my Opcode Studio 128x to work with my GeeThree stealth serial port properly in OSX. It works fine until I try to enable all 8 ports and then things go wrong. When I “Test Studio” on any of the ports, I get midi sent to all of them instead. After a few clicks, it stops working all together. Then I have to switch the 128x off and on again to resuscitate.

    If anyone has any ideas, let me know!

    -J

    – John Tennant, Monday, 18 April 2005, 10:32 PDT

  8. i’m also having difficulty getting a studio 4 to work with osx and a g4port... it works fine under os9, but in osx (using midi monitor), the only messages reported as received are “resets”...

    in the procedure above was the setting (while in os9) of “mtp emulation” somehow key? trouble is, this doesn’t seem to be available in oms’s studio 4 menu... or is the functionality more dependent on choosing the “1x” speed setting?

    any insight you could offer would be greatly appreciated,

    t

    – t, Tuesday, 19 April 2005, 23:11 PDT

  9. T, you shouldn’t have to do anything special to make the Studio 4 emulate a MTP; it wakes up in a mode where it recognizes the special messages to start the multi-port protocol. I think. I can’t remember; I never had a Studio 4, but I don’t think it even has a MTP emulation setting.

    The first thing I would try is to make sure you’re using the 1X speed; I’m not convinced that 4X is reliable.

    – Doug Wyatt, Tuesday, 19 April 2005, 23:33 PDT

  10. i did some further tests and you are exactly right - the fast mode flat out doesn’t work...

    one point i would highlight that may be of help to others is that apparently you have to boot into os9, run oms setup, and then use the “save and make current” command so that both the studio 4 and the computer are aware that they are to use 1x mode (not sure if the setup file matters afterwards)...

    after this, boot into osx and run audio midi setup to remind the computer of what you’ve already told it while in os9 - note that this step was absolutely necessary for some reason, at least in protools...

    hope it helps...

    t

    – t, Wednesday, 20 April 2005, 07:36 PDT

  11. by the way, thanks for your help...

    – t, Wednesday, 20 April 2005, 22:19 PDT

  12. Hi,

    I followed the instructions above and I can’t get any midi out of the studio 5lx at all.  When in test mode, I can see that midi in is working by hitting my keys/drumpads and seeing the arrows lite up onscreen, but clicking the device icon onscreen sends nothing to the interface, my gear isn’t getting midi at all.  My delta 1010 midi ports work fine and have two-way communication. 

    I’m using OS X 10.3.9 with a Serial Port and Cubase SX 1.

    Any ideas?

    – Jason, Tuesday, 1 November 2005, 09:59 PST

  13. Jason,

    Did you put the Studio5LX in MTP emulation mode in OS 9 before trying OS X?

    – Gil Sicuro, Tuesday, 16 May 2006, 09:44 PDT

  14. Does someone had a luck with 128X under OSX?

    – TS, Wednesday, 7 June 2006, 10:36 PDT

  15. I’ve been trying a S5LX with serial ports from a keyspan sx pro 4 serial card. I’m in tiger and trying both the stealth and the g4 midi drivers...I get the 15x15 interface in OSX to flash on testing, but no midi is being sent.  Any thoughts? Do I need to sell my keyspan and get a stealth port?

    Dave G.

    – Dave Gilbert, Monday, 14 August 2006, 18:58 PDT

  16. If haveing problems under OSX, try removing internal battery for a minute. You need to remove loads of screws to get at it. This resets to factory default where all ports route from in to out. This is especially if brought used as it remembers its last configuration which could include some fancy routing from its previous studio installation.
    Worked for me anyway.

    Good Luck.

    – Errol Ingleton, Friday, 19 January 2007, 01:14 PST

  17. Can I add a question ?  I’m trying to connect my PowerBook Pismo G3 to the Studio5LX.  The powerbook has only USB and modem (RJ11), the Studio5 has the mini-DIN8.  Is there any way to make a cable that goes from the modem connection to the mini-din8 ?  Or any other solution ? (I tried a Belkin USB to serial, but in that setup OMS can’t find the Studio5 apparently).
    Thanks ! Paul

    – Paul Coussement, Friday, 16 March 2007, 10:59 PDT

  18. Answer to number 16 found with the help of the OpcodeUsers forum on Yahoo : using the Keyspan USA 28X-B.  Works !

    – Paul Coussement, Thursday, 12 April 2007, 13:37 PDT

  19. Does anyone know if you can chain 2 studio 4's to get 16 ins and 16 outs???..

    – Lief Ryan, Thursday, 12 April 2007, 15:17 PDT

  20. I have had a good look at all the info above cant seem to quite answer my questions.
    a. how can i connect my studio 4 to my macbook pro and get it to work?
    b. could it work with a pc if needed?
    c. will it work stand alone?

    thanks for any help, i think this may have been a bad ebay buy :(

    tom

    – Tom Hackers, Tuesday, 29 May 2007, 03:19 PDT

  21. I doubt it would work with a Mac Intel machine, altough I never did the test - the GPort and Stalth MIDI driver were written for PowerPC and as far as I know Rosetta works for applications only, not drivers. I tried a verison for PowerPC of the MIDIoverLAN MIDI-to-ethernet software and it didn’t work on Intel, only on my Mac mini G4.

