Utilities Menu - Instrument Creator Window

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The Instrument Creator Window is used to create and modify the instrument definition itself as well as the drivers which the instrument is built from. Instrument creation, on whole, is not easy and requires a certain amount of technical ability and knowledge of System Exclusive. However, Sound Quest uses this very same Window to create all of instrument module drivers for use with the Midi Quest family of products. At the back of this online help file are instructions for creating your own Instrument Module drivers. Please press here to jump to this location.

Right click in the instrument list to display a pop-up menu that is used to manage the list of Instrument Modules. The options are:

Use this option to create a new Instrument module structure to the Instrument Creator. Use this option to create a new module from scratch

This option creates a copy of the currently selected instrument module. This option should be used to create a variant on an existing module for a MIDI device which uses some or all of the drivers of an existing module. Once duplicated, the module can be modified by adding or removing drivers to represent that device.

This option removes the instrument module from the Instrument Creator window and deletes the Instrument's .ini file from the Instruments folder. Deletion of other instrument module data must be done manually if desired.

This option renames the instrument module in the Instrument Creator window and the associated .ini file in the Instruments folder.

The list of MIDI devices in the Instrument Creator is updated to reflect any changes to the instrument module files made directly on the hard drive.

If, for some reason, the Instrument Creator is unable to automatically create a new module or duplicate a module, it is still possible to accomplish this by working directly with files on disk. This can be accomplished by following these steps:

On the Mac: in File Manager go to ~/Library/Application Support/Sound Quest/MidiQuestPro/v12/Instruments and you will see a list of all of the .ini files each representing an instrument module

On Windows: open Explorer and find the folder c:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\Sound Quest\MidiQuestPro\v12/Instruments

c) Duplicate an existing .ini file or use a text editor to make a new file with the instrument name

d) Open or Refresh the Instrument Creator and you should see the new entry in the list

e) Note that whatever folder you specify to hold the files for the module, you will probably need to create that folder manually inside the Instruments folder

When the Instrument Creator Window is active, the "Creator" menu is available as the second menu strip. It contains three entries to aid in the development of drivers.

The "Compile" item runs a test compile on all active macros. It is recommended that a test is run after each macro is completed to ensure that there are not any problems.

If there is an error, a message window is displayed indicating the line that the error occurred on, along with the character position at which it occurred.

This menu selection provides you with the easiest way to create your own driver for Midi Quest. It contains only 6 basic parameters which you set. From this information, a basic driver is created so that the program can request, store and return SysEx to an instrument. Choosing this entry brings up the "Easy Driver" dialog. Just fill in the parameters and it will create a driver for you.

Instrument: Enter the company and model name of the instrument (eg. Yamaha DX7).

Dump Request: Enter the dump request that is used to request the SysEx from the instrument. If you do not enter this information, the program will not be able to automatically request the SysEx from your instrument. You will have to trigger the dump manually from the front panel. This request must be entered in hexadecimal as you find it in your manual. Each byte must be separated by a space (eg. F0 43 32 0 10 F7).

Dump Size: If the SysEx coming from the instrument is ALWAYS the same size and you know what this size is, replace the question marks ("????") with this number (in decimal). This number must be the total size of the dump. If you do not know the size of the dump, leave the question marks and the program will allocate enough space to store your dump.

SysEx Dump is in 2 or more parts: Check this parameter is the SysEx you are requesting from the instrument arrives in two or more SysEx blocks. For example, if you have requested a patch bank and the instrument transmits this bank as one large dump, leave this option unchecked. However, if the instrument responds by sending a series of patches, each in its own SysEx message, you should check this option.

Dump is fixed size: This option should be checked if you know the size of the dump that the instrument will return in response to a SysEx dump request. If enables the program to verify that the correct number of bytes were received by the computer and that there were no errors during communication. When you enter a size into the "Dump Size" parameter, this check box will automatically be set. If the dump is not a fixed size, unselect it.

Since v5.0, Midi Quest has operated from an instrument centric view, that is you don't load individual components into the Studio but an entire instrument. Instrument definitions are created by using .INI files that are stored in the Instruments folder. To create an INI file for you new driver, save the driver in a directory under the Instruments directory. You must save the driver before using this function. Now, choose Make INI and a File Selector will appear. Enter the name of the instrument for the INI file and press OK.

If you now switch to the Studio Window and choose Studio/Add Instrument you will see the instrument name that was just added. Double click on it and the driver you created is added to the Instrument List. If you wish to add additional drivers to the instrument INI file you just created, you will need to click on the following line for more information on creating your own custom INI files.

3. The component's driver will be loaded into the Driver Creator Window for editing.

3. The Midi Quest SysEx File's driver will be loaded into the Driver Creator Window for editing.

We at Sound Quest were determined to build all of the tools we would need to create Midi Quest into the Midi Quest line. One of the things we required was a way to access old Sound Quest drivers which are built into old SysEx files. This option provided that capability. Its sole use in the normal course of events would be a situation where you obtained a SysEx file from someone using a driver that you did not have and you wanted the driver for your own use. This option will extract the driver.

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