Soft-Thru not working?

Forum for the JD-Xi Keyboard.
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brambos
Posts: 14
Joined: 10:15, 2 August 2015

Soft-Thru not working?

Post by brambos »

After tinkering for a while with my JD-Xi in standalone mode I'm now trying to hook it up into my MIDI chain. For some mysterious reason the "soft thru" mode in the MIDI settings doesn't seem to pass on any MIDI messages (no note messages, no clock messages, etc.).

I'm on the latest software, MIDI IN works, MIDI OUT works and the cables are fine. What am I missing?
brambos
Posts: 14
Joined: 10:15, 2 August 2015

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by brambos »

Is there anyone who has soft-thru working? It would already help to know whether it is actually possible to get it to work!
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thus
Posts: 25
Joined: 21:49, 15 July 2015

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by thus »

Are you saying that the MIDI arriving at the JD-Xi MIDI IN is not coming out of the JD-Xi MIDI OUT?
brambos
Posts: 14
Joined: 10:15, 2 August 2015

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by brambos »

Indeed, but I've now narrowed it down. It seems Midi going in through USB is not being sent out. Using regular Midi cables it does work.

That makes integrating the JD-Xi into a DAW setup considerably more difficult...
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rsaintjohn
Posts: 265
Joined: 02:56, 23 May 2015
Location: Cleveland, OH USA

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by rsaintjohn »

Did you try switching between the Generic and Vendor USB MIDI modes (USB DRV in Settings) to see if that made a difference?
brambos
Posts: 14
Joined: 10:15, 2 August 2015

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by brambos »

Went through the issue with Roland CE. Soft-thru does work, but with a few caveats:
- it only works with the midi in/out ports. If you use USB as a midi connection to your DAW you're out of luck
- soft thru only passes note and controller data. Clock sync messages are not passed through.

I can live with these constraints, but I must say they're puzzling and counter-intuitive. It's not how you expect midi-thru to work. It's also different from how it works on Roland's Aira range...

Hopefully these things will be fixed with a OS update, because they seem quite trivial.
liamjf
Posts: 5
Joined: 16:00, 4 July 2016

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by liamjf »

I agree, just figured this out for myself; makes the whole advantage of using USB a bit pointless.

Anyway, I can find a way round it but would prefer not to!

Liam.
eltouristo
Posts: 7
Joined: 20:16, 11 September 2016

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by eltouristo »

This is one of the first things I've looked into when checking out synths and controller keyboards.
To my amazement and extreme hated of the makers, such devices acting as true MIDI interfaces is
either extremely rare or non-existent in the case of synths and mini-synths, and it's NOT the standard with controller keyboards! Yes with controller keyboards, but I think that ALMOST ESSENTIAL feature is more common on controllers, but still surprisingly not ubiquitous. I truly hate these people's decisions.
THIS REALLY gets in the way of trying to keep things small and simple with lower device count.
Just makes me angry and depressed. Like quite a few things, there is no explanation, and the lack of that capability is completely not publicized. What is the matter with them all ? After all adding that capability it VERY small and VERY cheap IF you've already dedicated the space for the MIDI I/O connections. I makes sense only if you don't have space for those DIN connectors, otherwise it seems just completely UNFORGIVABLE to not ALWAYS include that. I REALLY DOUBT there is some 'technical reason'. So they are just tying up a USB port/MIDI driver and pissing us all off. I suppose it's kinda nice to just plug and go, but of course if you want to add a device then you must use a dedicated midi interface. I guess you can still use the JDXi audio interface (which I doubt passes audio either)..
but that's an unlikely scenario anyway since you want to hear your other device. Basically these built-in USB interfaces are really only convenient if you are not going to use other external devices.
There are even some quirks on the ways it's passed on controllers that do pass it.
So at this point I've just resigned myself to demanding true MIDI passing from a controller, but nothing else, and they way it is on JD and most others, just a bonus.
eltouristo
Posts: 7
Joined: 20:16, 11 September 2016

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by eltouristo »

Just got the JD-Xi a couple of days ago. Yeah the audio latency is really bad on my PC, but I bet (and have read) it's that way on latest PC's too. It's in the 143ms range! I have a Zoom H4n and it's 5ms !. I tried lowering it on the JD but it just farts out. So it's basically a no go for soft synths. But the JD parts I guess you could monitor from the headphone out and turn down the daw track while recording. If you are audio recording previously performed patterns it's an ok option. But then you probably have to offset the audio after recording. Default settings in Ableton Live didn't help, and it was really confusing...
trying to deal with track offsets. What a mess. For my purposes therefore I don't think I will use the USB audio. But it's pretty nice to copy in midi patterns from the JD by just real-time midi recording the 4 pattern tracks (one at a time). I didn't try the knobs yet to see if I can control soft synths or what gets output and can be midi recorded.

I just ordered a FA-06. I think maybe it may have a true midi interface, not sure. But I don't expect audio to be any faster.
korakios
Posts: 14
Joined: 11:33, 15 April 2014

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by korakios »

Jamming in 64 samples, glitch free....
Xorcist
Posts: 2
Joined: 17:56, 28 March 2019

Re: Soft-Thru not working?

Post by Xorcist »

omg no MTC or Midi Clock passthrough to the USB.... amazeballs... this should be MIDI-101 for an interface. Hell, my Akai MPK249 does it no problem.

I've written Roland of course - not sure it will do anything but seriously? A few lines of code in your firmware would fix this.
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