the watmm GAS thread

  On 5/25/2020 at 10:42 PM, user said:

Spent most of last night patching a m4l sysex controller for the quadraverb 

Tell me more. 

It’s in a very early stage. It works fine using one of the m4l midi/sysex externals but there are 2 hurdles I need to overcome. 

First is (and I hope to figure this out today, it’s being done by other people, I just don’t understand) is sending lsb/msb for all the “level” parameters because just sending msb is causing it to skip values. 
Second thing is, and this will probably take me longer, the parameters and order of parameters change depending on the chosen QV configuration. I think I’ve thought of a way to deal with this but it’s going to take a while to implement. The good thing is that this will also help decide how to structure the interface on the m4l device. 
 

If you like I can send you the device when it’s a bit further along. My QV is a QVGT though so I’m not entirely sure if the sysex strings will be the same for the regular QV. Although once the device is beefed out a bit more changing the sysex strings should be quite simple. 

Arturia Beatstep (1st version) is crap for controlling midi despite the 16 knobs that it has. Doesn't recall all the CC's, takes years to turn and barely recognises the movements that I make  - I've tried updated the firmware and am going to give up on it (this could also be a computer issue because I'm trying to use quite a few effects at the same time...) 

Want to use it for live tweaking in Ableton. Looking for something decent that actually works. Was thinking...

Killamix, Midi Fighter Twister, Faderfox EC4. Any recommendations? 

  On 5/27/2020 at 11:18 AM, user said:

It’s in a very early stage. It works fine using one of the m4l midi/sysex externals but there are 2 hurdles I need to overcome. 

First is (and I hope to figure this out today, it’s being done by other people, I just don’t understand) is sending lsb/msb for all the “level” parameters because just sending msb is causing it to skip values. 
Second thing is, and this will probably take me longer, the parameters and order of parameters change depending on the chosen QV configuration. I think I’ve thought of a way to deal with this but it’s going to take a while to implement. The good thing is that this will also help decide how to structure the interface on the m4l device. 
 

If you like I can send you the device when it’s a bit further along. My QV is a QVGT though so I’m not entirely sure if the sysex strings will be the same for the regular QV. Although once the device is beefed out a bit more changing the sysex strings should be quite simple. 

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Would be fun to have a look when it's coming along, yeah! I only have the regular QV, though.

  On 5/27/2020 at 10:56 AM, user said:

Damn, that is slightly off putting, especially on something that you want to jam with. I had this with a controller once that was also not exactly super cheap but it only happened when pressing the button coming from a certain angle, after a while I got used to it. 

Yeah, I'm getting used to it, and as mentioned I've come up with a fix that is at least temporary (and keeps my hands nice and soft ), but yeah, coming from Elektron devices, even the Model series have better trig buttons. They'd be alright if they were just those no-travel pads like on the Circuit etc. Maybe there's a way to mod it lol

But damn, I've had the thing on all day while idly working through the manual and trying things out, and it's really got a lot of features I'll use. Some things I haven't even seen in videos yet, like being able to select a region of a pattern and shift just those notes back and forth (or transpose them, or offset MIDI CC). Plus.. TRIG MUTES YES FINALLY

  On 5/27/2020 at 11:18 AM, user said:

It’s in a very early stage. It works fine using one of the m4l midi/sysex externals but there are 2 hurdles I need to overcome. 

First is (and I hope to figure this out today, it’s being done by other people, I just don’t understand) is sending lsb/msb for all the “level” parameters because just sending msb is causing it to skip values. 
Second thing is, and this will probably take me longer, the parameters and order of parameters change depending on the chosen QV configuration. I think I’ve thought of a way to deal with this but it’s going to take a while to implement. The good thing is that this will also help decide how to structure the interface on the m4l device. 
 

If you like I can send you the device when it’s a bit further along. My QV is a QVGT though so I’m not entirely sure if the sysex strings will be the same for the regular QV. Although once the device is beefed out a bit more changing the sysex strings should be quite simple. 

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I can try to explain the MSB/LSB thing. Basically standard MIDI CC values go from 0-127 (128 potential values). MSB/LSB trick is to combine two MIDI values to get a resolution of 128*128=16384. In this, MSB values (as understood by your hardware) go in increments of 128, because MSB=most significant byte (i.e. big decimal part of the value). To get the values between, you increment LSB (least significant byte) while keeping the MSB value constant. Something like this:

MSB LSB final value
0   0   0 (== 127 * MSB + LSB)
0.  1.  1
0   2.  2
...
1.  0.  127
1.  1.  128
1.  2.  129

( I may be off by one here in the formula, I am not good at math)

You know, given that Doepfer invented the Eurorack format, it's kind of ironic that (at least on this old module) they didn't put any kind of polarity indication on the power header.

On the bright side, part of the reason I had it out of the rack was making space for a better input module so functionally I haven't lost much functionality (none, i I can figure out why the gate output doesn't work right on the Mind Reader), and if it's just the opamp and that one capacitor it's an easy repair.