    Anyway I have Mac OS X 10.4.8 running on a PC here  :-P  which have built-in serial ports, I could make a test... if the serial ports are recognized by OS X, they are currently disable in the PC’s BIOS since I’m not using them. Well, if I made it work on OS X on a Power Mac 9600 - for Doug’s surprise - it’s worth a try...

    – Gil Sicuro, Sunday, 1 July 2007, 16:36 PDT

  22. Well, the answer to your question unfortunately is NO, unless they release Universal Binaries of the drivers for the Stealth or GPort (discontinued) serial adapters (or at least universal binaries of the MIDI drivers). I’m not sure if the new Intel Macs have any kind of serial ports (ie built-in modems that could be pulled out) so I’m not sure if these drivers will ever be released.

    Which is a pity, I have a PC here running OS X 10.4.8  :-P  which have its serial ports recognized by the OS and the Stealth MIDI Serial Setup application even works (it sees the serial and even bluetooth ports) - but I can’t select any port since the MIDI driver was written for PowerPC only, and Rosetta works for applications, not drivers, as far as I know. I tried as well to run a PowerPC version of the MIDIoverLAN MIDI-to-ethernet software, which have a similar plug-in, and there was a big no-go as well.

    – Gil Sicuro, Sunday, 1 July 2007, 16:56 PDT

  23. I howl in impotent rage as the inexorable creep of technology (and the lack of money and space that makes it impossible for me to keep a couple of legacy machines lying around) is slowly squeezing me out of any ability to use my Studio 5LX, long the backbone of my studio, for anything at all.

    I have recently gotten back into using my basement studio -- shock horror, it only took eight years! -- and my Wall Street (1999-era OS 9 serial/SCSI Powerbook) that I’d migrated off of for email web etc some time ago and saved as a front end for my Studio 5LX now refuses to boot. Because of what I do and how I do it, I don’t need complete I/O to a computer or anything of the sort... but I do need the ability to program the Studio 5LX to route my MIDI around and to firewall my incredibly stupid MIDI-spewing Roland U-50 from harming the rest of my rig.

    I am looking at picking up an ancient Mac just for the ability to use a serial port, or at moving away from my Studio 5LX, neither of which makes me very happy.

    Nick Rothwell routinely gave me dark warnings about relying on computer hardware of a certain generation to make art. I’ve been thinking about those a lot, lately.

    – Mike Metlay, Friday, 13 July 2007, 13:28 PDT

  24. Well in the case of an Intel Mac a good (and radical) workaround would be replacing your beloved Studio5LX for say, two MIDI TimePieces USB. If you were using OS X on a standard PC with built-in serial ports you could hope for some third-party Intel serial-MIDI driver to appear, because the Stealth MIDI Serial Setup application actually works under Rosetta.

    Of course you can always dig eBay for a cheap vintage Mac to drive your Studio5.

    Another - untested - workaround would be using an emulator like SheepShaver to run Mac OS 9 on a computer with a built-in serial port - and maybe an adapter cable). I could run 16 tracks of audio with Digital Performer 3.11 under OS 9 running on SheepShaver in a Pentium D 3.2GHz dual core Windows XP box, all in perfect sync. Audio could even be routed thru my M-Audio USB interface. Maybe MIDI / OMS could work that way as well.

    I’ve thinking myself several times as well about relying in a certain computer generation to make art, and I already had some serious headaches about that. Computers and hardware does get old (computers especially), I don’t know if it is the electronic erosion inside their ICs, but the fact is that they do become erratic and non-reliable after a certain age, as far as I can tell from my own experience.

    A new, cheap and fast PC with lots of fresh, upgradeable, resourceful  virtual instruments and no actual hardware MIDI interface at all has becoming a very attractive option lately. I still keep the vintage analogs from the picture at the top of this page, the SY77 is being used as a MIDI controller and the Karma is for sale. The rest is gone, along the Studio5LX itself. I’ve been using virtual instruments with way more quality and flexibility for quite some time now and I really don’t miss any piece of the old gear.

    – Gil Sicuro, Thursday, 19 July 2007, 12:14 PDT

  25. Please help me, that i buy the right adapter!!
    Is this true that my old OPCODE 4 Midi Interface works on my very new MacBook (Intel) 2.16GHz with Keyspan USA-28XG USB to Serial Adapter. Need I a special Software and Presets when I work with LogicPro 7.2.3 (on a Intel mac).
    Thanks
    Michael

    – Michael from Austria, Friday, 20 July 2007, 16:19 PDT

  26. I have never heard of any serial MIDI driver for the Mac Intel. If someone knows please post here because I need it too!

    – Gil Sicuro, Sunday, 22 July 2007, 14:46 PDT

  27. If the S5LX can be set to MTP emulation provided you have an older Mac, I wonder if it would work with a PC and the MOTU Win drivers. It would be a question of finding a cable Mac serial to PC serial. Feasible ?

