Genos plays VSTs wirelessly

[Neebo]

Hi Guys,
Today I decided to experiment with playing piano VSTs on my computer using the Genos.  I had read that this can be done wirelessly but never looked into it before.  Within 15 minutes I had a connection working perfectly with no latency.  It was strange hearing the sound coming out of the computer with no wires attached.  I even recorded into Ableton Live and played back numerous MIDI tracks simultaneously from Ableton back into the Genos.  Simply amazing!

Bravo Yamaha

[Divemaster]

I think this is, and will be the future of music production. Via computers and technology.
Not even knowing what VST'S are, I looked it up.
See below.
I can't say it rocks my boat, but progress will no doubt carry on long after those of us who actually buy instruments to physically play them have gone.
The skills learned handed to machines and synths. Do we really even need instruments any more, never mind players? Just connecting pc to midi player..... what's the actual point? What am I missing? Am I cynical...... or just hopelessly out of touch with Planet Earth?
Has Genos 2 come already, disguised as a bog standard Windows pc?
Well I got one of those, but there's no music stand on it. Baffled...

Hey Ho.... Off for my nap! 

Virtual Studio Technology (VST) is an audio plug-in software interface that integrates software synthesizers and effects units into digital audio workstations. VST and similar technologies use digital signal processing to simulate traditional recording studio hardware in software. Thousands of plugins exist, both commercial and freeware, and many audio applications support VST under license from its creator, Steinberg.


VST was developed by Steinberg Media Technologies in 1996. It creates a complete, professional studio environment on the PC or Mac.[1]
Overview
Edit
VST plugins generally run within a digital audio workstation (DAW), to provide additional functionality, though a few standalone plugin hosts exist that support VST. Most VST plugins are either instruments (VSTi) or effects (VSTfx), although other categories exist—for example spectrum analyzers and various meters. VST plugins usually provide a custom graphical user interface that displays controls similar to physical switches and knobs on audio hardware. Some (often older) plugins rely on the host application for their user interface.

VST instruments include software simulation emulations of well-known hardware synthesizers and samplers. These typically emulate the look of the original equipment as well as its sonic characteristics. This lets musicians and recording engineers use virtual versions of devices that otherwise might be difficult and expensive to obtain.[2]

VST instruments receive notes as digital information via MIDI, and output digital audio. Effect plugins receive digital audio and process it through to their outputs. (Some effect plugins also accept MIDI input—for example, MIDI sync to modulate the effect in sync with the tempo). MIDI messages can control both instrument and effect plugin parameters. Most host applications can route the audio output from one VST to the audio input of another VST (chaining). For example, the output of a VST synthesizer can be sent through a VST reverb effect.

Virtual Studio Technology (VST) is an audio plug-in software interface that integrates software synthesizers and effects units into digital audio workstations. VST and similar technologies use digital signal processing to simulate traditional recording studio hardware in software. Thousands of plugins exist, both commercial and freeware, and many audio applications support VST under license from its creator, Steinberg.


VST was developed by Steinberg Media Technologies in 1996. It creates a complete, professional studio environment on the PC or Mac.[1]
Overview
Edit
VST plugins generally run within a digital audio workstation (DAW), to provide additional functionality, though a few standalone plugin hosts exist that support VST. Most VST plugins are either instruments (VSTi) or effects (VSTfx), although other categories exist—for example spectrum analyzers and various meters. VST plugins usually provide a custom graphical user interface that displays controls similar to physical switches and knobs on audio hardware. Some (often older) plugins rely on the host application for their user interface.

VST instruments include software simulation emulations of well-known hardware synthesizers and samplers. These typically emulate the look of the original equipment as well as its sonic characteristics. This lets musicians and recording engineers use virtual versions of devices that otherwise might be difficult and expensive to obtain.[2]

VST instruments receive notes as digital information via MIDI, and output digital audio. Effect plugins receive digital audio and process it through to their outputs. (Some effect plugins also accept MIDI input—for example, MIDI sync to modulate the effect in sync with the tempo). MIDI messages can control both instrument and effect plugin parameters. Most host applications can route the audio output from one VST to the audio input of another VST (chaining). For example, the output of a VST synthesizer can be sent through a VST reverb effect.

