Korg Volca series

The Volca firmware is brilliant. Turns it into a pikey Digitakt imo.

polyphony, the probability option, new verb, midi etc.

i hadn’t used mine for ages so i had forgotten how much they eat batteries. Bodged an old multi volt adapter to use instead an made it a touch noisy... probably the adapter, but is that normal for Volca’s?

anyone recommend any good vids of the firmware update capabilities? i've only ever borrowed a sample a few times but man it sounds like it's pretty awesome these days

  On 4/25/2020 at 8:04 PM, th555 said:

https://ranzee.com/volca-fm-firmware-1-09-unofficial/

https://ranzee.com/volca-sample-unofficial-firmware/

Pajen´s custom firmware for the FM and Sample, most notably adding velocity from midi input to the FM, and chromatic note triggering to the sample (!!!!)

Does it increase the Polyphony of the Volca FM to 6 or something? 

  On 5/9/2020 at 12:28 AM, sheatheman said:

anyone recommend any good vids of the firmware update capabilities? i've only ever borrowed a sample a few times but man it sounds like it's pretty awesome these days

I was having trouble with this too. I grabbed one of the official firmware downloads and it had a PDF describing the procedure. It was pretty simple, something like holding Func+Play then starting up. For the FM it had to be restarted twice, probably a memory limitation.

https://korg-volca-drum-editor.jimdofree.com/

Awesome new Volca Drum VST / standalone that lets you setup / save / load kits and sequences.  Looks like plenty of other useful programs on that site too.  Seems to be well worth the 6 euro asking price!

Following up on the new Volca Sample firmware I wanted to share the insanely good life hack: even though the Sample only has one stereo out, you can set up a cue monitor mix by using the pan control. This will result in a mono mix only, but it's a fun way to work in a live situation where nobody wants to hear you trying to find good sounds on the "main mix". I had the left channel of the Sample as the main mix and right channel as cue.

Another thing - with the new firmware, the volume control actually does not work anymore (or maybe just because I sent MIDI from the Live sequencer). Two ways around this - use the pan as a rudimentary level control, or just modulate the velocities of the notes (this requires an external sequencer of course).

Anyway I had a lot of fun last night, definitely going to use the Sample more because of the ability to monitor things I am about to fade in.

Maybe I should get one now.