feature request Make Cakewalk remember USB MIDI Ports

[Sebastián Cordovés]

Hi:

I'm a long time Cakewalk user. In the past I used to have a multi port MIDI interface (now obsolete) and connect all my synths there.

Now I don't have that MIDI interface anymore and, as most modern synths have USB MIDI, I connect all my synths directly to the computer.

The problem is that not always want to use all my synth, sometimes I just turn on a single one and Cakewalk just mess all MIDI port selection on the MIDI tracks. The MIDI data (notes, etc) is sent to the wrong synths. I have to set the MIDI port for every MIDI track every time.
Even if  I turn on all my synths, sometimes Cakewalk  change the order of MIDI ports and again I have to set the MIDI port for every MIDI track.

Same happens when sending MIDI clock to my drum machine, after opening a saved project the MIDI ports are in a different order and the MIDI clock is sent to a different port so my drum machine doesn't start.

Also if I have set an instrument definition for a MIDI port, I lost that assignment...

So, please make Cakewalk remember the MIDI port settings. If I have a MIDI track and the MIDI port output is set to a MIDI port named SynthX (all my MIDI ports have the name of the synth), next time I open the project that track should be assigned to the MIDI port SynthX, and if that MIDI port is not available (not connected), should be routed to a dummy MIDI port, not to other MIDI port, if I want to route that MIDI data to another MIDI port I will do it myself manually (letting Cakewalk choose a random MIDI port doesn't help).

Thank you!

[Jim Fogle]

You don't have a bad idea but I believe Windows manages USB ports, not the DAW.

[Xoo]

There's a bit of a hack that I think works (I've run into the same with my control surface, which I rarely turn on):

- Turn everything on
- Run Cakewalk and set up the MIDI ports as you want them to be set up
- Close Cakewalk
- Open Windows Explorer and navigate to %APPDATA%\Cakewalk\Cakewalk Core
- Find ttseq.ini, and right click on it, and choose Properties
- Tick Read-Only and click OK

Of course, if you want to make changes to your MIDI setup, you'll have to un-Read-Only it, then start at the first step here again.

[Jim Fogle]

Very nice workaround Kevin.

[John Vere]

What you have discovered is the un talked about down side to USB midi. 
Din 5 pin midi always works as long as the midi interface has good drivers and is set up correctly.
You can run a room full of gear if your interface supports multi ports. And it doesn’t care what is turned on or  off, if it’s off it just becomes a dead end. 

But USB has become standard now because generally everything is ITB and few people have a room full of midi hardware. We’re on our own now. 
One solution is a power bar that fires up external hardware. You have to remember to turn this on before you load a project that uses it. 
Cakewalk midi device list is the heart of this issue. If a device is missing it will not be on the list. I guess this is due to Windows also not finding the device. 
Not only that if you open a project find a missing device, some midi driver’s allow you to turn it on and Cakewalk will see it and ask if you want to use it. Then this may work or not work and you have to close Cakewalk and re open to add the device.
Sometimes it still isn’t working so you have to re check it on the device list. 
Example is my Yamaha DTX 400 drums. It is USB but it has a stupid feature where it turns off if you are not using it. If I turn it on Cakewalk asks if I want to us it but even after saying yes it is not on the device list. 
But my Roland A49 will connect and works with out rebooting cakewalk. 
If my Yamaha kit had a real midi port I would use that for sure problem solved. 

The only solution I can see that is possible is that Cakewalk would have a way to lock the midi device list so even disconnected device show as ghosts and a reset button for these situations. 
The audio device list seems to do this. There’s always a ghosted Tascam us1641 when I’m using my Motu. I can switch interfaces with out rebooting cakewalk 

[Starship Krupa]

Cakewalk's handling of MIDI port changes is way better than it used to be, at least.

It used to be that if I unplugged my nanoKONTROL II, Cakewalk would automatically map the next MIDI port to control surface duty, whether it was already in use or connected to an actual control surface or not. Which in my case meant that the MIDI input in my main interface would stop paying attention to my keyboard. This caused me much wasted time and frustration trying to figure out why all of a sudden I couldn't get MIDI data into Cakewalk from the keyboard controller no matter what I tried. It was because Cakewalk had stopped listening for notes from it and started listening for control surface commands, which it was never going to get.