[overover]

Hi Guys,
Today I decided to experiment with playing piano VSTs on my computer using the Genos.  I had read that this can be done wirelessly but never looked into it before.  Within 15 minutes I had a connection working perfectly with no latency.  It was strange hearing the sound coming out of the computer with no wires attached.  I even recorded into Ableton Live and played back numerous MIDI tracks simultaneously from Ableton back into the Genos.  Simply amazing!

Bravo Yamaha

Hi Neebo,

I assume that you have established a wireless MIDI connection between computer and Genos. This is virtually latency-free (almost as fast as a MIDI or USB-MIDI cable connection or a wireless Bluetooth LE MIDI connection).

BUT no AUDIO data is transmitted via MIDI. So you're probably only transmitting MIDI data (and using the Genos MIDI tone generator). The purpose of virtual instruments like VSTi plugins is that the sound (Audio) is generated on the computer (usually output via an external Audio interface).

By the way, you can also transfer AUDIO data via Wi-Fi to the Genos (instead of a cable connection to the AUX IN jacks). This is relatively easy with Apple products such as Mac computers or iPad/iPhone. As far as I know, it is a bit more difficult to get a wireless AUDIO connection to the Genos with Windows computers because the required drivers/protocols are not included in Windows by default. This applies at least up to Win 10, I haven't tested it with Win 11 yet. In addition, such a wireless AUDIO connection usually has a clearly audible latency (sometimes over 1 second), so that it is only suitable for playing back finished songs (e.g. MP3s), but NOT, as you have described, for playing a virtual instrument in real time.


Best regards,
Chris

[technobob]

Hi Guys,
Today I decided to experiment with playing piano VSTs on my computer using the Genos.  I had read that this can be done wirelessly but never looked into it before.  Within 15 minutes I had a connection working perfectly with no latency.  It was strange hearing the sound coming out of the computer with no wires attached.  I even recorded into Ableton Live and played back numerous MIDI tracks simultaneously from Ableton back into the Genos.  Simply amazing!

Bravo Yamaha

Hi Neebo

Could you explain how you did this please?

Thanks in advance...

Bob

[Amwilburn]

Chris, as the Genos uses wifi rather than bluetooth, it actually *is* possible to transmit audio and midi virtually latency free (wifi is significantly faster and with more bandwidth than bluetooth, but I wish the Genos had both, as bluetooth has it's advantages as well). I've only done stuff like that on genos using wifi to my cell phone/tablet though, not a pc.

[overover]

Chris, as the Genos uses wifi rather than bluetooth, it actually *is* possible to transmit audio and midi virtually latency free (wifi is significantly faster and with more bandwidth than bluetooth, but I wish the Genos had both, as bluetooth has it's advantages as well). I've only done stuff like that on genos using wifi to my cell phone/tablet though, not a pc.

Hi Mark,

I'm talking about Bluetooth LE (Low Energy) MIDI. This technology is definitely "real-time capable" (latencies of 3 - 6 ms between two BLE 5 devices like CME WIDI Master).

As far as I know, no latencies below about 35 ms are possible with Audio transmission via Bluetooth (ver. 4/5), in most cases they are even 100 - 300 ms or more.

The very new "Bluetooth LE Audio" technology (also called "LE Audio" for short) improves the previous "Bluetooth Audio" technology significantly. It is now also used in hearing aids and promises latencies of around 10 ms. Accordingly, "LE Audio" would be real-time capable, but only if both transmitter and receiver support this technology.

With "Audio over Wi-Fi" ("Audio over IP"), as I said, the latency is much too high (typically 300+ ms) to play a virtual instrument / VSTi plug-in live. So I'm afraid that this won't work (e.g. controlling a virtual instrument on the iPad by the Genos keyboard, and feeding the audio output of the app in question to the Genos AUX IN via Wi-Fi).

