Dumb midi question

When inserting a midi track in AA 1.5 it plays fine using the Microsoft GS Wavetable Synth as the device. In 3.0 I can't seem to get this to work the same way, that is to play the midi file as created. The GS Wavetable Synth is selected as the output device but I have no output unless I (a) pick a midi channel for each track (all or any) in which case the instrument is always a piano or (b) choose a
VSTi like Adobe Polysynth in which case the instruments are, well, weird. I'd just like it to play as created and edit from there. Is this possible?

G.

When playing MIDI AA3 doesn't send instrument data. Therefore any MIDI device external to AA, either hardware or soft synth can only guess at the instrument and will normally guess instrument number 1 - piano. This is true regardless of the MIDI channel you choose. I have two hardware MIDI modules; one I can "trick" into playing different instruments, the other has front panel controls which allow manual override of instrument data. But softsynths such as Roland VSC or the GS Wavetable Synth have no such options.

You may have some luck with a VSTi using soundfonts. If you use the provided soundfont player you will need to play with the settings for attack etc. It also plays stereo soundfonts in mono. But I can never get soundfonts to sound "right" in AA3. I have used a variety of soundfonts in a variety of soundfont players in a variety of VSTi hosts and all but AA3 sound as expected. An expensive solution could be a third party sampler/soundfont player like Halion which has been reported to work well with AA3.

Adobe's goal for AA3 was to produce a very minimalist MIDI/VSTi sequencer. There are a few issues which could be dealt with in a dot release, but what they've achieved is mostly OK. For any sort of advanced MIDI work you still need another application, and that's fine.