Testing latency before buying midi keyboard controller

C

cinciredsfan11

New member
Greetings FPs,

Im in the market for a midi keyboard controller. I would like to start learning to play some keys, and get away from having to point and click my way through all my songs. This will be for my home setup, and I will not be playing live. I intend on getting an audio interface at some point, but want to save up and purchase a quality one that I do not really have the money for currently. So with that being said, I am looking to get by just plugging my midi keyboard directly into my computer for the time being. So my biggest obstacle from what ive gathered seems to be latency. I am not looking to get ridiculously low, but something that is acceptable to record my patterns at home. I have a pretty new desktop computer, 3rd gen i5, 8 gigs ram, but im using the MBs onboard audio (Realtek HD). I use FL Studio, and am planning on using ASIO4ALL. I tried to get an idea of the latency I would face by using my computer keyboard as my midi controller with ASIO4ALL, so I ran DPC latency checker with my one of my heavier beats loaded into FL, and recorded additional parts using my computer keyboard and I didnt see any noticeable latency. The max latency was 264 us on DPC. Now granted my computer keyboard is connected via ps/2, and I will be using a midi keyboard connected via USB. So the connection is completely different, but ultimately im wondering if this is a relatively good indicator of the latency I will be facing with my midi keyboard? Thanks
 
Well, the thing is that the connection between a keyboard and the computer isn't usually the source of it, although intuitively it naturally feels that way. But most of the latency tends to come from the part when the computer has already received the "instructions" (ie. MIDI data) from the keyboard & processes it, triggers the sound & pushes it out to the interface, which in turn converts it into analog audio. So the biggest obstacle tends to be the audio interface.

That said, I'm not sure how those DPC figures convert into real-world audio latency; I don't really know what the figure is that it outputs. A microsecond is a few magnitudes smaller than a millisecond (which is what's usually used in latency figures); 264µs would only be 0.264ms, which of course is impossibly small for practical audio purposes (considering the speed of sound already gives you ~1ms/ft).
 
thanks for the reply krushing. I just ran DPC because it was about the about the only program I found in my searches for latency, but it does seem to be geared more toward computing latency, not audio. I mainly started searching for latency checkers bc I read in a number of forums people said they had 10 or 20 ms latency, and I was trying to figure out how they calculated that. I just figured that a computer keyboard would act similarly to a midi keyboard, press a key to trigger a note.
 
cinciredsfan11 said:
I just figured that a computer keyboard would act similarly to a midi keyboard, press a key to trigger a note.
Click to expand...

I guess it should act similarly. It's just that most of the latency doesn't come from between the input device and the computer, but rather the computer and the output device...
 
With your good CPU... you should be fine.

Purchase your midi controller with confidence. I've hooked up my USB keyboard to much worse setups and can record some midi data without much latency.

The issue may arise moreso as a result of your VST use. If you start using very heavy VSTs, there's a chance you'll notice spikes/pops/clicks in your audio playback. If that happens.. it's b/c the onboard soundcard simply can't keep up. At that point, you would want to grab a good interface.

I'd recommend starting out with the keyboard and see how good your computer can do. Latency probably won't be your problem. The problem will probably become audio playback eventually. But... your CPU might do better than you think, and you may be able to put off the interface purchase for a while if you use VSTs that are not CPU intensive and you don't try to make huge 60 track projects lol.


I think I would highly recommend you using Reason BTW. I haven't used it extensively since Reason 3.... but i've played aroudn with 4 and 5. Reason should still be very CPU friendly. Nothing in the program is too taxing, so really shines in simple setups like yours. The FL Studio approach, and other DAW approach usually is a little more CPU intensive.. and opens you up to VST use which will really show you your limits sooner than later.
 
Thanks for the replies guys, I know there cant be an exact answer to my question, so i appreciate the help. I am hesitant to try a new DAW just because I have been using FL for about 5 years and am comfortable with it, plus with the money being a little tight, I am not sure if im ready to invest in a new DAW. But thanks for the recommendation CPhoenix
 
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