Well, the reason it sounded more balanced on the SC-88 is probably because the author of this MIDI file originally worked with a Sound Canvas. Those Roland modules were a standard for anyone working with MIDI and computer music back in the days. Anyway, I like and keep using both worlds today :)
I 100% prefer the soundCanvas. Roland knows how to make exceptional midi equipment. The Yamaha sounds great but a little too cheesy for my tastes, and I love cheddar cheese!
@@theironsword1954 if you ever wanted to listen to game soundtracks or midi music from the early 90s,there's nothing like the sc55. Nearly all of it was composed on a sc55 mk1. If you want to create own music there's better equipment, but for that purpose these things are the best, and that's why they are so crazy expensive, especially the mk1
@@erebostd Yes, while a lot of it was designed on the SC55, it is well known that games that weren't composed on the SC55 forced the soundcard to drop entire channels out of severe lack of support for that many channels, and it showed later in its life.
Roland's Sound Canvas has nice depth and oomph to it. Yamaha's sound modules from around this time just sound a little too bright and tinny for me. Drums especially.
Probably was. The Roland sc-55 truly was ahead of its time in synthesizing stuff. It's not to say the adLib and other cheaper variants were horrible, but the Roland variants were very versatile.
PASSPORT.MID is written in Roland GS standard. It doesn't contain any header to reset GS devices to initial states, but it betrayed itself in LSB and MSB bank selections.
i haven't seen this issue being addressed in the comments, so here it comes: This MIDI file and many others were designed to be played back in an FM synth card (sound blaster 16, etc) - NOT a sample card like the midi modules in this video. That's why they sound "bad".
I got a copy of this MIDI file in the strangest way. It was included as part of a driver and software bundle disc for Samsung's YP-T8Z mp3 player back in 2005. On the disc, it was also named BACK instead of PASSPORT. What's more, the mp3 player had no MIDI capability whatsoever, and none of the software included on the disc ever played the song. In that same way, I found copies of onestop, flourish, and town midis in my Microsoft PowerPoint 2003 program files folder on an old WinXP system. No idea how that got there. Conclusion: if you have an old software library, it might be worth opening them in Explorer and hunting for Easter eggs. You really never know what you're gonna find.
If you guys say either one instrument over the other, you're showing bias towards that instrument. As it stands, both instruments play the song correctly, with perhaps some volume levelling issues on Yamaha's end. Then again, not even the levelling on my own Roland SD-50 "Mobile Studio Canvas" happens to as consistent as with the older Sound Canvas line; if I want to hear songs with the "correct" levelling, i'd have to set it to "classical" instrumentation so that it happens to mimic a Roland SC-55 (AKA the first in the Sound Canvas line). The point is, I'm not entirely sure if the Sound Canvas line properly conforms to the General MIDI standard. That Mobile Studio Canvas instrument I've mentioned? Its default "Contemperary" instrument set's designed more to cater to songs composed through General MIDI Level 2 rather than General User, hens songs tending to sound a bit different if they happen to expect a GS-conformant instrument (such ss those within the Sound Canvas line). Let me also point this out: If the way a song gets presented seems to influence its quality, the song wasn't properly composed, to begin with, for changing the way the elements of a work get presented tends to make flaws seem a lot more obvious. This is why I'd suggest to form the thougts surrounding the work correctly, so that things such as this does not happen. I found that if a song happens to be composed correctly, it would be able to sound great even if it gets played through that MS Wavetable Synth everyone seems to hate. Passport and Canyan were made by those who weren't entirely aware of what they're doing. As such, as enjoyable as it may be to you guys, the thoughts being projected from those songs happen to be incredibly distorted. (Now, do not confuse this with subjective words like "enjoyable" or "great", for the concepts I'm talking about happen to objectively be the way works present their thoughts; I, myself, only used those terms since it's easier explain that way what I meant.)
Can you make this test again using FLOURISH.MID file? This file is available on Windows XP as a part of DirectX 9.0c. It has a more complex arrangement and completed 9 channels (including drum part in channel 10) played altogether.
MU80 sounds way more realistic. But the instruments have longer attack/decay rates, so I'm not sure I'd prefer it for games. You were supposed to customise the patches on these units, but in practice it was too tedious and therefore no one except some musicians did that. MIDI/GM/GS were never very suitable formats for games and serious music exchange since they require more precise control than what was available with all the variation in different devices. DOS/Amiga games later solved this with tracker style PCM-software mixing which offered higher compatibility, 4-64ch sample playback and didn't have to rely on these expensive devices to sound good anymore.
