Cheap $5 chinese midi interface..... the verdict is:

C

Cron

Inspired
Hey.

Thought id take a chance on one of those $5 chinese midi interfaces. http://www.made-in-china.com/showroom/a ... -718-.html

It works better than I thought it would. Recieving data from the axe-fx works flawlessly (backing up banks and patches etc) If i edit patches it seems to send data to the axe-fx just fine. As soon as I try to save a patch to the axe-fx it says "bad checksum". Ive tried bome and midiox and they dont work either.

This midi device doesnt come with a driver cd. It installs a driver when you plug it in. Device manager says its using some generic microsoft driver from 2001. Searching the net and windows update yielded no results for a suitable driver. I did try different midi settings....no go.

Maybe a simple driver update could make this cheapo work great.....but i cant seem to find one. Its a Konix w-718 and there are no drivers on the manufacturers website.

Does anyone have any idea where I can get a generic usb midi driver that might work? Maybe a driver from another product might work (long shot, i know).

Any ideas?
 
If it's only $5 bucks... I'd open up the thing and see if you can read some of the chipsets and locate the appropriate driver(s) if they are even available.
 
psst said:
Exactly that one works perfectly for me.
Click to expand...

Really? :/ What operating system and service pack? Could you please open device manager and check what driver its using? (if you dont know how ill message you instructions)

I tried it on my laptop aswell (both pc and latptop are xp service pack 3). Does exactly the same thing. "bad checksum" when saving patches.

As for cracking the unit open.... might work..... ill give that a try as a last resort.
 
Cron said:
psst said:
Exactly that one works perfectly for me.
Click to expand...

Really? :/ What operating system and service pack? Could you please open device manager and check what driver its using? (if you dont know how ill message you instructions)

I tried it on my laptop aswell (both pc and latptop are xp service pack 3). Does exactly the same thing. "bad checksum" when saving patches.

As for cracking the unit open.... might work..... ill give that a try as a last resort.
Click to expand...
It's a known issue with XP that its built-in MIDI-USB driver is buggy. This is the driver which is used by any device not providing a brand specific own driver. I have been researching a similar problem when doing patchdumps to the Axe-FX through the GORDIUS LittleGiant USB connection. I finally found out it must be related to the way the MIDI-USB driver is accessed by MIDI-OX and similar applications. I implemented a workaround in the LittleGiant ControlCenter (PC editor for the footcontroller). As a test, you might just download the editor at http://www.gordius.be and try the menu option "Tools" > "Send SysEx" to send your patchdump. First select the MIDI IN and MIDI OUT port of your chinese MIDI interface in the Communication tab.
No guarantees, but it might work...
 
Amazing. I can send patches to the axe using the gordius editor. Thanks for the tip.

So theres nothing wrong with the cheapo device.... it is just a driver/setting problem. There must be a better driver somewhere. Device manager says the driver its currently using is from 2001!
 
Cron said:
Amazing. I can send patches to the axe using the gordius editor. Thanks for the tip.

So theres nothing wrong with the cheapo device.... it is just a driver/setting problem. There must be a better driver somewhere. Device manager says the driver its currently using is from 2001!
Click to expand...

Good to hear it works :)

There's a problem with the XP driver indeed, specifically for transmitting large SysEx messages (over 4096 bytes).
Windows didn't do any upgrade on its driver since the launch of XP (October 2001). I'm not sure but I believe they even kept the same driver for Vista. As far as I know you won't find any better driver which you can use on a "class compliant" device like your MIDI interface. Many manufacturers have worked around this kind of issues by writing their own drivers for each of the supported operating systems. When a USB device is connected to the PC, it tells the PC which brand and model it is, and the PC finds the appropriate driver for that model. You won't be able to have your device tell the PC he's someone else (and thus can use a better brand-specifc driver). Unless you modify the device firmware (which is fun to do by the way, at least if you're interested in boring tech stuff... I hacked my Midisport 2x4 just to learn more about all this)
 
From what I can tell it uses the usbaudio.sys driver amongst others. The version i have is 5.1.2600.5512. (xp sp3) I have found several newer drivers online (im sure they are from vista and windows 7) but I have to pay to download it. Maybe replacing it with the driver from windows 7 or vista 32-bit would do the trick

These are the driver details listed in device manager:

C:\windows\system32\drivers\drmk.sys
C:\windows\system32\drivers\ks.sys
C:\windows\system32\drivers\portcls.sys
C:\windows\system32\drivers\stream.sys
C:\windows\system32\drivers\usbaudio.sys

c:\windows\system32\ksproxy.sys
c:\windows\system32\ksuser.dll
c:\windows\system32\wdmaud.drv

If someone using vista or windows 7 could send me these or zip them up and post a download link I'd really appreciate it. I think its worth a shot.
 
Oddly enough I've tried more than one interface that costs 10 times that much and still get "Bad Checksum."

Obviously, the price of an interface is not directly proportional to it's chances of working.
 
Mark P. said:
Oddly enough I've tried more than one interface that costs 10 times that much and still get "Bad Checksum."

Obviously, the price of an interface is not directly proportional to it's chances of working.
Click to expand...

True.

Im only pushing this because if i can get it to work perfectly it would be a great cheap midi alternative for new axe-fx users (haha cliff could even buy them in bulk and throw one in the box each time he ships an axe-fx out...........jj) (i realise if i get it to work it still doesnt guarantee that it will work for others). But some people have reported it working fine.
 
Got one of these the other day. Trying it with my Macbook to the AxeFX and I can't get it to even detect that the AxeFX is connected. :-( When trying to send firmware, the Axe doesn't even think I'm sending it firmware.

I also tried sending firmware to my liquid food with it, and I seem to get bad checksums every speed/buffer setting that I try.

Any ideas? It would be nice to use this guy with my laptop so I can remotely backup patches and upgrade firmware since the rig is usually at band practice.
 
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