Go to: 01 Directory First 01W page

MIDI Data Conversions

Topics
Revised: 15May10

Number System Basics

What is Binary?

Computers are simply switches. Millions of them, perhaps, and specially organized, but really just lots of switches.

A switch is open or closed. Think of your flashlight. It's just a switch, a power source (battery), and a light. If the switch is open, electricity can't flow, and the light is off. If the switch is open, electricity flows, and the light is on.

We can show if a switch is open or closed by using a one ("1") or a zero ("0"). For example, if the switch is open, let's call that a zero, or "0". If the switch is closed, that would be a one, or "1". This is quite arbitrary - we could just as easily done it the other way around (and we actually do just that in intermediate binary class), but for now, 0 = off, or nothing, and 1 = on, or something.

Representing Numbers

Suppose you had a friend in the house across the way, and every night, the two of you signal each with flashlights. If you were practical, you would learn Morse code, and that would work fine. But then this lesson would be over, and you wouldn't know binary. So forget morse code.

Suppose you had four flashlights, and you wanted to send a phone number. If 0 = off and 1 = on, here's a table of flashlight codes you could use to send zero through nine:
 
 

Binary Coded Decimal (BCD) Table
Decimal Four-Flashlight Code (4-Bit Binary)
0 0000
1 0001
2 0010
3 0011
4 0100
5 0101
6 0110
7 0111
8 1000
9 1001

On to Hex

Now, Binary Coded Decimal (BCD) is very common where numbers are displayed (like clocks and cash registers). But notice that we haven't used up all the possible flashlight (binary) codes. There are six codes not being used (1010, 1011, 1100, 1101, 1110, and 1111). For maximum efficiency, we want to use these codes, so we assign them sequential capital letters, starting with "A". The result is:
 
 
Hexadecimal ("Hex") Table
Hexadecimal  Binary Hexadecimal  Binary
0 0000 8 1000
1 0001 9 1001
2 0010 A 1010
3 0011 B 1011
4 0100 C 1100
5 0101 D 1101
6 0110 E 1110
7 0111 F 1111

On to Bytes

You've seen how four bits can represent any number up to 16. What if you had five bits, how many numbers could you send? Answer: 32. Six bits? 64 numbers. Seven bits? 128.

If we have eight bits, two groups of four, we can represent 256 values. Eight bits is called a "byte". If you see something is called "byte-wide", that means it is eight bits wide. (By the way, and you don't see this much anymore, 4-bits is called a "nibble", or if you really want to be cute, "nybble".)

Anyway, we can show the value of a byte by dividing the byte down the middle into two groups of four, then using the hex code for each nibble. Examples:
 

8-bit Binary - to - Hex Encoding Examples
Binary 4-Bit Groups Hex Encoding Final Hex Code
01010001 0101   0001 5   1 51h
10101110 1010   1110 A   E AEh
11110111 1111   0111 F   7 F7h

Base Labels

Here's a value: "51". Is it a decimal 51 or a hexadecimal 51? When there is room for confusion, we add a letter to indicate the number base (base 2 = binary, base 16 = hex, etc.). Unfortunately, there is no one way to do this. Different cultures (corporate or otherwise) use different codes.

Decimal is fairly standard - put a lower case "d" at the end (like, "51d").

Hex, on the other hand, has at least three "standards":
lower case "h" suffix (51h)
upper case "H" suffix (51H)
"0x" prefix (0x51)

Terminology

Most Significant Bit (MSB): The left-most bit (which represents the highest value). The "1" in 1000000 is the MSB.

Least Significant Bit (LSB): The right-most bit (which represents the lowest value). The "1" in 00000001 is the LSB.

Onward

Now that you understand bits and bytes, you are ready to learn how the 01 sends data over MIDI. Technically, the 01/W uses Packed Transmission with the Most Significant Bits sent first.

Format Conversions

As long as you are sending standard MIDI messages (like Note On, Volume, Pan, Controller Change, etc.), every bit position is defined, and there are no conversion issues. But what if you send a System Exclusive (SysEx) message? These manufacturer-specific messages are not defined by the MIDI standard - manufacturers can do whatever they want. So, when it comes time to send a byte of SysEx data, we run smack into...

The 8-Bits into 7-Bits Problem

Internal to the Korg 01/W (and most MIDI instruments), 8-bit data is used. MIDI Data bytes also use 8 bits, but the MSB must be "0" (Click here if you must know why.). This means there are only 7 bits available for data in a MIDI Data byte. How do we squeeze 8 bits from the 01 byte into the 7 bits of a MIDI Data byte?

You can't. Every time you put an 8-bit byte into 7 MIDI Data bits, you're gonna have one bit left over. You need a scheme to get these left-over data bits into the MIDI transfer somehow. Different manufacturers use different schemes, and some manufacturers use different schemes in different products.

The 01/W Conversion Scheme

Remember a MIDI Data byte holds 7 bits. The 01 first grabs seven 8-bit bytes. It then takes the MSB of each byte and puts it into a new MIDI Data byte. The result is 8 bytes of 7 bits each, one byte containing nothing but the MSBs of the other seven bytes.