What are the credentials of the MIDI file used? Have you optimised it to be two separate versions; one for XG and the other for GS? If not then this test is pretty null and void, because you need to hear both at their very best before making any valid comparisons. I own or have owned various Yamaha and Roland synth modules and rack synths. I eventually got rid of all my Roland devices and kept the Yamaha MU100R of which I have four. I have also upgraded them with six different PLG expansion boards (AN, DX, AP, DR, VH, VL). I have never regretted this decision for one moment.
The Roland synth is definitely better... but they are pretty close i would say... I would be happy with either one... Though happier with the Roland which is good because i ordered one recently :p
Since I bought the Sw1000XG PCI sound card in 1999, i can say, by listening and compare the Drums of similar Midi Modules this time, i prefer more Roland Drums, otherwise the SC 55 / 88 Series and the MU Tonegenerator Serie among them the Sw1000XG, both are powerful midi modules / Soundmoules that complement each other in their sounds, I would prefer to have bought the Mu2000 wich I connect to my Win10 system and the Sc55 or 88 Anyway, many analog voices of the SW1000XG have become important to me and can not find in my recent purchase of Yamaha the Motif XF6 The overall sound of the MU Tonegenrator Series especially for GM DOS Gamesoundtracks are excellent / brilliant
I think the reason the Roland sounds better is because the actual Passport song was composed on Roland hardware. So when it's played on the SC-88 it sounds the way the composer intended it.
lol the poor yamaha got destroyed... ROLAND SC-88 the best of the best of the best. period. only a professional band at a good studio with quality instruments, mics and mixers can beat that.
yamaha slap bass SUCKED, but dont worry it has many more and variations, yamaha trumpets and brass defeated Roland, Drums were even, so this is a TIE. NO LOSER
i agree, the Slaps of Yamaha are cheap but for example usable are Fretless, Fingered and GM Synth Bass depending on the velocity and resonance and cut off filter
I'm a sucker for the type of charm only period pieces like this can bring.
Same here, I just can't seem to find any.
@@GhostworxYT Ebay brother!
Same.
That Yamaha is the sound of a generation of visual novels!
That Roland brass and slap bass, damn son. So good.
Well, the reason it sounded more balanced on the SC-88 is probably because the author of this MIDI file originally worked with a Sound Canvas. Those Roland modules were a standard for anyone working with MIDI and computer music back in the days. Anyway, I like and keep using both worlds today :)
so you're saying the way it sounds on the roland was the way that the creator heard it when they composed the track?
That sounds like a soundtrack from a Sega Saturn Japanese RPG that was never translated :D and it reminds me a bit of Magic Knight Rayearth.
Yeah, definitely getting a Devil Summoner vibe.
Some Roland chips was input in computer and console
Thank you! Brings back fond memories from when I grow up. I can't remember if I first heard Passport.mid in Windows 3.1 or Windows 98.
i'm not sure if it was in 3.1
@@spikefallyt3350 I definitely had it on 3.1, but my Tandy had some Passport demo software as well.
@@crnkmnky heck that comment was 11 months old but thanks for reply
Roland SC-88 sounded better here. Thank you for sharing this video.
I 100% prefer the soundCanvas. Roland knows how to make exceptional midi equipment. The Yamaha sounds great but a little too cheesy for my tastes, and I love cheddar cheese!
lol nice troll XD
The SC55 was a piece of junk though, gotta admit that.
I mean it didn't have enough channels...
@@theironsword1954 if you ever wanted to listen to game soundtracks or midi music from the early 90s,there's nothing like the sc55. Nearly all of it was composed on a sc55 mk1. If you want to create own music there's better equipment, but for that purpose these things are the best, and that's why they are so crazy expensive, especially the mk1
@@erebostd Yes, while a lot of it was designed on the SC55, it is well known that games that weren't composed on the SC55 forced the soundcard to drop entire channels out of severe lack of support for that many channels, and it showed later in its life.
Roland's Sound Canvas has nice depth and oomph to it. Yamaha's sound modules from around this time just sound a little too bright and tinny for me. Drums especially.
3:23 Alternate Street Fighter music.
This track has some Alpha vibes for sure!
Could be a nice idea to play the song with BOTH synths together ^^
Roland knows how to do Midi.
