Very cool

Chris wrote:

Does this mean we can use a motif xf vst editor and access the Montage?

I would nit totally rule it out. But I would be extremely surprised. Loading in saved performances is a totally different beast than sharing an editor. Loading can be done in a one time conversion process. Live editing with the same editor requires that all used MIDI messages are the same. Note that saving from Montage and loading into Motif is almost certainly not possible. In short: no way!

No this doesn't mean you can use the VST editor. Sysex and MIDI addressing is not compatible. I do not know the mechanism of communication for the editors - but certainly the VSTs do not use converters on a file import feature which is all that the new Motif XS/XF+MOXF compatibility would suggest to entail. Plus I have not seen that transport controls have been added in v2.0 which is one possible path for communication.

This also means that the Karma for Motif XF isn't going magically work -- it does use the Motif XF (MIDI) transport controls.

I see this as the file converter has been enhanced. Not that Montage is now somehow emulating everything a Motif does. That's different.

With firmware 2.00 you can say that the MONTAGE can now load Motif XS/XF, MOXF Performances... it gathers all the data necessary to make the previous model’s Performances and/or Voices work in MONTAGE.

It does not mean the MONTAGE can decode LPC or WXC wave protocols. Those still act as ‘copy protection’ for that older data. It is still prevented from being read. If the MONTAGE cannot convert your data, you will receive a warning message that some data did not translate.

Ouch. That's a hitch. Sounds like Inspiration In A Flash still is crippled. An early post from Yamaha announced that the engineering team was working to fix this "problem" - but perhaps given the "copy protection" entanglement, finishing this task puts other libraries at risk somehow. Is it wrong to assume the early effort to "fix" WXC and LPC has been halted - and these MOXF or Motif XF or Motif XS sound libraries will continue, indefinitely, to have problems loading all Waveforms?

Jason wrote:

Ouch. That's a hitch. Sounds like Inspiration In A Flash still is crippled. An early post from Yamaha announced that the engineering team was working to fix this "problem" - but perhaps given the "copy protection" entanglement, finishing this task puts other libraries at risk somehow. Is it wrong to assume the early effort to "fix" WXC and LPC has been halted - and these MOXF or Motif XF or Motif XS sound libraries will continue, indefinitely, to have problems loading all Waveforms?

I had high hopes as well, to be able to load many "crippled" (as you say) voices. I don't know what's so "copy protected" about waveforms which are loadable virtually on ANY XS, XF or MOXF... I guess I have to wait to make sure.

The data assembled for the promotional giveaways, contained data from several sources. In some of the data, either to repair or prevent the use of the data beyond the promotional purposes, some Waveforms were replaced with the LPC or WXC format Waveforms. This format was readable by the MOTIF and MO series, but does not translate to MONTAGE. MONTAGE can reach as far back as ES for Voice Data, as far back as the XS for Waveform Data, but it cannot translate these two particular older formats. When you look at the data in the Melas Waveform Editor, you can see that it is sometimes used for a single Keybank among others or just a few Keybanks (which makes it looks like a repair to data), and some times the entire sound is made in one of these formats... which could mean it was used with permission for this one purpose.

Either way, these sounds were gathered from data that did not make it into some product either because the category was covered already... or whatever. They were in many cases “extra content”, that’s typically one of the sources of promotional content.... when Yamaha samples an instrument there can be, literally terabytes of data generated. How and when it gets formatted for a product can be the result of different sound design teams from around the world working on the data. If we can hunt down the originators of the “XSpand Your World” and “Inspiration In a Flash” Libraries we can find out about the use of these other Waveform formats in the data...

Now, whether the LPC or WXC Data was inserted to ‘fix/repair’ certain Keybank problems or to prevent the data from finding itself being ported into other products... the fact remains, the new MONTAGE engine which now can read 24-bit Waveform data, cannot decipher that older LPC/WXC data, in part or whole. It is quite possibly now too old a format for MONTAGE to read.

I’ve asked around, best I can find out/figure... the LPC and WXC formats aren’t used any longer. And as far as I know are found in the promotional Libraries only. So it’s unlikely you will run into it in other Motif or Montage Libraries. That’s as best as I could find out...

Ok - appreciate closing the loop on this as messaging was different before (only reason for the follow-up). "Can't pass GO" on this one is understood.