thinkin bout gettin a midi keyboard. . .but i have a low budget and am kind of confused about getting sounds for it, do some DAW's come with sounds such as like sonar or garageband? or do i HAVE to buy a sound module??? if so are there cheap ones? also im planning on buying a keyboard thats under 200 bucks, what makes more expensive ones better???

more expensive usually means more knobs/faders/buttons for parameter controls. and most DAW's support VST's that your midi keyboard will be able to play just fine. a lot of vst's are free too.

the title of this thread is an oxymoron.......just worded funny, unfortunately i am little help for the subject at hand, my cubase came with an extra disc with a sound library for all different kinds of sounds, but i'm sure you can search the net for blogs that post downloads for all sorts of vst plugin stuff that your midi keyboard can control, just search around and i'm sure you'll find a ton of ill shit

Dr Van Nostrand is right about the title. The term MIDI is a technical industry standard for exchanging musical note data between instruments (Musical Instruments Digital Interface). It's message-based, for example the moment you press a key on a midi keyboard, it sends out a note-on message which includes the note number and the velocity(speed, intensity) of the keystroke, and when you release it, it sends a note-off message. There is no sound involved yet; instead you can use these realtime messages to control any type of sound source with a midi input; could be a digital piano, a synthesizer, an organ, a digital drumkit/drum machine, sampler, effects device, you name it. All that is available in software too these days. The most common form of software instruments/effects are VST plugins, as you might already know.

There are tons of freeware VST plugins available, a good starting point is http://www.kvraudio.com

However the whole thing is kinda complicated when you never used it before, so I strongly suggest getting familiar with the basics first.

Further, what makes a more expensive midi keyboard better? Well, the obvious things: features, build quality. What makes a big difference is the kind of key mechanics. They range from cheap plastic stuff like on Casio keyboards, to serious hammer-action mechanics which feel just like a real Grand Piano.
Many midi keyboards these days have USB interfaces so you don't need a seperate midi interface for the pc. Useful too are such features like knobs, faders or buttons, which you can use to control the settings of software synthesizers, for example. Some even have velocity-sensitive drumpads like an MPC or etc.
Naturally, all that costs so you should know what you need first.

lol i understand that midi doesnt make sound. . .i guess i shudve thot about my wording a little better?? haha whatever anyway thanks for the responses and that link

which DAW do you use?

im actually in the process of choosing one. . .i bought sonar 4 wayyyy back in the day and never used it. tryin to find the fucking disc for it and registration code, lol im a mess but ive been messing around with audacity(which i kno doesnt have any) and reaper but i gota liscense it once i get money. im gona get a usb mic in the next couple of days, one of the ones comes with sonar so if i cant find the disc i mite get that one idk

Just for completeness, you don't need a full blown DAW to use instrument plug-ins. There are also apps known as "Hosts" that let you play the instruments as if the computer + your midi keyboard was a real hardware instrument. Hosts are as simple as running just one VSTi to letting you patch any amount of instruments and FX plug-ins together as if you had a load of real hardware gear. If nothing else, a Host is great for testing out the plug-ins, but really come into their own if you want to play the plug-ins live at a gig or prefer tape recording. KVR list the Hosts too and some basic ones are free like "Minihost".

If you want to record and edit the midi, you do of course need a proper DAW.

Plus you'll need an ASIO driver for the soundcard or else there's too much delay between playing the keyboard and hearing the notes. Sonar has it's own method of cutting the delay with the standard Windows drivers - most other DAWs rely on you having an ASIO driver.

If you bought Sonar on-line, it might still be possible to get your Sonar4 license code traced - especially if it was ordered from Cakewalk direct, otherwise you will need the number off the original disc.

Be a little wary of controller keyboards with lots of knobs and buttons - You normally have to assign what they all do and once you have, there is nothing there to remind you what those assignments were. There are some now with LED displays for each control that should tell you what they currently do, but you have to pay for that and the DAW has to be supported by the controller for it to work. Keep it simple for now.

Good luck
Jim

thanks alot. . .very informative, i was just reading up on asio drivers and apparently there not needed for mac osx and thats what i use so hopefully thats true