ＰＡＳＳＰＯＲＴパスポート
aesthetical
real vaporwave pioneers
wow real creative
The Roland is flawless!
I always did love the Yamaha MIDI drivers.
I'm assuming Passport.mid was composed with Roland SC equipment? It always seems to sound the best on Roland devices.
Probably was. The Roland sc-55 truly was ahead of its time in synthesizing stuff. It's not to say the adLib and other cheaper variants were horrible, but the Roland variants were very versatile.
Definitely, because the defaul midi system on previous system was a much simplified one.
@@FuZhixiang windows 3.1 didn't have a built in software midi synth
Would love to know who composed this. Sounds like Paul hardcastle
Basic Dos Gaming, that would be George Stone, also the composer of CANYON.mid
Both sound great, little too much reverb on the Yamaha it seems?
I prefer the Roland sound canvas, but I maybe have had a prejudice since my exposure to midi was from the mid 90s with Roland.
PASSPORT.MID is written in Roland GS standard. It doesn't contain any header to reset GS devices to initial states, but it betrayed itself in LSB and MSB bank selections.
i haven't seen this issue being addressed in the comments, so here it comes: This MIDI file and many others were designed to be played back in an FM synth card (sound blaster 16, etc) - NOT a sample card like the midi modules in this video. That's why they sound "bad".
They sound "bad" because they were made for FM cards, and Americans can't do FM synthesis 😈
Still use my SC55 on stage!
SC-88
Dude... Tim Follin tracks on these?
SC-88 sounded kinda real. Yamaha MU80 sounded like the new wave musics from 1980's
More like 90's public broadcasting general interest or talk show jingle. Like Canyon Mid sonlds like 90's news or current affairs show jingle.
@@YAUUN SoundCanvas still holds today.
I got a copy of this MIDI file in the strangest way. It was included as part of a driver and software bundle disc for Samsung's YP-T8Z mp3 player back in 2005. On the disc, it was also named BACK instead of PASSPORT.
What's more, the mp3 player had no MIDI capability whatsoever, and none of the software included on the disc ever played the song.
In that same way, I found copies of onestop, flourish, and town midis in my Microsoft PowerPoint 2003 program files folder on an old WinXP system. No idea how that got there.
Conclusion: if you have an old software library, it might be worth opening them in Explorer and hunting for Easter eggs. You really never know what you're gonna find.
Windows 10 still includes midi songs for testing
It's not a Easter Egg lol.
love it!
If you guys say either one instrument over the other, you're showing bias towards that instrument. As it stands, both instruments play the song correctly, with perhaps some volume levelling issues on Yamaha's end. Then again, not even the levelling on my own Roland SD-50 "Mobile Studio Canvas" happens to as consistent as with the older Sound Canvas line; if I want to hear songs with the "correct" levelling, i'd have to set it to "classical" instrumentation so that it happens to mimic a Roland SC-55 (AKA the first in the Sound Canvas line).
The point is, I'm not entirely sure if the Sound Canvas line properly conforms to the General MIDI standard. That Mobile Studio Canvas instrument I've mentioned? Its default "Contemperary" instrument set's designed more to cater to songs composed through General MIDI Level 2 rather than General User, hens songs tending to sound a bit different if they happen to expect a GS-conformant instrument (such ss those within the Sound Canvas line).
Let me also point this out: If the way a song gets presented seems to influence its quality, the song wasn't properly composed, to begin with, for changing the way the elements of a work get presented tends to make flaws seem a lot more obvious. This is why I'd suggest to form the thougts surrounding the work correctly, so that things such as this does not happen. I found that if a song happens to be composed correctly, it would be able to sound great even if it gets played through that MS Wavetable Synth everyone seems to hate.
Passport and Canyan were made by those who weren't entirely aware of what they're doing. As such, as enjoyable as it may be to you guys, the thoughts being projected from those songs happen to be incredibly distorted. (Now, do not confuse this with subjective words like "enjoyable" or "great", for the concepts I'm talking about happen to objectively be the way works present their thoughts; I, myself, only used those terms since it's easier explain that way what I meant.)
3:44 My best part
Can you make this test again using FLOURISH.MID file?
This file is available on Windows XP as a part of DirectX 9.0c. It has a more complex arrangement and completed 9 channels (including drum part in channel 10) played altogether.
I love how sounded some instruments of the Yamaha. I'll look for a soundfont or VST plug-in.
