Getting Maximum Performance Out Of M. Guitar?

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Let me start out by saying that this technology is, hands down, the future of guitar-to-midi. I’ve had every Roland unit, as well as IVL, Photon, Ztar, and, more recently, Triple Play systems. I’m classically trained, and play finger-style. MG 2 does a pretty friggin’ amazing job of tracking what I play, considering what it’s up against; trying to crunch all that audio input, and spit out cohesive midi. While it does get bogged down when trying to play more polyphonic, contrapuntal passages, I continue to be blown away by the immediacy, and naturalness of the thing. It literally feels like the strings are connected to the V.I. I’m playing - especially noticeable when playing high quality, virtual ac. guitar patches. The portamentos and bends track exactly as played - not ‘interpreted’, as with a hardware system. To my ears, the latency is better than even the T. Play, which feels ‘clunky’ after M.G. (Like taking off sneakers, and putting on boots.)

I’m using a 3Ghz i5 Mac, with 16 Gigs of Ram, with MOTU Performer 9. I’ve sussed out how gain input interacts with the MG parameters, and even toyed around with crafty things like inserting a compressor, and even radical EQ, to try and coax more performance out of it.

I do have a couple of questions regarding the product:

1: I am using it in stand alone mode on my desktop. Is there any possibility I’d get better performance out of it by inserting it as a plug in an audio track, inside the DAW? I could imagine that with a hexaphonic pickup with a breakout box, you could actually create a separate input for each string, and then run six separate instantiations of MG on six channels. Can’t imagine the processing power you’d need to pull something like that off though, but it’s interesting to contemplate…

2: Is the obstacle to a new version (MG3!!) a matter of continued innovation with the software itself, or is the technology simply hamstrung by the limitations of even the best desktop computers available today.
Or perhaps it’s a combination of the two? Any word there? I would gladly shell out $$ again for any performance improvement.

Thanks in advance for any helpful info!

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Thanks!

  1. Its an interesting experiment, but I’m not anybody put in enough effort to give a clear answer. The monophonic tracking is very fast indeed and probably more resilient to noise or other tones blending in than other mono-trackers. But 6 mono instances is certainly not what was intended :slight_smile:

  2. Interesting question. Any sane person would say the main obstacle is physics… not computers. But frankly speaking, im not quite sure :wink:
    We’ve head some success defying physics and I strongly believe in further improvements, but its of course incredibly complex and even when we have basics are in place (the MG2 tracker) there is so much tweaking involved and risks of degrading something which again calls for new inventions. We want to make this happen for sure, but cant yet promise anything.

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Thanks for the response. I get what you mean about the laws of physics. It may not even be tied to processing power, ultimately, as there have to be arbitrary algorithmic limitations in polyphonic pitch to midi, simply to make it workable in a general sense. Having said that, you guys have certainly pulled off a hell of a hat trick with MG2. (I started with version 1.)

One aside: I realized the input I was using on my AI was cutting in and out and static-y. I live in the tropics, and stuff like that is always rearing it’s head. Once I rectified that, the MG performance cleaned up quite a bit - no surprise there.

No, I can’t play Bach on it, but that’s even really hard with the hexaphonic Triple Play. Still, when just noodling around in the studio after a few beers, it’s easy to forget it’s guitar to midi, which is pretty high praise from someone who’s patiently dealt with these issues for decades.

I wish you continued success moving forward. Plug and play midi guitar HAS to be the future. I look forward to any future iterations of the product!

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