Can anyone help me connect the OP1 keyboard to the Play + via a Widi Jack bluetooth midi device? I have the Widi connected to the OP1 and TRS out of the Widi into the Play. The Play is set to TRS midi in on channel one, the OP1 set to send midi out to channel 1. Yet no notes are triggered. I must be missing something obvious that i cant find in either manual. Can one of you kind souls help me out? I just want to play the notes on the Play with the OP1, should be simple, no? Enormous thanks to anyone that can help!
@marchellner , just making sure: on the Play, do you have Notes In set to MIDI in Jack?
Notes in Channel set to Omni can’t hurt either.
If this doesn’t work, the next thing I would do is to test the OP1 with something else to be sure that notes are getting out of that device and/or try a different synth / MIDI controller to see if you get notes into the Play.
If this doesn’t bring any information, then the next thing to look at is the WIDI connection, and try with a cable if possible at all.
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I was able to connect the WIDI (via BLE) to my Mac, then connect the OP1 to the Mac (via USB) and this way i am able to send midi notes from the OP1 into Ableton and then back out to the WIDI (via BLE). So, the device works and midi out works on the OP1. But the problem is that when connected over BLE the OP1 does not send midi to the WIDI. I know this has worked for others but I’m stumped. Thanks for your support- I really want this to work!
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Are you able to test with a MIDI cable, to be sure that it’s the WIDI and not something else?
Yeah, the OP1 sends BLE to my mac using LightBlue as well as sending midi to my Mac via the USB cable. The Play + receives midi fine from a corded Keystep. The problem seems to be the WIDI not receiving BLE from the OP1. This should be so easy, but alas…
Is this one of those MIDI type A / type B situations? How does the WIDI handle this?
Oddly enough, it works if you broadcast the BLE but don’t actually link the OP1F and Play +
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@marchellner Hi. I’m in the exact same boat, struggling to connect my OP1-Field to the Play+. I’m curious about your current status.
I can connect my Play+ to my new 2024 iPad mini directly via USB-C for audio+MIDI, and the iPad seems to be able to power the Play+ just fine. I can’t connect two such devices, say the Play+ and my OP-1F to my iPad via my Belkin USB-C 4-ports hub, because the iPad doesn’t aggregate audio interfaces (it will just show either the Play+ or the OP1F for audio). But a laptop can do that I assume.
What puzzles me is that I can’t connect my Play+ directly to my OP1F via USB-C for audio+midi+power, because the OP1F does not seem to be able to give it enough power. The Play+ will start alright, but as soon as both get busy playing tracks, it shuts down. I can’t find an official spec as to how much power the OP-1 Field can deliver…
So right now my setup is:
- the Play+ USB-C port is for power only, through a USB power-bank,
- the Play+ MIDI in/out TRS jacks are connected to the OP-1 USB-C port via a small-ish LEKATO MIDI to USB C audio interface for MIDI notes, clock/sync, transport,
- the Play+ audio out is connected to the OP-1 line-in so that I can listen to it and record it.
This allows me to start the Play+ from the OP1F, send notes to the Play+, receive audio & notes from the Play+, etc.
That’s a lot of cables still, and also prevents me from powering the OP1F at the same time, hence why I’m curious about wireless Bluetooth dongles. The CME Widi Master seems popular, and some people are having success with it (?).
I know the OP1-F can advertises itself as a wireless MIDI device, but how does the other way around work? How do you get the OP-1F to connect to a device that advertises itself, here the CME Widi Master dongle? Is this what the Device page is for on the OP1-F?
Thanks!
@sebastien.barre I know a guy who used OP-1 which has integrated BT-module with CME WIDI Jack. However, he said that OP-1F doesn’t seem to work well with midi transport over BT (cables do transmit transport just fine). He had problems with transport connecting with his Mac too (no widi was used in this). However, WIDI works well work him anyway. He uses it to connect Octatrack with Mac wirelessly.
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Since the Play+ and the OP1F are both devices, I think a host to connect them via USB is needed. This video provides more details on how to set it up:
Hope this helps!
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Thanks, oldies but goodies. My understanding is/was that the OP-1F is a USB host, but maybe I’m not the only one misunderstanding that? It doesn’t help that it has a “List” page", documented as “list and control any connected usb / ble midi devices”, plural.
- "USB hosting means the OP‑1 Field can talk directly with other MIDI gear without requiring a computer or USB hosting interface. "
- “The OP-1 Field is supposed to be a USB audio host” (adding, “but from what I gather, it doesn’t work as expected.”)
- “Now that the OP-1 Field is a USB MIDI host, …”
etc.
My gut feeling is that it doesn’t quite do the job one would expect from a USB MIDI host.
Thanks all for your help. I just received the WIDI Master and was able to successfully connect my OP-1 Field to my Play+, thus freeing the OP-1 Field’s USB-C port I had been using for MIDI between the two so far.
Make sure that the OP-1F is the one advertising itself from the MIDI page, as opposed to connecting to the WIDI Master from the OP-1F’s List page, where it will be marked as “available” by the OP-1 Field for you to pair. The former connection will allow you to send clock/transport, while the latter won’t. Both types of connection have different LED color on the WIDI master.
OP-1F is has usb host capability. But it seems to not give enough power for the Play + and that is where it goes wrong.
What I do is use a generic midi interface cable (usb - midi). I use this one from TIE (with a small usb to usb-c adapter).
Midi interface cables are made for mac/pc, but since OP-1F is a usb host (like a mac/pc) it works. Don’t buy the expensive interface cables for this. 15€ and you are set.
You can use this cable to connect OP-1F to all gear with midi connection. Gear that doen’t need power over usb works directly with a usb cable. I connect my OP-1F to my Modor NF-1(m) over usb and it works great.
Hope this helps.
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Yes, and I was using the LEKATO MIDI Cable, MIDI to USB C interface so far, but wireless MIDI allows you to free the USB port on the OP-1F, and connect it to an iPad for example (or another host), or simply keep it charged. Wired MIDI to USB is still the cheapest and probably the most reliable solution, for sure.
Upon further testing, I don’t think connecting the Play to an OP-1 Field using a WIDI Jack or Master works. I did a lot of testing in the past few days swapping all components in that chain, discussing the issue in the WIDI forums, and my conclusion is that it is not the WIDI’s fault; it appears to me that the BLE MIDI stack on the OP-1 Field just fails after some time, and will stop handling notes sent by the WIDI from the Play+. I replaced the OP-1 Field with my iPad in this scenario, and that worked fine, all notes accounted for.
The same behavior was also reported by several people when trying to connect a different sequencer (the Oxy One) to the OP-1F via Bluetooth MIDI (here and here), with people reporting notes getting skipped, then notes not being handled at all anymore by the OP-1F.
Hopefully this whole thread can save somebody some money.
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