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Don McCullough
Registered Member

Date Joined Aug 2005
Total Posts : 245

Posted 8/4/2015 3:41 PM (GMT -6)

I've used Finale a long time and never experienced this odd behavior... a channel/instrument will suddenly go slightly flat. This occurs in 1 of 2 scenarios: 1.) I am simply playing the keyboard through a channel (not recording) and the pitch will suddenly change or 2.) when I start playback, one or more of the channels is already flat. If I go in and change the offending channel to a different channel, it will go back to normal (for a while). This occurs in VST or Midi and on old and new files.

Btw, the change in pitch is less than a half step. Nonetheless, I've checked transpositions.

Any thoughts are appreciated.

Don

Don McCullough
Composer and Conductor
www.donaldmccullough.com

Finale 2014.a.v3535
Full GPO 4
Windows 7 Home Premium
Intel Core i7-2600
CPU @ 3.40GHz
8.00 GB RAM
64-bit operating system

Motet
Isorhythmic

Date Joined Dec 2002
Total Posts : 12849

Posted 8/4/2015 3:54 PM (GMT -6)

This could be due to a hardware issue with a processor (sound card rather than CPU) being maxed out. I would try shutting down and turning the power off, then rebooting.

Finale 2011b, 2005, TGTools
Finale 2014d demo
Windows 7, MIDI input
Finale Transposition Chart

Don McCullough
Registered Member

Date Joined Aug 2005
Total Posts : 245

Posted 8/4/2015 4:45 PM (GMT -6)

Thanks for the idea, Motet. I tried what you suggested. Even turned off Avast and anything I could think of running in the background. Same issues I'm afraid.

Don McCullough
Composer and Conductor
www.donaldmccullough.com

Finale 2014.a.v3535
Full GPO 4
Windows 7 Home Premium
Intel Core i7-2600
CPU @ 3.40GHz
8.00 GB RAM
64-bit operating system

Don McCullough
Registered Member

Date Joined Aug 2005
Total Posts : 245

Posted 8/4/2015 4:59 PM (GMT -6)

If it helps any....

-If I play a note on my external keyboard it is flat. BUT... If I open VST and click on a channel/instrument and click the same note on the virtual keyboard, the pitch is correct.

-I tried unplugging the external keyboard... no change.

-If I switch back to whatever I'm not using (VST to Midi and vice versa) it will often fix it for a while.

Don McCullough
Composer and Conductor
www.donaldmccullough.com

Finale 2014.a.v3535
Full GPO 4
Windows 7 Home Premium
Intel Core i7-2600
CPU @ 3.40GHz
8.00 GB RAM
64-bit operating system

Zuill
"The Troll"

Date Joined Oct 2003
Total Posts : 29077

Posted 8/4/2015 5:23 PM (GMT -6)

This is probably caused by the known issue regarding the pitch wheel. The bug can actually be a useful tool in some circumstances, but not normally. One thing you can do to fix the immediate issue is to go into the MIDI menu and choose the item to send a MIDI value. Send a 0 pitch wheel value for the chosen staff.

Zuill

"When all is said and done, more is said than done."

~~Finale 2002b, 2003a, 2004b, 2005b, Win XP SP3~~, 2011b Win 7 64bit, 2012a Bought and Paid For (Hopefully soon 2012b with some of the MAJOR BUGS fixed--well, now with 2012b and some of the bugs are fixed) 2012c, with some bug fixes. ~~2014c at present.~~ Now 2014d.

Favorite Forum quote: "Please, everybody, IGNORE THE TROLL!"

Motet
Isorhythmic

Date Joined Dec 2002
Total Posts : 12849

Posted 8/4/2015 6:50 PM (GMT -6)

Ah! (I think this came up before recently, no?)

In a former life I worked on sounds for model trains. When the processor maxed out, the sounds would go flat because it couldn't keep up with the sampling rate.

Finale 2011b, 2005, TGTools
Finale 2014d demo
Windows 7, MIDI input
Finale Transposition Chart

Don McCullough
Registered Member

Date Joined Aug 2005
Total Posts : 245

Posted 8/4/2015 7:04 PM (GMT -6)

Motet got me to thinking and looking around. My Hard Drive (which is BIG) was nearly full - main problem? Restore points!! Deleted those suckers (and reduced the percentage it's allowed to use) and the problem seemed to go away. Just in case, I also used the windows resource monitor and discovered a program that was using 25% of my CPU. Ended that process and playback is the best I've heard it in a long time.

Maybe this will help someone else down the road. Thanks for the help gentlemen!!

Don

Don McCullough
Composer and Conductor
www.donaldmccullough.com

Finale 2014.a.v3535
Full GPO 4
Windows 7 Home Premium
Intel Core i7-2600
CPU @ 3.40GHz
8.00 GB RAM
64-bit operating system

Don McCullough
Registered Member

Date Joined Aug 2005
Total Posts : 245

Posted 8/6/2015 3:25 PM (GMT -6)

UPDATE: My Eden was short-lived. The problems remains. The only thing that works is Zuill's suggestion:

MIDI/Audio > Send MIDI Value ... > select Pitch Wheel '0' > Send>Done
This corrects the pitch but it comes back A LOT!

Don McCullough
Composer and Conductor
www.donaldmccullough.com

Finale 2014.a.v3535
Full GPO 4
Windows 7 Home Premium
Intel Core i7-2600
CPU @ 3.40GHz
8.00 GB RAM
64-bit operating system

Jetcopy
Registered Member

Date Joined Oct 2000
Total Posts : 4795

Posted 8/6/2015 3:31 PM (GMT -6)

Does your music contain any glisses or pitch bend smart shapes? If so, try deleting them.

