MIDI musicians out there? Midex 3 & Midex 8 issues

[roses]

For those of you who don't know, the Steinberg Midex 3 and Midex 8 are USB-powered MIDI interfaces, with 3 MIDI Outs/1 MIDI In and 8 MIDI Outs/8 MIDI Ins respectively.

 

From your DAW or sequencing software, they allow you to send MIDI data simultaneously with very little latency on all 16 channels of EACH output (3 x 16 = 48 for the M3, 8 x 16 = 128 for the M8). By spreading the load over more than one MIDI cable for large amounts of data, they can help you to avoid what is known as MIDI 'choke'.

 

These units are now legacy according to Steinberg (which means they are unsupported, especially on Hackintoshes). In the good old days of Classic Macs, you had to FIRST download and install Opcode's OMS 2.3.8 BEFORE installing the Midex driver from the accompanying CD or download. But for us OS Xers, that is no longer necessary and there is a Mac version of the current driver available for free download from their website (steinberg-dot-net). It says "should work" (their words, not mine) for all OS Xs from 10.5 through to 10.8. After installing it, you should be able to see an icon for the M3 or M8 in the MIDI window of the Utility>>Audio Midi Setup (AMS).

 

It is important to NOT plug in the MIDI interface before or during the installation of the driver, only after you get the "Installation Successful" message.

 

However, with my Midex 3 I have been experiencing difficulties and inconsistencies with my Hackintosh installs.

 

Leopard 10.5.3 - after software install, unit does not light up (receiving no USB power although all my other USB devices work OK), and icon is not seen in AMS/MIDI window

Other Leopard distos and versions: the same as 10.5.3

 

Snow Leopard 10.6.1 & 10.6.2: unit lights up, icon is in AMS and by pressing the Test Seup icon (top right of MIDI window) you can press each of the MIDI out downward-facing arrows and send a MIDI message to each of the ports of the M3 unit.

 

Leopard 10.6.6i: unit lights up but no icon in AMS.

 

As of yet, I haven't been able to further test the MIDI Outs as there is no relevant software installed. (Is there a definitive list somewhere of all the DAWs and sequencers available for Macs  in terms of which is the lowest OS X version they support??)

 

 

Any musicians out there who use their Mac for sequencing, please report back, especially if you have an M3 or M8, or if you use other USB MIDI interfaces.

[roses]

Success! Of sorts anyway..............

 

Had complete hassles with my 10.6.6i installation as it was refusing to do even basic things like install Google Chrome or a simple sequencer such as Cubase AI 5.

 

So I went back to 10.6.2, installed Midex 3 driver, all OK in AMS/MIDI window.

 

Installed Cubase AI 5 which I got from TPB. It's a bit of a nonsense cos there are 7 different Zip files and you have to join them together with a program such as HJSplit orSplit&Concat (I used the latter). This gives you a file with the .toast extension but is actually a .dmg file which can be mounted in the normal way, then installed. This DL has the additional content of GM Drums and Halion One files.

 

This program can also be downloaded as one complete file for free direct from the Steinberg-dot-net website. Click 'Sprachen' top right to change the page to English, then look in Support>>Current Downloads, and use the drop-down menu of Downloads Software to get to the program you want. The rubric next to the Mac version of AI 5 says 'This installer does not require a previous installation' but for me, the install got stuck halfway through as it seemed to need a disc inserting. However, the icon was there in Applications and the program was able to start, but there was no additional content (which are various included VST instruments). 

 

So I now use my TPB version. Whichever, the Steinberg web page recommends you immediately install CoreAudio2ASIOUpdate (available for free DL from the same AI 5 page) as well.

 

This is what I did to test my MIDI interface with my Mac for the very first time!! I imported one of my fave MIDI files into AI 5. Be aware (this threw me for a little while as I am used to Nuendo on the PC) that there are 3 types of tracks in AI 5 with different colours on the track numbers far left, immediately to the right of the Inspector pane, namely: VST Instrument are light green, Audio are light blue, MIDI are light grey. If your MIDI channel tracks are assigned to VST tracks after importing, simply create some new MIDI tracks (Project>>Add Track>>Midi) and drag the data tracks in the middle of Cubase window to the MIDI tracks. You can then choose your MIDI output port eg Midex 3-Out 1 and MIDI channel. Hold your mouse over each black window in the left pane until you see Output Routing and Channel respectively. When you play back your track, your Midex 3 LEDs will light up!!

[roses]

Have been trying to see if other Leopard 10.5 distros will accept the Midex driver, but to no avail.

 

The .pkg file always completes its installation successfully but still no LEDs on the M3 unit or its associated icon in AMS/Midi.

 

But what I DO always see if I boot up in the verbose mode is the following lines:

 

de.Steinberg.Midi USBFwLoader is not compatible with its superclass. 9IO Service superclass changed?(in white text on black background)

 

and

 

Failed to load extension de.Steinberg.MidiUSBFwloader (yellow text on black background) 

 

I've never seen yellow text in verbose mode before so it must be something pretty serious.

 

Anyway, I guess even a musician can figure out what the upshot of all this is, but can a Hackintosh expert tell me why the driver won't load? What is the reason for the OS failing to load it?

 

How can I override the block? Is there anything in the kext file I can change using Property List editor? If anyone is willing to help me, i can upload either the pkg installer or the kext (or both).

 

I repeat: Steinberg say this is compatible with 10.5 (but their caveat is 'only with real Macs, not Hackintoshes').

 

And the driver works fine in most SL 10.6 installs.

[roses]

Would like to report that Midex 3 works OK in ML 10.8.2. Icon is present in AMS/MIDI window and test of each out port was successful.

 

However, there was a hitch during the driver installation with an 'Install Failed' message. After installing the kext manually with Kext Beast and rebooting, everything was fine.

[Pinucciotron]

Hi there,

since the post is quite old, i'll leave you my report.

 

Gigabyte GA Z77-DH3

Steinberg MIDEX 3

 

There is no way to make it working properly.

The device has been recognized by the system, but, driver or not, the timing is just horrible.

It's  unable to play two notes at the right moment and for the right length.

 

I've noticed that stein berg provides the same driver for MIDEX 8 and MiDEX 3.

 

Could be this the reason?

 

Any ideas?