What To Do If You Do Not Hear Any Sound

If you do not hear any sound during playback of a song, you should use the Quick MIDI Device Setup to try out alternative MIDI playback devices that are available on your system.

Sometimes another program, such as Windows Media Player, will  set the MIDI sound level on your sound card to zero ("0") after it is closed.   With Windows Media Player 11 (WMP), this happens if WMP is the default MIDI player.  If you’ve installed WMP 11 and used the "Typical" setup, then it will be the default player, and thus is probably causing your "no sound" problem with  Musician.  To re-set the MIDI volume on your sound card, please follow these steps.  These are the exact steps to take with Windows XP.  Other operating systems will have quite similar steps:

2.  Select "Control Panel."

3. In the Control Panel, select "Sounds and Audio Devices".

4. In the tab marked "Volume", click the "Advanced" button.

5. You should now see the Playback Control panel (see picture below).  Check the slider for "MIDI" and use your mouse to "grab" and move it up if it is set to the bottom.

6. Click the red "x" in the upper right corner to exit and save the new setting.

If you have WMP 11 set as your default player, you will need to repeat this procedure after each time you use WMP to play MIDI files.  If you use Musician often, you may want to "associate" your Notation product as the default MIDI player, to avoid having to reset your sound card’s volume each time you use a program that is different than WMP. 

This topic offers several possible explanations and remedies for the problem of no sound. Some explanations and remedies are not specific to Musician. It is quite possible that you will not hear MIDI playback in any MIDI program, not just Musician. If you have explored several possible explanations and remedies within Musician, and still do not hear sound, it is a good idea to determine whether the problem is just with using Musician, or whether the problem is common to any MIDI program on your system. A good way to do this is to try playing a MIDI file using another MIDI program. We recommend using the Windows Multimedia Player, which is almost always installed on a Windows system. For detailed instructions on testing MIDI playback using the Windows Multimedia Player, see the procedure at the end of this topic.

The first test you should do within Musician is to try the Test Playback option in the Quick MIDI Device Setup window. If you unexpectedly do not hear sound for a particular device, then several possible explanations and remedies are offered below. The most common explanations, and the easiest ones to solve, are listed first:

Another application is using the MIDI output device.

In this case, exit the other application and try the MIDI device again in Musician. It may be necessary to also exit Musician and then start Musician again.

The volume level in Musician is set to zero.

In this case, increase Musician's volume level.

The Windows sound volume level is set to zero, or is muted. In this case, click the following icon in the Windows taskbar at the bottom of the screen:

          on Windows XP, or on earlier versions of Windows

Windows will then display the following sound volume level control:

Make sure that the volume level is above the lowest setting, and that there is no check mark for Mute.

The specific volume level for MIDI playback is muted or set to an inaudible level.

On some versions of Windows, the volume level for playback of MIDI can be controlled separately from the volume level for playback of other types of audio. Make sure that the volume level for MIDI playback is not zero and not muted, as follows.

Click the Windows Start menu at the bottom, left corner of the screen. Windows will display a pop-up menu. Choose the Settings / Control Panel option. In the Control Panel folder, choose the option named "Sounds and Audio Devices" or "Sounds and Multimedia":

   -- OR --

Windows XP will display the Sounds and Audio Devices dialog box. Click the Volume tab. Under "Device Volume", click the Advanced button.

Windows will display the Playback Control panel. It looks like the following on Windows XP, and similar to this on earlier versions of Windows:

Observe that there is a separate volume control for MIDI. Make sure that the MIDI volume level is above the lowest setting, and that there is no check mark for Mute.

You selected an external playback device, but there is no external MIDI device, such as a MIDI keyboard, connected via a MIDI cable to the MIDI Out connector of your sound card.

In this case, choose an internal playback device instead of an external device. The MIDI Device Configuration Window indicates whether a device is internal or external.

There is a problem with the external MIDI device or cable connecting it to your computer.

If the output device is an external MIDI synthesizer or sound module connected via a MIDI cable to the MIDI output connector of your sound card, then there are a couple of reasons why you may not hear any sound.

The device driver for the MIDI device is not installed correctly.

To determine if this is the case, explore whether this MIDI device can be used by another MIDI application, such as the Windows Multimedia Player, as described in the last procedure of this topic.

If the device cannot be used in other MIDI applications, then try re-installing the device drivers for your MIDI sound card.

Sometimes problems with non-responsive MIDI devices can be resolved by updating the driver to the most recent one available from its manufacturer. Search the Internet for the manufacturer's web site. Look for the "download" or "drivers" section of its web site. Find and download the driver that matches the model of your MIDI device and the version of Windows you are using (Windows 98, Me, 2000, XP, etc.)

To test the playback of MIDI files using another MIDI program on your system, and using a specific MIDI playback device:
 

NOTE: Although the names of the Windows options, folders, and dialog boxes vary among different versions of Windows, the following instructions are still basically the same.

 
1.        Review, and optionally change, the default MIDI playback device that Windows chooses for playing MIDI files:

Windows will display the Start menu.

Windows will display the Control Panel folder.

Windows will display the Sounds and Multimedia Properties window.

The window will look like this:

Windows will display a menu.

This will start the Windows Media Player program.

c:\Program Files\Notation Musician\Songs