This group of eight MIDI Data bytes is then sent out one bit at a time, starting with the MSB byte, then byte 0, byte 1, ... , byte 6, and finally byte 7.

Converting 8-Bit Data to MIDI 7-Bit Data for Packed Transmission, MSBs Sent First.

The 01 converts 8-bit internal data to 7-bit MIDI data as follows:

Step 1

Group the 8-bit data into 7 bytes (byte 0, byte 1, byte 2, ... , byte 6). In 01 terminology, DATA is (1 set =  7 bytes of 8 bits each). Order the bytes so the first byte (Byte 0) is on the left with additional byte to the right. This is just like reading English, left-to-right.
 
01/W 8-bit Internal Data (7 bytes worth)
Byte 0 Byte 1 Byte 2 Byte 3 Byte 4 Byte 5 Byte 6
00000000 10001000 01000100 11001100 00100010 10101010 01100110

Step 2

Build a byte containing only the MSB of those seven bytes. Bit 0 come from Byte 0, bit 1 comes from Byte 1, and so on. Call this the MSB Byte.

Building the MIDI 7-bit "MSB Byte"
bit 7 bit 6 bit 5 bit 4 bit 3 bit 2 bit 1 bit 0
always 0 MSB of 
Byte 6		 MSB of 
Byte 5		 MSB of 
Byte 4		 MSB of 
Byte 3		 MSB of 
Byte 2		 MSB of 
Byte 1		 MSB of 
Byte 0
0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

Step 3

Mask out (that is, set to zero) the MSB of all the original 8-bit bytes (set all MSBs = 0).
 
MIDI Data (7 bytes of 01 data in 8 MIDI bytes)
MSB Byte 0 Byte 1 Byte 2 Byte 3 Byte 4 Byte 5 Byte 6
00101010 00000000 00001000 01000100 01001100 00100010 00101010 01100110

Step 4

Send the MIDI data , leading off with the MSB Byte (byte MSB, byte 0, byte 1, byte 2, ... byte 6). In  01 terminology, MIDI DATA (1 set = 8 bytes of 7 bits each).

Reminder: This applies to 01 internal data only. All external MIDI stuff (like SysEx headers, MIDI commands/instructions) are already in MIDI format.

go to Top of page.

Converting "MIDI 7-Bit Data" to "01 8-Bit Data"

Why? If you do a MIDI Dump from the 01, like into your computer-based sequencer, you will see a series of MIDI bytes that don't exactly line up with what you read in the 01 MIDI Tables. That's because internal to the 01, 8-bit data is used. MIDI uses 7-bit data, with the MSB = 0.

To understand the MIDI data, you must convert the 7-bit MIDI data to 8-bit internal data as follows:

Step 1

Write your MIDI data in same order it was received, first received byte on the left, next byte to the right, and so on ( byte 0, byte 1, byte 2, ... byte 7).

MIDI Data (7 bytes of 01 data in 8 MIDI bytes)
MIDI 
Byte 0		 MIDI 
Byte 1		 MIDI 
Byte 2		 MIDI 
Byte 3		 MIDI 
Byte 4		 MIDI 
Byte 5		 MIDI 
Byte 6		 MIDI 
Byte 7
01 
MSB		 01 
Byte 0		 01 
Byte 1		 01 
Byte 2		 01 
Byte 3		 01 
Byte 4		 01 
Byte 5		 01 
Byte 6
00101010 00000000 00001000 01000100 01001100 00100010 00101010 01100110

Step 2

Move each bit out of the MSB Byte to the MSB of all the original 8-bit bytes. Bit 0 goes to Byte 0, bit 1 to Byte 1, through bit 6 to Byte 6. (Bit 7 is always 0, and doesn't go to any Byte.)

Restoring the 8th Bit of Each Byte
bit 7 bit 6 bit 5 bit 4 bit 3 bit 2 bit 1 bit 0
always 0 MSB of 
Byte 6		 MSB of 
Byte 5		 MSB of 
Byte 4		 MSB of 
Byte 3		 MSB of 
Byte 2		 MSB of 
Byte 1		 MSB of 
Byte 0
0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0

You now have 7 bytes of 01/W 8-bit internal data.

01/W 8-bit Internal Data (7 bytes worth)
Byte 0 Byte 1 Byte 2 Byte 3 Byte 4 Byte 5 Byte 6
00000000 10001000 01000100 11001100 00100010 10101010 01100110
 
go to Top of page.

Why MIDI Data is only 7 bits?

MIDI uses 8 bits for all transfers, but the MIDI language defines two classes of messages: Status and Data. Status messages have Bit 7, the MSB, = 1. Data messages have Bit 7 = 0. So, if we tried to send eight bits of data in a Data message, and Bit 7 happened to be a "1", then our data would be interpreted as a Status message - which it isn't.

In other words, MIDI is an 8-bit language. If we used all eight bits for data, there would be no way to say what to do with the data - no way to identify MIDI commands.

go to Top of page.

Copyright ©1998, 2015 by Ken Westover at Cliff Canyon Publishing Co. All rights reserved.
This material may not be distributed without the written permission of the author.
E-mail questions or comments to cliffcan@indra.com.

Go to: 01 Directory First 01W page Top of this page.
1505100814