FUQ (eff -yu - cue) - FAQ's with an EDGE

Tagged As: Wavetable Synth

Question:
does anyone know of any programs that could be used to edit the internal (FM?) sounds coming from the Mcrosoft GS wavetable synth in my SBLive? i know that there are editors for modules (and Vienna for the SFont stuff), but is it silly to think that there must be a way to modify the internal gs sounds? if they are FM (and not samples), you could easily come up with some wacky stuff (although there re alredy a few usable sounds...) Any suggestions? thanks

Answer:
There are multiple sound sources inside an SBLive (there is no FM chip though). Depending on your driver you will get different choices. I recommend you use the Creative Labs driver available on their site. If you are using Microsoft GS Wavetable Synth, the sounds for that synth are in the file %windir%\system32\drivers\GM.DLS. You can edit these with Microsoft's free DirectMusic Producer (available with the DirectX SDK), Awave (www.fmjsoft.com) or others. I don't recommend editing GM.DLS though, as this would affect every app that tried to use it - and all other apps assume it is true GM, whereas if you change it, it won't be. In fact, Microsoft probably has that file labeled as protected, so as soon as you change it, Windows changes it back to the original file. Actually, I don't recommend using Microsoft GS Wavetable Synth on an SBLive since it is the least flexible and most CPU intensive of your options. Instead, choose one of your SBLive's built-in hardware synths; they are named something like A: SB Live! MIDI Synth. These synths don't eat up as much CPU, and the soundsets are more easily changed. Get Creative Labs' free Vienna 2.3 editor and create (or edit) your SoundFont files. This synth doesn't use GM.DLS, but rather another file - I can't remember the name, but it starts with a 2, 4, or 8, and has the extension .sf2. Depending on your driver, this file will be located somewhere in either the Windows or Program Files directory structure. So, search for 2*.sf2 - etc. Anyway, a better option than changing the SBLive's GM soundset is to create your own - or copy the SBLive set to a different filename and edit that new filename. The SBLive allows you to append or even replace the GM soundset with whatever file(s) you want, which gives you true sampler-like flexibility without the risk of destroying your GM file.