Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum recording from my keyboard to laptop

I know this isn't the right place to ask this, (I have posted the same on the digital piano forum, but the posting rate on there looks slow compared to ABF - which I dont normally venture out from)

I've aquired a USB to Midi Keyboard PC Convertcable cable (it installed on my laptop as VIEWCOM (I'm running Win7))

I have a Casio CTK 591

Can anyone advice me as to what software I need to record from the keyboard, I haven't got a clue! Is there any simple software for stupid people? Free? (lol am I taking the p*ss)

I hope someone can help,

Hi Wayne,

I'm confident that mahlzeit's website has all the info you need:

http://www.pianoclues.com/

Good luck!

will take a look now Monica, thank you

Audacity, is free, very easy to use, and does a few things.
Or to be really fancy,
Bit torrent Ableton and or reason, then you can really go to town as you have a virtual studio on laptop.
Ableton has a much better sequencer than reason.

you can use all the devices in ableton from reason if you use the rewire function.

Laptop needs a duel core processor to run ableton ...

Actually Wayne, I have these progs on disc, real cost in the shops about £400 for reason and the same for ableton.

can burn you a naughty copy if your laptop is up to spec...

+1 for Audacity

Thank you Rossy, you really are a pal

I installed audacity, but I looked at it and was intimidated lol (all those buttons ha ha), I could only see recording options for using jack plugs in the audio in, rather than the usb to midi cable that I got. (or have I got that completely wrong)

Are the ones you recommend able to record via one of these cables?

I then tried the simpler "Red dot forever" (I'm not very impressed - it's a good job that I know the recording I did, DID NOT sound anything like what "Red dot forever" played back)

oh and Rossy, I'm lucky enough to have a dual core lappy with win 7

I hope we're not talking about software piracy on the forum.

No packa, I will be sending Rostosky £400, we are in the middle of PM(ing) each other now!

Wayne, you can go direct into audacity from a phono jack output on your DP to the phono/mic input onyour laptop.

But as you got a Midi to USB, then this will be absolutely sound for Reason.
(I set up this way) Once in Reason, you have access to many synths, both anologue and otherwise, a thousand and one million effects, in fact if you can dream of a sound, Reason can usually provide it...check youtube for demos etc...

It is massive, like really massive.

You can multi track, there are drum machines, loop machines, and a vocoder, etc etc etc...

Pm me .......

The problem is that Reason is way too complex if Audacity is too complex.

I'm just so impatient, and wanted to record something off the keyboard to my laptop, using the lead mentioned in th OT, RIGHT NOW!

I'm sure I'll figure "Reason" out

Hi there. Congrats on your converter to connect to your laptop! Let the world of VST's and Virtual Studios open up for you1 I currently have a dual core Windows 7 laptop as well that I use to play my piano's through. One is a pure MIDI controller and the other is a Digital Piano that is full weight 88 key keyboard that also can act as a MIDI controller. The programs that I use to record any of my songs is Sonar 7 Producer aka cakewalk. The learning curve can be steep at times but once you learn how to properly route VST's to your MIDI controller and play it back on your laptop to record its quite amazing. I recommend downloading ASIO4ALL. Its a free driver that installs and ASIO audio driver to your current system allowing lower latency. I use it all the time and It has performed wonderfully for me. No latency between pressing a key and hearing the virtual sound is key. I use a MIDI to USB adapter on my system to record the main Piano that I have and the other one is just USB connected only. Once you set up Sonar or another DAW(Digital Audio Workstation) like Ableton Live recording is generally a cinch. Most DAW's require you to "arm" the track for recording and then physically hitting the record button. After you have learned how to record from a specific DAW you can then export song into a plethora of formats such as wav, mp3, etc. If you do go the route of Sonar I advise for Mp3's to not buy there encoder but to download a free one required by Audacity called Lame MP3. Once you save the file to your computer you can point the DAW to the .dll file for the mp3 encoder and viola you didnt have to buy one from the company. Now, moving on to recording from audio cables instead of MIDI inputs and outputs. What I used to do to record my Digital Piano into my Laptop before I had a decent DAW was to take a 3.5mm audio jack to a 3.5mm audio jack and connect one to my headphone port on my digital piano and one to the microphone port to my laptop. Now some Digital Piano's come with auxiliary outputs for audio and are generally labeled left and right. You will sometimes see one hole labeled as both as well if you dont have the right cables. Now the only issue I have ran across by doing this method is that you need to turn down the mic on the computer itself in the audio options menu to almost 0 so that when you do record say through Audacity you don't have something so distorted and loud that it's unrecognizable. I also found that on my Digital Piano that by turning down the physical volume of the entire piano also helped to find the right fit for recording into Audacity. Once you do record into Audacity you can easily use the LAME MP3 encoder to export as mp3. Remember you will have to download that separately from the main program as well and point towards it. A simple google search should tell you exactly how to do that. I hope some of this information helped you out and if you have any more questions don't hesitate to ask. Also on a side note if you are wanting something simple to set up and play then I suggest taking a look at Mixcraft 5. It's the closest thing I have found to Garageband for Mac on windows. It isnt free but they have a demo version you can try and it comes pre loaded with tons of col sounds and effects and is very easy to get set up.

Well, I finally got Reason 5 and installed it on my laptop, plugged in my keyboard via the usb to midi, selected Grand Piano and I was off. I plugged my laptops audio out into my mixer which goes to an amp, and it sounds like I've got a grand piano, the neighbours probabily wonder how I've managed to fit it in my music room, lol.

I did notice the sound is a little delayed, but I managed to play regardless.



would this work for Reason also?

Yes, the ultimate answer Wayne is called an "audio interface"
(just read expense) Ableton live 8 has no latency, AND you can use all of reasons devices in it by using the rewire function.
Ask and thou shalt recieve.

Ps nearly did a post entitled "The reason for Wayne being awol" (get it the "reason"?)

PS, if you want, you can open up many grand pianos in reason, and play them all at once!

Think I better take this one step at a time. So firstly I'm gonna try downloading ASIO4ALL and see what difference it makes.

I'll get hold of Ableton live 8, and keep it to one side



AWOL lmao, have I been away that long, do I need a doctors note?

If you opened up an instance of a device for a grand piano, just open up another device underneath it Wayne, and so on..
You can open up as many devices as you wish,no harm done, you can just close them again if you dont like!

My guess is you will have used NNXT advanced sampler? well try opening another underneath, and having strings, and another with say brass, and then say opening up delay under that etc.... its BIG isnt it?? enough for a lifetimes hobby and learning?

Oh no........I downloaded ASIO4ALL and installed it and now there's no sound from Reason at all. I've uninstalled ASIO4ALL and still no sound. The sounds working on my laptop, just not in Reason.

Would I have to install ASIO4ALL and then re-install reason?