running 3 volcas together?

tips? questions?

how do you control 3 volcas by midi? i have a midi y cable. is there a 1to3cable easily available? would there be problems without buffering?

anyone good with electronics? know any designs for a midi 1 to 3 (or 4) thats buffered?

I have a midi 2 in 2 out and a 1 in and 1 out that controls the three. There is some physical manipulation involved because korg are weird and made some of the parameters non-midi controllable, but you can do things with the korgs that you can not do manually. For instance you can turn the Volca Bass into a Volca Keys by controlling each of the oscillators separately with mute switching.

I haven't run into too many problems buffering but i'm not doing crazy fast stuff with them either... yet!

Are you looking to actually send notes to all three? If you just want to synchronise the sequencers you could probably use the sync outs, perhaps?

yes use the sync out and the midi in on the first volca to connect to a master clock if needed

do volcas send the gate all the time or just when they are playing?

also there is this mode when one volca stops the other starts

i controll my keys with a huge midi keyboard - much nicer to play chords and having like the filter and the ads on big faders instead of these knobs enables much more drastic knob twisting. check it out its not hard to set the cc# up

wicked

yes, control for the notes and cc for all 3 by midi

This is a really dumb question I know but is there any way of sending sync out to daw? Or a cable which converts sync out to midi out. Basically I'd like to be able to use the internal sequencer alongside Ableton. Any thoughts?

Why not do it the other way around and use the DAW as master? Timing would probably be a lot tighter that way.

That's how I do it a the mo. I like the other way though because random tapping of notes always produces some cool riffs lol.

you need a midi splitter box. i use a kenton midi thru-5. allows me to send notes on different midi channels to 5 different devices at once.

edit: at op

edit edit: at bro - a lot of newer DAWs only send midi sync out, but some do accept sync in allowing you to slave the DAW's tempo to an external sequencer or drum machine etc. i think renoise, reaper and fruity loops sync to midi in from memory. however, if you just want to jam out random riffs on a keyboard into your DAW, you just need a normal midi interface and plug your keyboard or whatever into the midi in, set the send and receive midi channels the same etc then jam away and quantise (or not)...is that what you meant? how to basically play notes into your DAW from external gear?

  On 11/25/2014 at 10:44 PM, The Bro said:

That's how I do it a the mo. I like the other way though because random tapping of notes always produces some cool riffs lol.

Wait, what are you looking to do? You can still use the sequencer on the actual unit and just rely on the MIDI out from DAW for sync. Unless you want to control softsynths using the key contacts on the volca.. for that there's a MIDI out mod you can do pretty easily:

http://iamcomputo.wordpress.com/2014/01/02/korg-volca-hack-points-and-videos/

I'm not sure if that actually allows for the keys to output MIDI notes but I think it says something about it transmitting sequences as well as sync..

@ The Bro -

  On 11/25/2014 at 11:13 PM, BCM said:

edit edit: at bro - a lot of newer DAWs only send midi sync out, but some do accept sync in allowing you to slave the DAW's tempo to an external sequencer or drum machine etc. i think renoise, reaper and fruity loops sync to midi in from memory. however, if you just want to jam out random riffs on a keyboard into your DAW, you just need a normal midi interface and plug your keyboard or whatever into the midi in, set the send and receive midi channels the same etc then jam away and quantise (or not)...is that what you meant? how to basically play notes into your DAW from external gear?

Ableton accepts MTC/an external clock. In preferences you just need to enable the 'sync' button for your AI input in the MIDI tab. Click EXT in the top left and you're away no?

I'm assuming the Korg outputs MTC?

In that case I just need to figure out how to convert sync out on the Volca Bass to midi out.

oh i see, you're wanting to use the volca sync out, not midi sync? yeah, you can't do that. well you probably can with arduino or something but it wouldn't be at all straightforward.

at b born: korg volcas do not transmit midi sync out or MTC no. not without modding them anyway.

Well midi in bypasses the internal sequencer which I'd like to use.

don't think it does so long as you're not sending notes to it, just midi sync. you'd just set it to external clock sync but use internal sequencer...think you can do that...I'll have a look when i can be bothered...my volcas are currently consigned to the loft.

Cool. Maybe I'll try and read the manual lol.

there's seriously not much in the "manual" although it does give you some detail on midi set ups...might be better off googling it though for more in depth info

Cheers mate.

Yeah like I said earlier the MIDI in can just receive sync information; I hardly ever use the onboard sequencer so I have to keep an empty pattern in the first sequence slot because I usually control it with the beatstep or play it live, and the beatstep sends play/sync commands to the volca

  On 11/26/2014 at 12:46 PM, BCM said:

at b born: korg volcas do not transmit midi sync out or MTC no. not without modding them anyway.

Ah I see. Sorry I wasn't really sure due to not owning one.