Del Gittinger writes; >I have Dean's "Tuning Manager" program for which I paid $295. It did = >the basic stuff but was not really finished. No updates were ever = >offered. In discussions with him he essentially just abandoned the = >program. > >It is in written in MSDOS and I found to my dismay that it only works = >with the MIDIater (?) that he sold and the MidiQuest card I used to have = >in my computer. When I updated my motherboard I eliminated the = >duplication of Midi ports and have a standard MPU401 port on a = >SoundBlaster board. Tuning Manager won't work with it. I don't have = >any ISA slots available to reinstall the old MidiQuest board. = >Therefore, Tuning Manager is now a piece of expensive useless software = >in my file cabinet. > Tuning Manager was superseded by RCT, but not abandoned. We don't sell TM any more, but we still support Tuning Manager users (answer questions etc...). There is also an upgrade path (trade-in) from TM to Reyburn CyberTuner. But TM still works fine with most PC computers running DOS with a MIDIator, Music Quest Card and original Roland MPU-401 and MPU- IPC MIDI cards for which it was programmed. We did have updates up to version 3.51. Upgrade to that version is free for any user by email, or a nominal charge snail mail. Version 3.5.1 fixes a MIDI timing which only occurs on fast Pentiums. As for not being finished, I suppose you could say that about any software. TM did the job for which it was intended quite well. It seems to me you could solve the MIDI interface problem either by prioritizing an ISA slot for your MIDI card, or by trouble shooting the MIDIator. The MIDIator comes with a "looptest.exe" program which will quickly tell if your MIDI hardware and port are working. This is a hardware problem not a software/TM problem. If it's a hardware problem with the MIDIator or serial port you should contact midiator.com or your computer maker for help. I've never seen a case where the midiator looptest worked, but TM still wouldn't work. If these suggestions don't work I'll try to help. MIDI and DOS were definitely not a marriage not made in heaven. It was not practical to support a large number of MIDI interfaces because I had to write separate drivers for each type of MIDI device (partly in assembly language!). Sound cards may claim they are MPU-401 compatible but most are not fully compatible in DOS. TM has been used in a number of different Windows environments success- fully, and though it runs in DOS mode it works fine with Windows 95 and 98 on almost any PC. I don't think it will run in Windows NT or Windows 2000 but that's because Microsoft is "abandoning" DOS. Windows 95/98/NT solve the MIDI interface compatibility problem elegantly. They use standardized drivers so each program doesn't need its own driver for each device. RCT/Windows uses this method and talks to the SAT using all Windows MIDI interfaces we've tested so far. I have not written a Windows Tuning Manager program primarily because the low number of units I sold for DOS indicates this wouldn't be worth while, and RCT keeps me quite busy enough. I wish I had time to do all these project, but alas, time is limited. We do offer a trade-in towards RCT. Many, or most users who would want Tuning Manager on Windows already use RCT. -Dean Reyburn ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Dean L. Reyburn, RPT RPS, Inc. email: dean@reyburn.com 2695 Indian Lakes Road web page: www.reyburn.com Cedar Springs, Michigan, 49319 USA 1-888-SOFT-440 (or 616-696-1002) Fax: 616-696-8121
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