MIDI Latency and Jitter
2003-09-19 by smoerk
as i want to use my computer as a software sampler for my drum pads, i'm looking for a good MIDI interface. it seems that USB is not the optimal solution for MIDI, because it introduces more jitter and latency than on-board or serial MIDI interfaces. see the text below. (btw, USB audio hardware should also be avaoided, if possible. firewire and PCI is recommended). did anyone experience USB-MIDI jitter when playing drums over a computer? and a last question: do you think the yamaha DTS 70 (trigger to midi) is a reasonable device? excerpt from http://www.digitalprosound.com/2001/01_jan/features/midi2001-3.htm "So what\ufffds the problem with MIDI? According to Jim Wright at IBM Research, a longtime member of the MMA Technical Standards Board and chairman of the organization\ufffds working group concerned with new transports, USB has timing problems that make it problematic for MIDI. He has conducted tests comparing \ufffdclassic\ufffd (i.e., serial, parallel, PCI or PCMCIA) interfaces against USB interfaces, looking at their round-trip latency (the amount of time it takes for a MIDI event to get in and out of the interface) and their jitter (the variation in the latency). He found the latency in the USB interfaces to be between seven and eight milliseconds, about three times that of the classic interfaces. This is not in itself an insurmountable problem, because musicians adjust to small latencies in sound sources quite well\ufffda bass player and a lead guitarist standing seven feet away from each other usually have no trouble staying together. But the jitter in USB interfaces was also much higher than the older interfaces\ufffdabout twice as high, meaning (to continue our analogy) that the two players could at any given moment be five feet away from each other, and the next moment be 10 feet away\ufffdand constantly moving. In another analogy, which Wright likes to use, imagine playing a slightly arpeggiated guitar chord: The jitter could make it sound as if one of your fingers jerked slightly while you were playing the chord. And for tight grooves and thick MIDI data streams with lots of aftertouch or controllers, this level of jitter is really unacceptable. Wright also found that when you add audio to the USB stream, the jitter goes up another 50%\ufffdso it\ufffds three times what MIDI musicians have had to deal with in the past."