Retina Macbook Pro OSX 10.9.5, 2.5GHz Intel Core i7, 16 GB RAM

Motet
Isorhythmic

Date Joined Dec 2002
Total Posts : 12849

Posted 8/6/2015 4:18 PM (GMT -6)

Selection tool, Select All, Edit->Clear Selected Items, MIDI Data.

Finale 2011b, 2005, TGTools
Finale 2014d demo
Windows 7, MIDI input
Finale Transposition Chart

Don McCullough
Registered Member

Date Joined Aug 2005
Total Posts : 245

Posted 8/7/2015 5:22 PM (GMT -6)

Jetcopy, no glisses, in fact, I was writing out a straightforward hymn harmonization the other day for my choir and it went wonky on me in that simple file. I can also play the keyboard, say for speedy entry, and the pitch will just suddenly drop. So it seems that it's not anything "IN" the document that's doing it and it seems unrelated to playback.

Motet, I had tried, several times, what you suggested. Seems logical but it didn't help.

I think it might be something that's gone bad in my sound card (part of my motherboard). Does that make any sense??

Thanks!

Don McCullough
Composer and Conductor
www.donaldmccullough.com

Finale 2014.a.v3535
Full GPO 4
Windows 7 Home Premium
Intel Core i7-2600
CPU @ 3.40GHz
8.00 GB RAM
64-bit operating system

Zuill
"The Troll"

Date Joined Oct 2003
Total Posts : 29077

Posted 8/7/2015 5:44 PM (GMT -6)

I believe this glitch is limited to VST. Try working in MIDI and then change to VST for playback if needing to make a recording. If you only need the MIDI note data, try limiting what you send to just that, if possible. Is your MIDI Thru set to Smart? Do you have the keyboard hooked up both in and out? I limit my hookup (MIDI to USB) to just In (keyboard Out to computer In). I get odd behavior when MIDI data comes back to the keyboard while it is sending data.

Zuill

"When all is said and done, more is said than done."

Favorite Forum quote: "Please, everybody, IGNORE THE TROLL!"

BrassOrigins
Registered Member

Date Joined Aug 2013
Total Posts : 16

Posted 8/9/2015 1:06 PM (GMT -6)

It's not limited to VST.
I'm having the same (horrible!!) problems with Midi.
My personal solution: I pull the plug off my keyboard, re-plug and go thorugh device set up.
There are days when I have to re-adjust the keyboard every couple of minutes.
On other days even working for 10 hours is fine.
Hwen this happens, a "54" appears on my masterkeyboard and down goes the pitch.
Really annoying.

BTW: We had to stop using VST due to white noise problems which are said to only occur in Mac....we use a PC/Windows Vista with Finale 2009.
So it's definitely an issue in both VST and Midi.

Jule

The problem with common sense is, it's not very common.

Post Edited (BrassOrigins) : 8/9/2015 1:20:59 PM (GMT-5)

Zuill
"The Troll"

Date Joined Oct 2003
Total Posts : 29077

Posted 8/9/2015 10:48 PM (GMT -6)

I've been using Finale since 1996 without ever seeing this problem. I would have no idea what might cause this. I only know of the one fix I mentioned, which does not cure the problem. Oh well. Some of us are just lucky, I guess.

Zuill

"When all is said and done, more is said than done."

Favorite Forum quote: "Please, everybody, IGNORE THE TROLL!"

Drumkat
Registered Member

Date Joined Jun 2003
Total Posts : 51

Posted 8/16/2015 11:13 PM (GMT -6)

Same thing just happened to me on 2014 on a Mac. Using your fix it seemed to do the job (at least right now!) Thought it was a Kontakt problem. Funny cause everything I did didn't seem to be doing anything. But, it's working, in tune!!!!

Jolora
Registered Member

Date Joined Mar 2009
Total Posts : 684

Posted 8/17/2015 9:55 PM (GMT -6)

Zuill said...
I believe this glitch is limited to VST. Try working in MIDI and then change to VST for playback if needing to make a recording. If you only need the MIDI note data, try limiting what you send to just that, if possible. Is your MIDI Thru set to Smart? Do you have the keyboard hooked up both in and out? I limit my hookup (MIDI to USB) to just In (keyboard Out to computer In). I get odd behavior when MIDI data comes back to the keyboard while it is sending data.

Don,

Zuill's response here gave me an idea (probably a dumb one; I am not much for using a midi keyboard with Finale): Is it possible you are inadvertently nudging the pitch wheel? Or could it be stuck a shade off of 0 somehow (lint, dust, baby spit-up, cracker crumbs)? Or is there a way to calibrate it or the keyboard's overall tuning? Anything along these lines?

If you think this is a stupid idea, well, I told you I was a neophyte at this.

Joe

Finale v1 through 2014d
JW Plugins; TG Tools (Full)
Garritan GPO 4; Garritan COMB 2; Garritan JABB 3
Anvil Studio 2015 midi editor

Windows 8.1u 64-bit, Intel i7-4771, 32GB RAM

Don McCullough
Registered Member

Date Joined Aug 2005
Total Posts : 245

Posted 8/21/2015 7:37 PM (GMT -6)

Thanks, Jolora. It's not a bad thought, but I tried disconnecting my midi keyboard and rebooting. It still did the same thing.
I've used the same keyboard and computer for years and Finale for 20ish years. This just appeared suddenly. probably some MS update or a deteriorating sound card or something.

Don McCullough
Composer and Conductor
www.donaldmccullough.com

Finale 2014.a.v3535
Full GPO 4
Windows 7 Home Premium
Intel Core i7-2600
CPU @ 3.40GHz
8.00 GB RAM
64-bit operating system

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