Name: LGR - Roland MT-32: Retro PC MIDI Music Revisited
Uploaded: 2020-04-13T16:08:46.000Z
Duration: 11 min 35 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

The name alone has a seductive mysterious quality to it

As a kid, configuring all sorts of DOS games,

every time I saw that name come up in a setup menu, I would fantasize about it.

My Packard Bell PC only had a PC speaker for sound,

so, really, anything more would have been cool by me.

But all I knew was that Roland made expensive digital pianos and

She was, and is, an accomplished pianist.

So, we were always going to various music stores for various music things.

Inevitably, we would try out a Roland synthesizer in each trip,

and just as inevitably, we would leave the store impressed, but empty-handed.

My mind would race with excitement, thinking that if their piano sounded

that awesome, just imagine what a sound card from them would do for my games.

Fast forward about 24 years, and it's finally happened.

Specifically, this is the old model MT-32 without the

separate stereo headphone jack on the back,

so, it's not quite as valuable as the newer model, but I am absolutely

This is all thanks to a donation by Anders Enger Jensen.

Who's like a patron saint of Roland computer hardware or something.

Just super generous with helping YouTubers with this stuff lately

and is a fountain of knowledge forever and ever, amen.

But yeah, the MT-32, huh? Just look at this thing.

Contrary to what I thought as a kid, it is not a sound card.

An external synthesizer box that plugs into all sorts of MIDI capable devices.

It was released in 1987 as something geared towards amateur musicians.

Retailing at $695 or approximately $1500 today.

But it was a heck of a lot cheaper than a Roland D series synthesizer.

The D series being what the MT-32's capabilities were based on.

With it, you could use the MIDI-capable device of your choice,

and get that Roland linear arithmetic synthesis sound

without dropping two grand on a D-50 or something.

A certain something that led to its inclusion in hundreds of DOS PC games over the years.

who reached an agreement with Roland to distribute the MT-32 in the USA

with "King's Quest IV" being the first game of theirs to have its music

Compared to what most people had at the time, the PC speaker.

even compared to the AdLib music synthesizer card,

which used Yamahas YM3812 FM synthesis chip.

However awesome the Roland sounded, though,

the AdLib was way, way cheaper, at just $195,

While the MT-32 cost much more on its own, and also needed

an additional interface to work with PC games.

that allowed DOS games to utilize the MT-32.

It didn't stop here, either, you also need the MPU-401.

Another external module that acted as the interface between the IPC

This is a MIDI device after all, and most home computers in the US

Now, you might be wondering about the integrated

MIDI capability of Sound Blaster cards and

Their Sound Blaster MIDI kit provided a breakout cable for the joystick port

But, keep in mind, this does not provide MPU-401 support.

So, if your sound card doesn't have that built-in, your mileage may vary.

Another option is emulation through soft MPU.

It's not 100% compatible with all games, but it does provide intelligent mode

MPU-401 capability on sound cards without it.

At least installing the Roland stuff is pretty easy, if a bit cumbersome.

You just plop the IPC card into a free ISA slot,

connect the card to the 401 box with a DB25 cable,

connect the box to the MT-32 with a standard MIDI cable

and then use a standard audio cable between

the MT-32 and your sound card's line in port.

Or just hook it up to a pair of speakers or headphones.

The end result isn't pretty, but hey, it works.

And there's no need to set up any drivers or software on top of it.

Games with MT-32 support just need to be told to look

through their setup program and there you go.

This seems like a good time to talk about

the difference between General MIDI, plain old MIDI,

Because there's a chance you'll see one or all of these

Typically, though, if you see MT-32 listed, that is what you want.

Since that means it's tailored specifically to the device's capabilities.

You might also see things like LAPC-1, or CM-32L and such,

but these work fine too, since they're iterations of the same basic hardware.

Selecting MPU-401 works as well, but that just tells the game to look for the interface itself.

And since any MIDI device can be plugged into it,

the sound isn't always distinctly taking advantage of the MT-32.

Same goes for MIDI mode, which is just telling the game to send music

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LGR - Roland MT-32: Retro PC MIDI Music Revisited

individual

awesome

specifically

general