By the way, it might be possible to achieve audio latencies of around 10 ms or less with the current Wi-Fi 6 (IEEE 802.11ax) or the upcoming Wi-Fi 7 (802.11be), but the Wi-Fi adapter built into the Genos ( identical in construction to the Yamaha UD-WL01) only supports Wi-Fi 4 (802.11n), and it would be completely new to me that such low latencies can be achieved with wireless audio transmission.


Best regards,
Chris

[Amwilburn]

Hi Mark,

I'm talking about Bluetooth LE (Low Energy) MIDI. This technology is definitely "real-time capable" (latencies of 3 - 6 ms between two BLE 5 devices like CME WIDI Master).

As far as I know, no latencies below about 35 ms are possible with Audio transmission via Bluetooth (ver. 4/5), in most cases they are even 100 - 300 ms or more.

All correct; bluetooth's transmission protocols are fast enough for latency free midi, but not audio, no. Although the new APTX (the one that gives the 35ms latency) is promising; maybe someday bluetooth will be fast enough (<5 ms) to be used for headphones, for example!

With "Audio over Wi-Fi" ("Audio over IP"), as I said, the latency is much too high (typically 300+ ms) to play a virtual instrument / VSTi plug-in live. So I'm afraid that this won't work (e.g. controlling a virtual instrument on the iPad by the Genos keyboard, and feeding the audio output of the app in question to the Genos AUX IN via Wi-Fi).

By the way, it might be possible to achieve audio latencies of around 10 ms or less with the current Wi-Fi 6 (IEEE 802.11ax) or the upcoming Wi-Fi 7 (802.11be), but the Wi-Fi adapter built into the Genos ( identical in construction to the Yamaha UD-WL01) only supports Wi-Fi 4 (802.11n), and it would be completely new to me that such low latencies can be achieved with wireless audio transmission.


Best regards,
Chris

It's definitely not 300ms on the GEnos; try using the chord tracker app and streaming audio and watch how out of sync the bars are on bluetooth (audio is often about 1.5 beats of a 4/4 a bar behind the displayed chords) but when using Genos wifi, there is no discernable lag between the displayed chords and the audio. Of course, that's using streamed pre-recorded, I won't truly have a sense as to how much latency there is unless I can trigger my own audio (and yes I agree, the OP is probably referring to midi wifi transmission, playing back the audio on his pc speakers). But just from the chord tracker app, the difference between bluetooth and wifi is *significant*. Try it!


I'm using "access point mode", not infrastructure mode, btw.
THe UDWL01/GEnos uses  802.11 b/g/n, but can't do the 5GHz mode. But even using 2.4GHz mode (802/11 g) on a microphone typically produces 4-5ms latency, which lines up with what I'm seeing on Chord tracker. But I don't have any way to measure the actual latency, no

I just tried synching the same song through Genos wifi audio (not bluetooth :p) and P515 audio bluetooth; the bars were almost exactly 2 beats behind the visual display of chord tracker for Jai Ho (AR Rahman /Singh version) which has a bmp of 137, so the bluetooth latency can be estimated at roughly 876 ms, which is pretty awful)

Switching the same cellphone to wifi direct connection to the genos, the beats were visually on-beat. THere should be a few ms of latency, but not that i could visually discern.

Mark

[Neebo]

Hi Bob,

Further to your question, I used a Mac laptop running Keyscape VST.  I set the Genos Wireless Network mode to access point mode.  Then on the MAC, I went to Audio Midi Setup and created a new midi network in Midi Studio.  Then the Genos showed up as a MIDI option in Keyscape as if I had connected a MIDI cable.  This link might be useful:

https://www.baum-software.ch/downloads/OtherManuals/Manual_Yamaha_Genos_SongBook.pdf

Regards

Neebo