Casio CZ/ VZ/ FZ - Pro Series

Hi dedlander,

I did some experimenting tonight and I have another thing for you to try. What I think is happening is that your modern computer, and your modern USB/MIDI cable, is sending the sysex messages TOO FAST for your CZ to keep up. The CZ's are from the mid-1980s and do not have fast processors.

To answer your immediate question, I have an EMU XMIDI 1x1 cable. This is the one that worked for me, and then stopped working for me. What I realized today is that what changed for me between when it worked and didn't work was the COMPUTER. Not the operating system, not the software, the physical computer. I had been using a vintage PC, and switched to using a modern laptop.

So my theory is that modern computers, with modern USB/MIDI cables, can spit out the sysex so fast that a CZ can't keep up.

I tested this today. I used a fast laptop with a USB/MIDI cable and sent a sysex dump to my CZ-1. Nothing happened. Next I routed the sysex message through a small script that slowed the message down byte by byte. Now it worked.

I think you should try slowing down the sysex message, but do everything else as normal.

I believe that Bome's Send SX has a "Speed of sending MIDI" option. Set that to low and try again.

MIDI-OX also has the ability to slow down the output. You set a certain size output buffer, and then add a delay after each buffer. Read the built-in help file under System Exclusive > Configuration Options.

When I tried it, I put 1 millisecond between each byte, and 1 second between each message. The one second felt a little too long, but it worked.

To try one millisecond per byte in MIDI-OX, open up the Sysex window. Go to Sysex > Configure. Set the output to use only one buffer, and have the buffer be one byte in length. Then set the delay between buffers to one millisecend.

There might be other timings that are better and more appropriate for the CZ hardware, I'm just mentioning the ones that I tried that worked.

This solution would match the symptoms of being able to receive MIDI events from a CZ, but not being able to send them. You have a computer which speaks and listens very quickly. You have a CZ which speaks and listens slowly. When the CZ speaks, the computer is able to understand it with no problem. But when the computer speaks, the CZ is like, "What just happened?".

This solution would also match the symptoms of people using vintage equipment not having a problem, and people with modern equipment having a problem. It seem that other people with other vintage equipment have run into this same problem as well.

I hope this helps!


--- In CZsynth@yahoogroups.com, "dedlandar" <dedlandar@...> wrote:
>
> Nothing happens when I transmit the glide on command back to the CZ.
> 
> What kind of MIDI>USB cable are you guys using?
> 
>