Now it doesn't remap, and it at least tries to correctly map reconnected USB gear. Looks like it's not always getting it right.

[Sebastián Cordovés]

On 10/2/2021 at 2:40 AM, Kevin Perry said:

There's a bit of a hack that I think works (I've run into the same with my control surface, which I rarely turn on):

- Turn everything on
- Run Cakewalk and set up the MIDI ports as you want them to be set up
- Close Cakewalk
- Open Windows Explorer and navigate to %APPDATA%\Cakewalk\Cakewalk Core
- Find ttseq.ini, and right click on it, and choose Properties
- Tick Read-Only and click OK

Of course, if you want to make changes to your MIDI setup, you'll have to un-Read-Only it, then start at the first step here again.

Thank you Kevin, I will try that.
If it works it will do my life a lot easier

[Xoo]

I'm not 100% sure it'll work perfectly, but it did solve my particular control surface problem.

[Sebastián Cordovés]

Hi all,

I come back to ask if this problem can be solved.

Setting ttseq.ini to read only is not very helpful. It makes Cakewalk sets the ports in the correct order, but only  helps when I turn on all the synths, because as soon as I have one turned off the MIDI routing becomes a mess... (as I explained in the first post).

I know this can be solved because I have several other MIDI software that works properly and remembers the MIDI port assignments.

I don't know if it is a more direct way to make a feature request (or should I call it bug report?) to Cakewalk/Bandlab.

Edited May 14, 2022 by Sebastián Cordovés

[Starship Krupa]

I seriously thought that this had already been addressed (no pun). Or was it only how Cakewalk would usurp the next available port for control surface duty if you started with your USB MIDI control surface unplugged?

And yes, Windows manages USB ports, but so what? That does NOT mean that Cakewalk should lose track and shuffle them around if you unplug a device and then restart the program. I believe that each USB MIDI device gets its own GUID, but even if that's not the case, most of the ones I've seen have unique friendly names, which Cakewalk can and does read (it displays them, after all).

Just because Windows manages them doesn't mean that Cakewalk can't or shouldn't gather and maintain its own information about them.

So IMO, Cakewalk doesn't have to lose track (no pun). Even if I'm wrong about the GUID's, at worst it might be lose track in the case of two USB MIDI devices with the same friendly name, which is a thing that I've yet to see.

If you want to see the information that Cakewalk can get from the OS regarding USB ports and devices, there's a freeware utility called USBDeview (scroll alll the way down to download it) that will show you. Each USB device has a manufacturer number and a product ID, which you can also read right from Device Manager: https://www.the-sz.com/products/usbid/ There's plenty of information supplied by the OS to distinguish one USB MIDI port from another.

A program should be able to look at that list, notice which devices are still there from the last time it started, which of them are not, and retain its configuration for the ones that are still there.

As the OP points out, there are other Windows programs that don't have the same issue, which suggests that it's possible to address.

I thought that it had been addressed. It no longer causes trouble for me, anyway, but that might just be for the control surface issue.

Edited May 16, 2022 by Starship Krupa

[Sebastián Cordovés]

OK, I wrote a note directly to Cakewalk support, lets see what they say....

[moonbooter]

I am dealing with this problem for over 20 years and so far there is no satisfying solution. I also have over 35 different Midi-devices in my setup and cakewalk rotates ports from time to time. BUT: I think the more important problem is, that Cakewalk deactivates MIDI ports on his own. So, if You reopen a project and the device is NOT manually re-activated in the MIDI settings, THEN the ports will be exchanged (not before). So this problem will NOT take affect when You activate all necessary ports BEFORE loading a project. So far my experiences. Other DAWs activate always all available MIDI ports at startup. They have only the option to deactive selected ports so that VST plugins can directly speak to a connected hardware synthesizer.

My wish: Please let Cakewalk always activate ALL available MIDI-ports automatically.

AND: The problem, Sebastián described, takes also effect on the Midi-in presets. So I personally have to re-select my masterkeyboards and midi controllers every time I start Cakewalk with different connected hardware (midi ports).

