Bluetooth midi on Windows 10

Hi,
Had a pleasant surprise testing Bluetooth midi on Windows 10. Although the virtual Bluetooth midi port was crashing all apps I tested
BMTpro was stable for hours.

Thanks!

What kind of Bluetooth midi device were you using?

It was an iPad

Thanks for your reply. Could you elaborate on how you connect the iPad to a Windows 10 PC via Bluetooth?
Thanks again.

Hi Sakis,
thanks for letting us know, and happy to know MT Pro works fine! We haven't been able to test BLE-MIDI on Windows 10 yet.

However, my latest information was that only application specifically using the "New MIDI API" in Windows 10 will be able to connect to BT MIDI devices. So does Windows allow you to create a virtual MIDI port for a BT MIDI device?

Thanks,
Florian

florian wrote:Hi Sakis,
thanks for letting us know, and happy to know MT Pro works fine! We haven't been able to test BLE-MIDI on Windows 10 yet.

However, my latest information was that only application specifically using the "New MIDI API" in Windows 10 will be able to connect to BT MIDI devices. So does Windows allow you to create a virtual MIDI port for a BT MIDI device?

Thanks,
Florian

I first paired the ipad with the PC. Nothing special happened...
Then I launched an iOS app supporting BT midi . To my surprise windows created a virtual port!
Reaper, ableton and midiox crashed after a minute using the port. But BMTpro is working!
I plan making a step by step guide for @Torch in the weekend.
@Torch try launching MidiLe app (now called Midimittr)

http://www.s-r-n.de/midile/

It's free (donationware)

I tested it with another app I bought in the past (MidiFlow). But it should work with any BTmidi app.

awesome, I need to try that!
Florian

@Torch sorry for the delay ,but don't have much spare time.
In the meantime make sure you have an iPad >=3 and iOS version >=8.

Mine is Air, and it is updated to the latest version. Take your time. I'm not in a hurry.

Wasted 4 hours, but I give up.
I don't know what happened and I am a bit frustrated right now. I wanted to make a guide but I can't do it.
Unpaired Bluetooth, uninstalled the devices from device manager ,rebooted and tried the exact steps as I did before but nothing.
Lost my previous midi port. Maybe there wasn't any and I am a bit crazy....I really don't know what happened.

Terrible sorry for the mess...

Edit : will try again (after new windows update 1607) ,as I see now (again) the BTmidi port.

Uploaded a picture (it's in Greek, but you get the point)

Sakis,
I am sorry that you hat to spend hours on this. I appreciate your efforts. These days Microsoft seems to be working hard to support musicians in the area of midi and audio. A lot of us will be happy when we Windows support BT MIDI natively.

You were using a cable from the IOS device to your Windows PC, correct? For some reason, I thought you were connecting your iPad to a Windows PC wirelessly using this app and I wanted to know how you were able to do it. I tried out the app. There is too much latency. I tried musicIO. It works very well, but you need to open a VST host shuch as Ableton Live. It also alwasy crashes Ableton Live when I close it. There is another paid IOS app that does the same but it just could not handle lots of CC#11 messages on multiple MIDI channels from my midi accordion.

If you are connecting two computers/tablets, there is a neat device. This device will give you multiple MIDI ports. http://www.ableton-live-expert.com/arti ... tion-tool/

I also use a Bluetooth midi receiver called WIDI by CME-Pro when I send midi from my keyboard or midi accordion directly to Windows machines over Bluetooth. I have paired it with the mi.1 by Quicco Sound. It works very well. It is supposed to work with any other Bluetooth midi transmitters. I tested the c.24 Miselu with the Widi Bud. They pair well. What's nice about the WIDI Bud is that I don't have to open any app, but it pairs with one device at a time.

Torch,
I have used in the past StudioMux and MusicIO apps for connecting audio/midi via usb ,but I am talking about wireless bluetooth (no cables)
This time it worked but having problems when sending tones of MidiCC (it also crashed BMTpro).

