VIRUS CLASSIC MANUAL 155
The Virus And Sequencers
The Virus lets you to send the entire memory content or just parts thereof to the sequencer. The
most reliable solution is to transfer the entire memory (MIDI DUMP RX: Total). There is, however, a
catch: Since a great deal of data is being transmitted (”Total”, after all, means all SINGLE programs,
all MULTIs, and so forth), the dump is very extensive and takes quite some time. Alternatively, you
can also send just individual sounds, MULTIs or so-called ”arrangements”.
The other truly reliable option for archiving sounds is dumping an arrangement (MIDI DUMP RX:
Arrangement). In this case, the current MULTI is transmitted. Since a MULTI contains the addresses
of SINGLE sounds used in the arrangement rather than the actual SINGLEs, the sounds of all active
PARTs are sent separately (for more info on this, see the section on MULTIMODE). This option is
convenient and fast, but has an inherent drawback: this type of arrangement dump does not take
into account that your song uses program change messages to change sounds in the MULTI. Only
the eight sounds to which the MULTI refers in the arrangement are sent, which is to be expected
when you consider that the Virus can’t anticipate that you intend to change these at some point
during playback.
Dumping an arrangement is a great option when you’re able to make do with the sixteen sounds to
which the MULTI refers. If you want to or are compelled to change sounds, you should record the
entire memory content to the sequencer. Sending individual MULTIs for the purpose of archiving
sounds is pointless because they don’t contain the actual sounds. Sending individual sounds, in
turn, is only a viable proposition if you are operating the Virus in SINGLE mode and have opted not
to use program change messages in the song.
Proceed with extreme caution when you’re working with SysEx data! If you send anything
other than individual SINGLE sounds or individual MULTIs from the sequencer to the Virus,
the CORRESPONDING DATA IN THE VIRUS WILL BE IRREVOCABLY OVERWRITTEN! So
before you dump, for example, a bank to the Virus, you should make a backup of the user
banks stored in the Virus (the RAM banks) by dumping them to the sequencer, provided of
course that you care to preserve the sounds that they contain. Incidentally, it can’t hurt to
regularly dump all data stored in the Virus for backup purposes.
You’ll find a summary of all dump options and an explanation of these in the comprehensive over-
view of parameters, specifically, under the global parameters.
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