Low speaker volume when playing midi files in quicktime

You're saying that you have to turn the sound up so loud to hear the midi, that any non-midi or system sound comes out far too loud for safety? I want to clarify. If so, this sounds serious. I would do more than post to this discussion board.

I found that the MIDI vs Non-MIDI comfort level difference is 6-7 volume 'notches' (press the volume keys 6 or 7 times), which is significant especially when using headphones.

That's using the latest version of Auralia, which is a standard academic Ear training software :

www.sibelius.com/products/auralia/

For low MIDI volume issues on Mac OS X 10.7.x, have you tried adjusting the MIDI Output Volume in /Applications/Utilities/Audio Midi Setup.app?

Sorry but where do you find this setting?

It's nowhere to be found on my machine...

I have made certain adjustments in 'Audio MIdi Setup' and this seems to have improved things a little.

Regards,

Ian Dalgleish

I might be mistaken but it seems to me that the only thing you are doing here is increasing the general volume.

Whereas what we are looking to do is reduce the relative level difference between midi and non-midi sounds...

honoramongstthieves wrote:

I might be mistaken but it seems to me that the only thing you are doing here is increasing the general volume.

Whereas what we are looking to do is reduce the relative level difference between midi and non-midi sounds...

Yes. You're right - I jumped the gun passing along that info.

To address the relative difference we're all noticing (from MIDI to wav output) I'm looking further into the issue. I found a trail recommending that we test on Mountain Lion (Developer Preview 2 or greater) which looks promising.

Since currently only the developer preview of OS X 10.8 is available, if anyone is a registered Mac Developer, can you reproduce this problem in Mountain Lion "Developer Preview 3"? If I don't hear back, I'll try this out later and let you know.

( OS X Developer Previews are available to registered Mac developers on the "OS X Mountain Lion" tab here: https://developer.apple.com/devcenter/mac/index.action - until of course, the OS ships, and then it will be available to all. )

This issue also happens on my Macbook Air (late 2011), running OS X 10.7.4.

When I plug the headphones though, the MIDI sound is almost normal. When I unplug them, it's barely audible.

Please fix this, Apple.

Hi,

The problem still exist under OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion.

The default Player is Quicktime 7.

Apple please fix this. Thanks.

If it persists in QuickTime on Mountain Lion, please file a problem report using <http://developer.apple.com/bugreporter>.

If you provide clear steps to reproduce the issue, it will better the chances of a speedy fix.

Hi,

As per your suggestion, I have filed a Bug. Thanks

PS: I am just surprised that it is such an obvious issue that has been reported for about a year in forum discussion here, and Apple can missed it for OS X 10.8

My MBP6,2 finally came back to normal with Snow Leopard after facing unexpected bugs of Lion.I compose midi files in Logic and they play loud enough within as they use exs grand piano samples, but if I hit on midi with a space key in finder, it plays extremely quiet. Also I found some differences between midi components versions in audio midi settings info. Hundreds of great features are in Lion, but because of the only MIDI problem I can't use the world's most advanced OS including Mountain Lion as many people have reported the same issue. Any suggestions?

I seem to have joined the crowd of midi users who sadly wonder why the volume is so low...

I use Auralia and a midi creation program - they are both almost unusable on my new 2012 MBA running Mountain Lion.

Without an option to change midi device outputs or volume, I'm wondering why Apple has not rectified this issue. I am now having second thoughts about the whole "Apple experience"

Is there any way to install an alternate midi device rather than quicktime?

An update - I got the volume to be louder in a program that plays midi sounding voices - Musescore. It is usable if you raise each track.

Auralia on the other hand - still a hassle with the volume being so low, yet the system sounds jump out and blow your ears up. Not a good feeling. The only option seems to be disabling every other sound on the computer. A bit drastic.

Dear Apple,

Obviously no-one reads this message board, but on the rare possibility: please update and raise the midi volume!!! Even if it was merely a setting for quicktime somewhere which could be adjusted to give us sad midi users some volume!!! (extra "!!!'s" for volume)!!!

Best Regards

WWSD?

Message was edited by: MJY123 - OK - Auralia is alright with headphones BUT make SURE you disable every other sound on the whole computer!!! True story

.

Message was edited by: MJY123