You should hear it on a SoundBlaster AWE-64G and the Ensoniq Soundscape Elite.
nope not even close, and i like the awe64.
Can you please play Starman.mid (or Star64.mid) on these? It's my favorite midi from AWE32 and AWE64.
Play the "Ethno_pa.mid" from DX Ball please!
ua-cam.com/video/p_Wc3zU1C0Q/v-deo.html
MU80 sounds way more realistic. But the instruments have longer attack/decay rates, so I'm not sure I'd prefer it for games.
You were supposed to customise the patches on these units, but in practice it was too tedious and therefore no one except some musicians did that.
MIDI/GM/GS were never very suitable formats for games and serious music exchange since they require more precise control than what was available with all the variation in different devices. DOS/Amiga games later solved this with tracker style PCM-software mixing which offered higher compatibility, 4-64ch sample playback and didn't have to rely on these expensive devices to sound good anymore.
I agree. The Yamaha sounds realistic, but I prefer the synthesizer sound of the Roland device.
realistically chiptunes, more like cheap casio keyboards for kids lol
A bit too much reverb on the SoundCanvas. I would tune it down a notch
Yamaha in XG mode or GS?
Warcraft 1 Midi...Bioforge...and Transport Tycoon---1942 Pacific Air War/ Menue Theme-
Lovely lil' stack.
請問你是台灣人嗎?
Roland wins
I picked up a SC-55 Pro last week with a broken screen, it's working perfectly but I need to find a new screen, any one know how to do that?
You mean SC-88 Pro. I don't know that you can get a replacement screen for it.
This is the 3.0 version of passport.mid
What are the credentials of the MIDI file used? Have you optimised it to be two separate versions; one for XG and the other for GS? If not then this test is pretty null and void, because you need to hear both at their very best before making any valid comparisons. I own or have owned various Yamaha and Roland synth modules and rack synths. I eventually got rid of all my Roland devices and kept the Yamaha MU100R of which I have four. I have also upgraded them with six different PLG expansion boards (AN, DX, AP, DR, VH, VL). I have never regretted this decision for one moment.
My guess would be this is the MIDI file that was bundled with earlier copies of Windows to test MIDI playback.
I seriously gotta take both. I don't mind the cheese.
ａｅｓｔｈｅｔｉｃ
The Roland synth is definitely better... but they are pretty close i would say...
I would be happy with either one... Though happier with the Roland which is good because i ordered one recently :p
Since I bought the Sw1000XG PCI sound card in 1999, i can say,
by listening and compare the Drums of similar Midi Modules this time, i prefer more Roland Drums, otherwise the SC 55 / 88 Series and the MU Tonegenerator Serie among them the Sw1000XG, both are powerful midi modules / Soundmoules that complement each other in their sounds, I would prefer to have bought the Mu2000 wich I connect to my Win10 system and the Sc55 or 88
Anyway, many analog voices of the SW1000XG have become important to me and can not find in my recent purchase of Yamaha the Motif XF6
The overall sound of the MU Tonegenrator Series especially for GM DOS Gamesoundtracks are excellent / brilliant
I think the reason the Roland sounds better is because the actual Passport song was composed on Roland hardware. So when it's played on the SC-88 it sounds the way the composer intended it.
Roland
thanks m8y
Midi links
Anyone else getting Animusic vibes form the song?
Damn still expensive...
Shit, I must say SC sounds better :-(
I own Yamaha
sure you do
The yamaha version sounds okay, but the roland version? Perfect midi
sounds best on SC-55
The SC-88 does have an SC-55 map.
やっぱり音量バランスはSCの方がいいね、でもSCもたり酷いw
lol the poor yamaha got destroyed... ROLAND SC-88 the best of the best of the best. period. only a professional band at a good studio with quality instruments, mics and mixers can beat that.
Roland have clearer sound than yamaha
Y'all are tripping it's the yamaha all the way for me...
In XG mode, I like Yamaha better.
Windows boi.
if your midi arrangement is in xg type roland is nothing number one is in drums arrangement
yamaha slap bass SUCKED, but dont worry it has many more and variations, yamaha trumpets and brass defeated Roland, Drums were even, so this is a TIE. NO LOSER
i agree, the Slaps of Yamaha are cheap but for example usable are Fretless, Fingered and GM Synth Bass depending on the velocity and resonance and cut off filter
Not a fan of the yamaha
way too much reverb...