Comments on: Polyphonic Synthesizer in Your Pocket

miniMusic has released version 1.2 of its popular NotePad music notation software for the Palm Platform. NotePad now has a polyphonic synthesizer built-in and a new notation rendering engine providing sharper and more detailed graphics.
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Nice idea

a_nonamiss @ 12/10/2003 11:43:16 AM #
While I applaud this idea, I downloaded the demo and was pretty disappointed. This software doesn't seem ready for commercial release yet. I am an avid user of Finale for Windows, and have tried other music notation software, and I must say that this was very frustrating to use. I don't know if I have it set up right, but I wasn't able to do some pretty simple things, like dotted quarter and eighth notes. Things like adding accidentals to the notes also proved frustrating, and there's no "eraser" in the main input mode. Also, I tried a few of the synthesizer voices on my Tungsten T3, and they all sound the same, and VERY quiet. The demo song that is included sounds very good, but I think it would be maddeningly frustrating to try to reproduce this on your own.

I commend MiniMusic on their effort. This is an area which is quite lacking in the Palm arena, and I hope that they keep developing and enhancing this type of software. Considering other pieces of much more "polished" software (not music software, mind you) available for the price, I consider $30 to be quite steep. I would find it very difficult to compose on this.

Arthur

Palm Pilot 1000 > Palm Pilot Professional > Palm III > Palm M100 > Sony Clié PEG-T415 > Palm T|T3

RE: Nice idea
java_jonez @ 12/10/2003 12:30:52 PM #
Although I have to agree with you on the frustrating lack of an eraser and the frustrating input in general, I did find it much easier to use once I read the instructions. You can increase note length by writing a space in the grafitti area or reduce it's length using backspace. You can also apply an incidental to a note by pressing up or down using your D-pad. Like you, I applaud the effort because Palm is seriously lacking in the music notation arena. One thing that's nice is the fact that Minimusic is committed to improving their products.

RE: Nice idea
java_jonez @ 12/10/2003 12:37:37 PM #
Oops! Did I type incidental??? I meant accidental.

RE: Nice idea
ozz @ 12/10/2003 1:24:05 PM #
I guess that was an accident! :-D
RE: Nice idea
RhinoSteve @ 12/10/2003 1:46:05 PM #
Yes it is a good idea but trying to compare this to piece of Windows software is a out magnitude comparison. Thus, I do not consider what you said a valid review.

If you want to draw a good comparison, try existing PDA software or better, some of these closed design synth boxes that are out there at any music store.
RE: Nice idea
PalmSide @ 12/11/2003 2:53:50 AM #
they've got some nice software in the ppc camp...

http://www.planetgriff.com/galleria.php

a sequencer with vst-style plugins! and it's been around for a while...

aaron & co, why don't you use your sequencing library to create something like that?

RE: Nice idea
a_nonamiss @ 12/11/2003 10:08:45 AM #
[quote]
Yes it is a good idea but trying to compare this to piece of Windows software is a out magnitude comparison. Thus, I do not consider what you said a valid review.

If you want to draw a good comparison, try existing PDA software or better, some of these closed design synth boxes that are out there at any music store.
[/quote]

Please read more carefully. I was not comparing it to desktop software. I would be positively mad to think that a $30 piece of Palm software could approach the usefulness of a $450 professional composition suite running in Windows that has been under development for over a decade. I was merely stating that I was a Finale user as a point of reference.
That being said, the criticisms of this software are valid. There is no eraser, and trying to put little notes on little lines with the stylus can be very frustrating. There were also clearly screen refresh problems on my T3. When I put notes in place, then changed them, it did not refresh the area where the old note was. Also, in comparison to other Palm software on the market that retails for $30, this software definitely lacks polish. I stand behind my initial review.
Perhaps others are more patient that I and will get a lot of use out of this product. I acknowledge that it is a great step in the right direction. There is a lot of potential in the design of this product, and I wish MiniMusic the utmost success. We musicians need more and better software for the Palm OS. I would very much like to see a more polished version of this product in the future.

