Alessio wrote:Since both offer trial versions, why don't you just download them and see which one you like best? After all, we already did recommend Synthfont instead (and answered your volume question). So it's best to check yourself which software you like most/you're most comfortable with. I've only used Synthfont so far, can't comment on the other two.
100% agree. If you're going to purchase software, you should try it to see if it fits your needs; ie: check which one better renders your midis; you shouldn't really care how well it renders other people's midis.
Also note that you won't find 100% accuracy on any midi renderer, no matter if it's free or if it costs a million dollars: the concept of "perfect midi rendering" doesn't exist, because a midi file doesn't have any sound data itself. While the metaphor of 3D models vs rendered animations explained in an earlier reply is not bad, I'd rather compare midi vs wave (by wave understand wav, but mp3, ogg, wma, and all other wave-form formats as well) with partitures and performances: a midi file
is a
partiture. And a partiture is just a piece of paper that depicts how to play a given piece of music. The final sound depends completely on the performers that actually play it. In the digital sense, the performer is the sound card or conversion program. It's quite difficult that a given converter will produce the same result than
your sound card, but if you test the file on a computer with a different sound card, you'll find that it sounds quite differently.
Of course, it may happen (and seems to be happenning) that the final output of
your sound card is the exact final sound you are aiming to achieve. In this case, I have a suggestion for you, that will create a wav representation of the exact output from your audio card (it's quite straightforward once you see it in action, although may be difficult to come by). All you need is a male-male
jack connector, which will be far cheaper than any software (and the software will not give you 100% accuracy anyway). The steps are simple:
- Connect one of the jack's plugs to the speaker or headphone connector of your sound card (un-plug for a while your speakers if needed).
- Connect the other jack plug to the microphone connector of your sound card (can you already see how the trick works?
)
- Start Windows Sound Recorder (or any similar program).
- Start your favourite MIDI playback program, and load the midi file you want to convert (don't start playing yet).
- Hit the "Record" button in the recorder, and then start the MIDI's playback as fast as you can (to avoid leading silence).
- Wait for the MIDI playback to finnish, and hit the "Stop" button in the recorder. Still in the recorder, go to File|Save as... and save your wave file wherever you want.
You'll end up with a wave file that is an exact representation of your sound card's output for the original MIDI; you can now convert it to ogg, mp3, or any other format without worrying about it sounding "different"
The key point of this method is the jack bridging the sound card connections: whatever would be sent to your speakers gets feeded back as if it were the microphone's output, so you just need to send the midi to the "speaker" and receive the "microphone" from a recorder. I guess there'll be some programs that emulate this process (so you can save even the jack wire), but I don't know about any one in particular. Note that you might need to play a bit with your volume controls before you get the wave file exactly as you want. As a final tip, shorter cables are less likely to produce "noise" in the recording (and will tend to be cheaper). Anyway, there are lots of programs capable of removing noises. And about the bit of leading and trailing silences, just check the recorder's Edit menu: there are two options to cut from and to the current cursor position. Even more (believe me, that recorder is one of the most amazing software pieces written by Microsoft!!), you can record the midi with maximum output volume, and then reduce the volume of the wave from the recorder (from the Effects menu). And finally (that little program is really amazing!), you can go File|Properties|Convert now to convert the file to MPEG-Layer3, which is the underlying format of mp3 files (although it will still have a .wav header, the file will be compressed to a 1:10 ratio, approx). It's a pitty that it doesn't handle Vorbis OGG, but I bet you wouldn't have expected so much from this Windows "Accessory"
And if you still want a "pure" mp3, or an ogg, once you have the .wav there are
hundreds of free programs that can perfectly handle the conversion.