1. I paired my PC with the ipad .I clicked the connect button from PC (NOT the ipad).
Then I was asked to confirm if the codes matched .

2. I launched MidiLE app add checked "advertise Midi Service". On my PC I saw the new BT device and paired from the PC.
Then I was asked to write the code that was generated from my PC ,to the ipad.

3. I noticed that now on my ipad there was a new BT device that had the same name as my PC.I guess this is my BTmidi on PC

4. I open on PC a BT midi port (with an app like MidiOX) and now on the ipad I see my second BT device on connected status.
I switch to MidiLE app and confirm that there is a message "Connected to 'My_PC_Name'.Advertising disabled"

5. I launch an app on my ipad and choose the BT midi port that has my computer name (or whatever name your bluetooth device has on your PC) and it works!

Note that it worked on my PC with Win10 64bit and NOT on my tablet with Win10 32bit. On my tablet I couldn't find any BTmidi port when launching MidiOX,Reaper,BMTpro etc...
PS. I think that the Bluetooth dongle must be at least version 4 and above.

And a tiny detail
Please install korg's midi BT driver.
I forgot that I had installed that in the past to my PC. I installed it on the tablet and now I can see the port (step 4) on my tablet...
Maybe it acts as a bridge between apps....
http://www.korg.com/us/support/download ... /530/2886/

Thanks for the tutorial. A wireless MIDI connection between two devices is indeed nice. I can pair the Surface Pro with my iPad Air, but could not turn on 'Advertise MIDI Service." I was able to turn it on last night, but it doesn't turn on today. I will have to give it another try on a differnt tablet some other time. In the meantime, the mi.1 Bluetooth midi transmitter and the WIDI Bud receiver works well for me, but that is not between two hosts but a midi controller and a Windows machine.

Hmmm...that's strange. What's the Status message below the "Advertise Midi Service"?

Hi,
seems to be a small mess to get MIDI-BLE working with native Windows software! We're working on direct support of BT MIDI devices on Windows for future versions of our software.

Sakis, you mentioned a crash of MT Pro, do you have a crash log? Is it reproducible? Please contact us so that we can resolve this.

Thanks,
Florian

Florian, it is excitng to hear that you are working on MT to support BT midi devices. Your post made me think and try something that I would not have thought about on my own. I was so excited about it that I posted on the BomeBox forum just now. The BomeBox allows me to connect my BT midi transmitter mi.1 and a BT midi receiver Widi Bud in a wireless connection, and I am playing an exteranl midi module wirelessly from my midi controller. This is very very nice. Before this I even thought about buying another IOS device just for that. Without going through that expensive and messy route, this is simple. It's very sweet. Sakis, I've got to thank you. It all started with your post and Florian's.

No need to thank me. Florian is the one interested in BTmidi


But

Sakis wrote:Hmmm...that's strange. What's the Status message below the "Advertise Midi Service"?

I mention this again ,because on the iPad ,once a connection is made I could not turn on advertising to connect to different Bluetooth (maybe a bug on the app) .So I hard reset the iPad and everything was back to normal

Sakis, strange, but I don't know what's happened there on your iPad.
Torch, brilliant idea with the Widi Bud. I've added the information to the BomeBox FAQ.
Florian

florian wrote: We're working on direct support of BT MIDI devices on Windows for future versions of our software.

Hello Florian,
I was just wondering how you are making progress on direct support BLE MIDI in MT Pro. Also, do you think once MT Pro supports BLE MIDI, then Bomebox could receive BLE MIDI with a standard Bluetooth receiver similar to how I use the Bomebox with the WIDI Bud?

Hi Torch,
thanks. Unfortunately, it is unlikely in the near future that the BomeBox supports BLE-MIDI using standard BT dongles. We'll keep it on the list, but the problem is that BT dongles usually need proprietary drivers, and I suspect BT dongle manufacturers have other priorities than developing drivers for the BomeBox...
No updated info on BLE-MIDI support for Windows 10.
Best,
Florian