I was playing a 4-staff/4-track “Cannon in D” on my external Motif Rack-ES, and I kept changing the channel 1/track 1 tone, which was correctly displayed on the synth.  The tone never really changed much, if at all.  I soloed the track and noticed that the tone being played was not what was being sent.  It was playing a trumpet/sax sound even though Pre1 voice 01, ap:Full Grand” was displayed in the Multi voice display on the Rack-ES.

I complained about GM voices not sounding correctly a year or two ago, but now I realize that certain MIDI channels play the wrong tone all the time in Multi mode.  I have tried to see if there was some fixed offset to the patch that is playing to the one selected but can’t find it in the same bank or at the same voice position on any another bank.  These symptom occur via a MIDI or USB connection.

Here’s my setup:
1.  Windows Vista 64 SP3, but this used to happen on Win XP over the last 2 years.
2.  Overture notation/sequencing program v4.1 patch level 19 (the latest), but this happened on previous patch levels, and from Sonar 8 Producer.
3.  Yamaha Motif Rack-ES v1.03.
4.  Full factory reset was done on the Rack-ES.  MIDI/USB control was verified/ configured.

The results:
5.  Program changes are received successfully over MIDI, and are correctly displayed in the Multi display window after they are sent.
6.  The wrong tone plays on MIDI channel 1 and some others as I remember from last year’s efforts.  If I select Preset1 voice 01 (ap:Full Grand) via MIDI, the ES display eflects the correct patch and a different trumpet/sax-like voice sounds.

Does anyone else ever see this?
-Mike

I assume you called Customer Support and they got you straight, correct?

Not yet.  I owe it to them to get the Rack ES updated to v1.03.  After that I will call them if needed.  What a great bunch of guys they are.  You have responded to my problem in another recent topic concerning using Windows Media Player to update the OS, and I will continue there.
Thanks,
-Mike

Response from Bad_Mister about the wrong tone that is playing from my Rack ES (continued from another forum topic)…

The update will do nothing to change how the Motif-Rack ES works in regards to this - so let’s see if we can resolve the issue you’ve had “for years” even before updating your unit.

When you hear the sound Trumpet/sax tone - are you
1) Certain it is the Motif_Rack ES? Try turning the volume down on the Motif-Rack ES - do you still hear the trumpet/sax tone.
This will eliminate other sound sources like your computer’s software synthesizer.

2) Do you have any PLG150 boards installed in your Motif-Rack ES
to check do the following:
Press [UTILITY]
PAGE [>] until you reach the “PLG1SYS” screen
What does it say on this screen?

I was finally able to update the Rack ES, but as advertized, it had no effect on my problem.  I did, however, unplug the PLG100VH board while I had the Rack ES out of the instrument rack.  BTW, the PLG100VH doesn’t seem to be available to buy anymore, per Motifator Shop.

Previously I had turned the ES volume to 0 and the odd voice that was playing dropped off along with the other channels that were playing.  I had forgotten all about that one PLG board that was installed for all of these years.  Now with the VH board unplugged, everything is playing correctly, no more strange voices.  I would like to be able to use the VH daughter board.  Where do we go from here?

Added moral:  Bad Mister is a genius of deduction.  He seriously needs a raise.

I have to get this resolved.  How can I get the PLG100-VH board to play nice with the Rack ES?
-Mike

You cannot. Here’s why:
The PLG100-VH is a vocal harmony board. It requires an A/D (analog-to-digital) input - a place to plug in a microphone. The Motif, Motif ES, S90 and S90 ES are all keyboards and could all use the PLG100-VH - the rack units cannot because they simply do not support audio inputs.

Oh-oh.  I’m busted.  I took the ES apart only to find out that the PLG150-VL (Virtual Acoustic) is installed, not the PLG100-VH (Vocal Harmony) board.

Now I have the VL board unplugged so that the Rack ES works properly.  Does this mean that the PLG150-VL is incompatible, or is there some setting that I need to make for it to work properly without interfering with normal voice parts in Multi mode?

Sorry for not listing the correct PLG before.  I hate to waste people’s time.

I just started using the ES rack with Studio Manager this weekend and had the same problem.

I have the AN board installed and when using a multi, midi channel one always played the first sound of one bank of AN sounds, and I couldn’t change it no matter what was selected.

I found a setting on the hardware unit itself, in the ‘utility’ area, on the plg1 page, I think it was called something like ‘port’ number.
I changed it to ‘3’, and now midi channel one works correctly.

Not sure if this is the right solution though, or what port 3 means.

Maybe port 1 is for the base unit, and ports 2 and 3 are for the plug-in boards?

WildBill,
I think that Port 1 might be the A-bank of 16 MIDI channels, and Port 2 would be the B-bank of 16.  Thus, the two PLG boards would then be ports 3 and 4.  Just a guess.

I couldn’t find the PLG page on the Rack ES Utilities.  The only setting that I found was PlgAutoLload on the MIDI page and the settings are on/off.  Can you tell me how to navigate to the PLG1 page?
-----
Whoops!  Never mind.  The options for the PLG’s don’t show up in Utility mode unless the board is actually plugged in.  I had unplugged mine so that the rest of the Rack ES would behave properly.  Once I plugged the cable into the PLG-VL board, I could see the new utility page, and thus change the setting.  I changed it to 3 because it worked for you, but the original setting was None.

Aack and alas!  If I had tried what Bad Mister had said months ago I would have this resolved by now.  Problem was at that point I had already unpluged the board so I couldn’t see the settings.  Aaaaarg!
-Mike