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<H3><A NAME="s1">1. Introduction</A></H3>

<P>
<P>KMidi is a midi file player and midi to wav file converter.
<P>If you have already given up on midi on Linux/Unix try this! Without
expensive hard-ware such as a Gravis Ultrasound or Sound Blaster AWE64
you will get fantastic sound comparable to what you get with the above
mentioned hard-ware. FOR FREE!
<P>The catch:
<P>
<UL>
<LI> KMidi will use your CPU time, typically about 10-30% at 32000 Hz on my
Pentium 120. If you have a slower machine, simply use the commandline options to
reduce the sample frequency. You should be able to get very decent
sound even on a 486 without straining your CPU.
</LI>
<LI>You need the sound patches. You can get a full set of general midi
sound patches  at any  Ultrasound archive. Typical storage requirements
around 10 megs. 
</LI>
</UL>
<P>Belive me, for the sound you are going to get this is a small price to pay!
<P>KMidi supports at the moment (Version 0.3) the following platforms:
<P>
<UL>
<LI>Linux</LI>
<LI>FreeBSD</LI>
<LI>DEC OSF/1</LI>
<LI>HP UX</LI>
<LI>SUN</LI>
<LI>SUN SOLARIS</LI>
</UL>
<P>Ports to other platforms should be easy. Please contact me if you ported
kmidi to another platform.
<P>KMidi uses Tuukka Toivonen's  timidity 0.2i engine 
Copyright (C) 1995 
<A HREF="mailto:toivonen@clinet.fi">Tukka Toivonen</A>  
together with 
<A HREF="mailto:iwai@dragon.mm.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp">Takashi Iwai</A> 
latest sound font patches, which enables you to use  SoundFonts with KMidi.
<P>I realize this is a rough release, and I am sure that if you try
hard enough you will be able to get KMidi to crash, but I think
KMidi is already more than usable and will hopefull give you hours
of fun. Remember Midi files are typically around 50k or less and
are therefore so easily downloaded that you will never run out of great midi's
to play.
<P>Have fun with KMidi!
<P>
<P><CODE>Bernd Johannes Wuebben</CODE>,
<A HREF="mailto:wuebben@kde.org">wuebben@kde.org</A><P>
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