[Freepats] freepats for low resource computers

[Mark Constable]

On 2008-05-09 08:25, ml at distasis.com wrote:
> I've been using some of the freepats soundfonts on my Windows machine with
> Timidity and am really impressed with the output of some of the high
> quality sf2 files.  However, I've recently been experimenting with one of
> my old laptops and running DeLi Linux.  It struck me that there's a need
> for a low resource, small but still somewhat decent sounding series of
> soundfonts to run on very old computer systems.  The Windows Timidity++
> at Tim Brechbill's site comes with a small set of sound fonts (about 6MB)
> to get people started.  I'm not sure of the licensing on it though.  Was
> just thinking, it would be really nice to have a totally free and open
> source licensed version of a small midi soundfont set to run with programs
> like Timidity++ on low end computer systems.  Am wondering if anyone's run
> across anything like that with Open Source licensing or if something could
> be put together for small systems under an Open license and offered
> through the Freepats web site.

I guess you mean a fairly complete 128 voice GM sf2 soundfont set?

I totally agree and that is actually the main point of the freepats
site, to encourage that as one goal, if possible.

> Just thought I'd mention it to others on the list.  I definitely think
> there's a need for a free but compact set of midi sounds.  It would also
> make the resources of the freepats group available to even more computer
> systems.  Anyone have any further ideas on this?

The ideal would be as large a range of 24bit/96htz samples of all
types of instruments that could then be rendered into a number of
instrument sets at various quality levels. It would be even better
if some or most of the instruments could be dynamically generated
on the end users system, to save huge downloads, and also be
dynamically converted into whatever soundset in whatever format
at whatever quality, also on the end users computer... but that
is expecting way too much for now.

The minimum goal is a "reasonable quality" but mostly complete
GM set of samples that could provide a usable soundfont set...
and then be able to re-render the components into a light 16bit
32htz set for mobile or PDA devices with a license acceptable to
hardware makers (BSD-ish license perhaps).

There is actually a business case here, to offer a set of GPL3
samples for free use but then also offer a commercial closed
source license for hardware manufacturers with custom sounds
available just for that manufacturer etc. I'm all for open and
free sounds but it's such a hard thing to pull together that
perhaps commercial incentive (ie; people getting paid to do the
work) would ironically generate more free sounds than being a
completely free range operation like the freepats project.

I wish I had a spare lifetime to look into this angle.

--markc