Arthur

Palm Pilot 1000 > Palm Pilot Professional > Palm III > Palm M100 > Sony Clié PEG-T415 > Palm T|T3

RE: Nice idea
a_nonamiss @ 12/11/2003 12:11:59 PM #
BTW, I feel that it is bad form for me to criticize without offering anything. I would gladly volunteer my experience to anyone at MiniMusic to help make this a better product. While I am not a programmer, I do have a Music degree, and have more than a few years of experience as a Computer Engineer. I have been using a Palm in some form since the first one came out in 1996. Please feel free to contact me a the email address in my profile.

Arthur

Palm Pilot 1000 > Palm Pilot Professional > Palm III > Palm M100 > Sony Clié PEG-T415 > Palm T|T3

RE: Nice idea
RhinoSteve @ 12/11/2003 1:14:17 PM #
To avoid a flame war I will not comment any further one this subject and I stand by my opinion.

RE: Nice idea
miniMusic @ 12/12/2003 7:58:27 PM #
Thanks for the comments, Arthur.

Designing any product often requires finding or choosing a balance between making it powerful/easy and making it obvious. With the limited screen space of the Palm Platform, we chose not to clutter the screen with tools and pallets the way desktop notation software does. As a result, some of the features you mention are not obvious to users of Finale, Sibelius or similar products. That doesn't mean they aren't available.

For those that don't like reading documentation we did include a single page "quick start" guide with this version that comments on how to erase notes and how to transpose by half-step (for accidentals). Instead of an extra pen mode and an "eraser tool" on screen, you can simply write a graffiti "x" to erase selected notes.

Never-the-less, many computer users still do not read the instructions and we will contnue to try and make all of the features more clear for such users.

Our Arm "soft synth" is polyphonic, but currently not multi-timbral (just one instrument sound). The window you mention that allows you to select different instruments only affects playback when in "Play To: Serial Port" or "Play To: Sound Card" modes (found in the Preferences screen) where a full General MIDI sound set is available. That is why the instruments all sound the same in the "Play To: OS 5 Sound" mode.

We do have a road map for many improvements but are always happy to hear your feedback.

-Chad
miniMusic


music studio

Finch @ 12/10/2003 3:36:03 PM #
why not just use Music Studio by MicroMad House... its much better and has low-res support with many diffrent instrument voices

RE: music studio
theharmonyguy @ 12/11/2003 8:40:00 PM #
Because music studio requires a Sony for polyphony, while this title can do it on any handheld apparently.

I echo the comments above - this is good news and there is so much potential here. I'm a Sibelius user (sorry Arthur :) and would love to have notation on my Palm. I've tried demos in the past, but none offer polyphony on my Kyocera. I plan to check this one out - even if it's rough around the edges, it may be better than nothing.

Thanks for the news, PIC!

RE: music studio
Finch @ 12/12/2003 9:15:05 AM #
i get polophony on my treo 600 :-D

RE: music studio
miniMusic @ 12/12/2003 8:29:21 PM #
miniMusic NotePad also supports all of the FM sounds available on Sony Clies with the built-in Yamaha sound chip, we've supported that for over a year. The change now is that NotePad can play polyphonicly on OS 5 handhelds that DON'T have that sound chip.

The Treo600 and Zodiac both have built-in sound chips that we will be adding support for shortly.

Finch, of course NotePad supports low-res too...

Unfortunately, theharmonyguy, if you are talking about the Kyocera 7135, since it is OS 4 it cannot run our new polyphonic synthesizer... mono sound only, on board.

Thanks for the comments.

-Chad
miniMusic

RE: music studio
theharmonyguy @ 12/15/2003 6:53:22 PM #
Aah . . . oh well . . . Us Kyo users have faced compatibility disappointments before. Maybe when the 8235 or Treo 700 come out I'll be fine. :)

Thanks for the response.

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