More info on this.
As per Clemens, I got a new cable, and now my
system is 50% working. I can send external MIDI
events out, and drive my MIDI gear from my Linux
box.
But I still can't receive any external MIDI events.
And the behavior is strange:
If I directly connect pins 12 and 15 of my game
port (Clemens' suggestion below), I get this result:
- all bytes written to /proc/asound/dev/midiC0D0
are echoed back. In /proc/asound/card1/midiD0
I can see the byte counts for transmitted +
received bytes. They look correct.
- if I run pmidi and play a midi file out the card,
I do NOT see the pmidi output echoed back in.
In /proc/asound/card1/midiD0 I see the transmitted
bytes fine, but the received count doesn't change.
How is it that writing bytes directly to
/proc/asound/dev/midiC0D0 echoes back, but no pmidi
data is echoed?
Is that problem related to the fact that I can't
receive any external MIDI events? The above seems
to indicate that this time, the cable isn't the
problem (but I'm not 100% sure).
One hypothesis: pmidi opens the midi device in
write-only mode, which blocks the echo (read) at a
low level (before it shows up in /p/a/c/midiD0).
And my cable is busted for MIDI in :( I'm hoping
there are better (software-only) hypotheses.
My /etc/modules.conf (do I need to enable any
special options or drivers to receive MIDI?):
...
# ALSA portion
alias char-major-116 snd
alias char-major-14 soundcore
alias snd-card-0 snd-card-emu10k1
# module options should go here
# OSS/Free portion
alias sound-slot-0 snd-card-0
# card #1
alias sound-service-0-0 snd-mixer-oss
alias sound-service-0-1 snd-seq-oss
alias sound-service-0-3 snd-pcm-oss
alias sound-service-0-8 snd-seq-oss
alias sound-service-0-12 snd-pcm-oss
> > I think the problem is your cable. Many cheap gameport-MIDI
> > converters do
> > not work, especially with Soundblaster cards.
> >
> > Please try connecting pins 12 (MIDI TxD) and 15 (MIDI RxD) of
> > the gameport
> > with a wire. Then all data sent to the MIDI port will be
> > echoed back (if
> > the port works).
> >
> > 8 1
> > -------------------
> > \ o o o o o o o o /
> > \ o o o o o o o /
> > ---------------
> > 15 9
> >
> >
> > HTH
> > Clemens
>
> Cable? That's silly...
>
> OHMYGOD. Yup, whatever I write out to
> /proc/asound/dev/midiC0D0 is echoed back when I
> have pins 12 and 15 connected. If I remove the
> wire, I see nothing echoed back.
>
> [ more screaming deleted ]
>
> So I'm guessing that, in fact, I have a bad
> cable. It explains why various kernel and driver
> recompiles over the past two weeks made no
> difference.
>
> [ more screaming deleted ]
>
> I will get a better cable tomorrow. And write a
> short letter to my old cable's manufacturer.
>
> Thanks for the help! I'm excited to be moving
> forward on my project again.
>
> -Thomas
>
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