[sjoens]

If you have many MIDI devices, why not use a MIDI interface? I think they are (over priced but) still available.

[Sebastián Cordovés]

22 hours ago, moonbooter said:

I am dealing with this problem for over 20 years and so far there is no satisfying solution. I also have over 35 different Midi-devices in my setup and cakewalk rotates ports from time to time. BUT: I think the more important problem is, that Cakewalk deactivates MIDI ports on his own. So, if You reopen a project and the device is NOT manually re-activated in the MIDI settings, THEN the ports will be exchanged (not before). So this problem will NOT take affect when You activate all necessary ports BEFORE loading a project. So far my experiences. Other DAWs activate always all available MIDI ports at startup. They have only the option to deactive selected ports so that VST plugins can directly speak to a connected hardware synthesizer.

My wish: Please let Cakewalk always activate ALL available MIDI-ports automatically.

AND: The problem, Sebastián described, takes also effect on the Midi-in presets. So I personally have to re-select my masterkeyboards and midi controllers every time I start Cakewalk with different connected hardware (midi ports).

I reported this problem to Cakewalk support 6 months ago, after a month I received a mail asking if the problem was solved in the last upgrade, I explained everything again, and they told me that will pass the problem to the technical support (I don't know who was answering my report, I thought that technical issues were managed by technical support).
Anyway, I didn't had any news since that...

 

 

22 hours ago, sjoens said:

If you have many MIDI devices, why not use a MIDI interface? I think they are (over priced but) still available.

Just because I don't want... the problem is Cakewalk, it should work with modern hardware. Other DAWs and MIDI software works properly (I tried Ableton Live, Reaper, several synth editors, etc, all of them remembers the MIDI port configuration).

[moonbooter]

On 12/27/2022 at 9:31 PM, sjoens said:

If you have many MIDI devices, why not use a MIDI interface? I think they are (over priced but) still available.

Sorry, but I think it´s much easier, when this "bug" will be fixed, than if thousands of users will buy additional midi hardware... ? Or not?

[Xoo]

On 12/27/2022 at 8:11 PM, moonbooter said:

My wish: Please let Cakewalk always activate ALL available MIDI-ports automatically.

Can you expand on this?  What happens if you remove a MIDI device deliberately?  How does Cakewalk know the difference between that and it not being turned on?  How does a project that used ports 1-6, say, then handle port 3 being intentionally removed from the system?  The ordering necessarily changes in that case.

[moonbooter]

Kevin, You are absolutely right. That is exactly what will happen. That's why, for one thing, all midi hardware would have to have a unique identifier. In addition, all ports must be activated by Cakewalk when Cakewalk is started (including those that are active in the system and are therefore physically connected). Then you can save yourself a lot of trouble. I.M.H.O. This is how most other DAWs do it.

[SirWillyDS12]

On 12/27/2022 at 3:11 PM, moonbooter said:

My wish: Please let Cakewalk always activate ALL available MIDI-ports automatically.

Kevin made a very good point here...

1 hour ago, Kevin Perry said:

What happens if you remove a MIDI device deliberately?

 

I use MidiQuest VST with my keyboards and I have to disable the midi input to route them to MidiQuest... (Forbidden Windows driver sharing...) Then use a third party midi loop back driver to interface with Cakewalk... So if Cakewalk would always enable all midi devices that would be a nightmare...

But I 100% agree that Cakewalk should remember disconnected devices and not re-assign the next available driver when a device is not present... This can also be a real pain when I open a project without one of my keyboards on...

[Sebastián Cordovés]

On 12/29/2022 at 2:06 AM, SirWillyDS12 said:

Kevin made a very good point here...

 

I use MidiQuest VST with my keyboards and I have to disable the midi input to route them to MidiQuest... (Forbidden Windows driver sharing...) Then use a third party midi loop back driver to interface with Cakewalk... So if Cakewalk would always enable all midi devices that would be a nightmare...

But I 100% agree that Cakewalk should remember disconnected devices and not re-assign the next available driver when a device is not present... This can also be a real pain when I open a project without one of my keyboards on...

I think moonbooter means that the ports are always active in the preferences, not always selected in the preferences.