    – Francois Rossi, Monday, 23 July 2007, 20:26 PDT

  28. The cable can be made, altough I doubt the Mac and PC share the same serial protocols. As far as I remember the Mac is RS-422 while the PC is RS-232 (correct me if I am wrong). Plus the MOTU Windows drivers addresses parallel and USB interfaces, not serial.

    – Gil Sicuro, Tuesday, 24 July 2007, 13:53 PDT

  29. Someone test the Keyspan USA-28XG USB to Serial Adapter on a Intel Mac with Midi-Interfaces? Please post . . .
    Thanx

    – Michael, Tuesday, 31 July 2007, 15:46 PDT

  30. Let’s say it works, you will need the MIDI driver for Intel too.

    – Gil Sicuro, Thursday, 2 August 2007, 16:49 PDT

  31. I tried to get the Keyspan USA-28X to work with the Stealth MIDI driver on a MacBook Pro.  No luck whatsoever.  The stealth MIDI driver recognized the Keyspan just fine, but my interface didn’t show up.  Checked Keyspans site - they say no MIDI support.  Sigh...looks like my MOTU MTP/AV is headed for eBay.

    – Jerome Begin, Friday, 24 August 2007, 18:51 PDT

  32. The Serial MIDI Setup application actually works (under Rosetta), the very problem is the MIDI driver itself, since Rosetta is for applications only. Anyway the serial MIDI driver would recognize a serial port only, in your case it’s a serial device plugged in an USB port.

    – Gil Sicuro, Wednesday, 5 September 2007, 08:56 PDT

  33. Hi there all,
    im considering purchasing a Opcode Studio 3 midi interface to use with my tibook 400mhz os9.2 or osx 10.2.8 if that will be more succesful?? but am interested to find out if i can use one of the usb to serial interfaces on the market. has anyone testedany of these system setups and what were your findings?

    cheers in advance

    – dman, Thursday, 25 October 2007, 23:14 PDT

  34. Hi,

    I have a powermac G3 upgraded with G4 with mac os 10.2. There are built-in serial and parallel port.
    I have put the stealth midi driver folder in the SYSTEM/LIBRARY/AUDIO/MIDI DRIVERS/ folder as explained in the stealth package.

    When I execute the stealth midi setup application, I can see both serial and parallel driver but no driver can be chosen (only “none”) for each port.

    My opcode studio 4 is connected to the serial port.

    Is there something else to activate before ?

    I have already rebooted the mac, tried with serial and parallel checked/unchecked in network configuration.

    I do not understand why no midi driver is listed !

    Thanks Doug.

    – yungjoon, Saturday, 10 November 2007, 00:45 PST

  35. Hi - Regarding the keyspan sx pro and serial cards in general for midi - I noticed that there is an example usb driver in the coremidi dev kit but what about a serial port example ? This was being discussed a while back until the g-port / stealth drivers came out - but those still dont work with the 5v (old) sx-pro multi port pci cards - it would really be way cool to get these (and perhaps other newer multiport pci serial cards) working. I know new kernel drivers would need to be written for other cards - but the sx-pro already has hardware drivers and from my perspective would only need a wrapper driver like the g-port driver. Any leads would be GREATLY appreciated.  I’m not talking MTP multiport stuff here just a simple dumb serial interface wrapper / driver operating 31250 baud.

    THANKS

    – Danny Fuller, Tuesday, 27 November 2007, 08:55 PST

  36. The Studio 5LX and Studio Patches is still the best midi device in 2008! I wish there was some way to use Studio Patches on newer operating systems. Can’t it be reverse  engineered? arrrggh.

    – John O, Wednesday, 19 March 2008, 18:55 PDT

  37. Hy!

    I have a question.
    How can I connect my 5LX tom my PM G4 Quicksilver?

    ‘Cause i see in the back of the 5LX only ADB like ports...and I havent ports like this...

    Or can I make or buy an adapter for this? (ADB-TO-MODEM)

    Thanks, snaper

    – Snaper, Tuesday, 8 April 2008, 05:21 PDT

  38. The “ADB-like” ports you see are not ADB, they actually are serial ports. You can connect it to the Quicksilver using the Stealth  serial adapter.

    – Gil Sicuro, Saturday, 19 April 2008, 15:32 PDT

  39. hola necesito saber si existe algun driver que se instale junto al studio 5 ,que venga con la máquina,no tengo nada mas que la unidad, ni manual ni posible driver.existe este driver? .he conseguido uno studio 5  , y he comprado un keyspan 28x y un cable serial para conectarlo a mi intel imac 17” 2ghz. aun no lo he probado.Tambien necesito tener instalado el programa stealth para que funcione?

    – LEO, Wednesday, 7 May 2008, 04:17 PDT

  40. LEO,

    La Studio 5 no es compatible con el Intel Mac. The Studio 5 is not compatible with the Intel Mac.

    – Gil Sicuro, Wednesday, 28 May 2008, 18:38 PDT

This discussion has been closed. Thanks to those who participated.