  On 5/27/2020 at 1:15 PM, thawkins said:

I can try to explain the MSB/LSB thing. Basically standard MIDI CC values go from 0-127 (128 potential values). MSB/LSB trick is to combine two MIDI values to get a resolution of 128*128=16384. In this, MSB values (as understood by your hardware) go in increments of 128, because MSB=most significant byte (i.e. big decimal part of the value). To get the values between, you increment LSB (least significant byte) while keeping the MSB value constant. Something like this:

MSB LSB final value
0   0   0 (== 127 * MSB + LSB)
0.  1.  1
0   2.  2
...
1.  0.  127
1.  1.  128
1.  2.  129

( I may be off by one here in the formula, I am not good at math)

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Great, thanks!

Kind of a lost day today. Will be able to dig in a bit deeper friday and see if I get it now after your explainer. Cheers! 

  On 5/27/2020 at 1:04 PM, modey said:

Yeah, I'm getting used to it, and as mentioned I've come up with a fix that is at least temporary (and keeps my hands nice and soft ), but yeah, coming from Elektron devices, even the Model series have better trig buttons. They'd be alright if they were just those no-travel pads like on the Circuit etc. Maybe there's a way to mod it lol

But damn, I've had the thing on all day while idly working through the manual and trying things out, and it's really got a lot of features I'll use. Some things I haven't even seen in videos yet, like being able to select a region of a pattern and shift just those notes back and forth (or transpose them, or offset MIDI CC). Plus.. TRIG MUTES YES FINALLY

yeah it's pretty fun isn't it  with you on the meh buttons (tho i've not had any issues like you're having) ...there's multiple small things that kinda turn me off on the hardware side of the Pyramid, but it is relatively sturdy from all i've read and in my experience. definitely would've done many things differently if they'd just consulted me. 

so much stuff buried in the manual and in the forums, had honestly considered doing a super-thorough video walkthrough if for no reason than it would help me wrap my head around it better if i had to know it well enough to explain and demonstrate it all...you never truly know something until you teach it, they say. maybe one day...but probably not. i'd ramble like a fool, would be a 40 hour series lol. you could do something like that tho, you've got the YT video setup and all going already. 

good little succinct explainer on MSB/LSB i've referenced every once in a while as i inevitably forget the information 6 months later: https://www.morningstarfx.com/post/2016-12-25-midi-msb-and-lsb

just got the model cycles a few days ago, but totaled my truck on the highway yesterday. lucky to be alive, but now my relationship with this new device is very "eh"

it's definitely fun, but man the pads are terrible. coming from a tempest (which has the best pads i've ever used, they respond perfectly to the lightest touch, and it isn't hard to get full velocity), you really have to mash these pads in to even get 60 velocity. 127 is just laughably hard. and light presses dont register at all.

it sounds good though.

i caved and ordered the autechre t-shirts from bleep. 

at the start of pandemic lockdown i sold a bunch of modules and bought winter modular Eloquencer sequencer. quite programmable. makes a good mate w/the malekko Varigate 8+ which is really fast to use. 

lol its funny to play modey's patterns on here.

fuck elektron man. did reload pattern and it erased my saved pattern with whatever was in the project buffer and now my first really good pattern is gone. FUCK

I'm really telling myself not to blow my tax return on the new 2.0 voice card PCBs that are coming out for the Kijimi (the original SSM2040 was finally reissued so they've designed new voice cards that use it) and/or one of these:

https://modularaddict.com/midibox-tia2600synth-partialkit

THAT DEMO THO

  On 5/31/2020 at 9:54 PM, sheatheman said:

fuck elektron man. did reload pattern and it erased my saved pattern with whatever was in the project buffer and now my first really good pattern is gone. FUCK

Üktatrak? Never happened to me. 
Are you sure you saved it? 

There are two save levels. Temp save and save to project. I think they have different buffers as well? So if you reload in the settings menu, you'll get different data to pressing the temp reload shortcut. 

Also yeah the pads are terrible. I just put them on fixed velocity. I think they're trying to work on a solution though? I think I remember Ess saying something like that on Elektronauts. 

ah the models! sorry 

  On 5/31/2020 at 9:54 PM, sheatheman said:

fuck elektron man. did reload pattern and it erased my saved pattern with whatever was in the project buffer and now my first really good pattern is gone. FUCK

Ah, the old built-in Octatrack hazing routine! I slapped myself in the face with this a good dozen or so times before I developed an anti-Pavlovian muscle response on this one.

yeah modey, i realize that now. i had an OT for a while and got pretty fast with it, but it's been a while.

i managed to remake the pattern though. its a really good little machine. here's a snippet. i think its good enough to be a preset pattern!!! kind of sounds like plaid.

haha man, the chance knob is just instant insanity. control all and change machines is also insane.

i'm really interested in the way ess got his live set super distorted. basically if you drive the kick all the way, the levels of everything else will start clipping really nicely, that plus some FM feedback can give you some really raw stuff.

it has kind of a shitty elektron sound but it's also real good.

  On 6/1/2020 at 3:46 AM, sheatheman said:

 

 

Your browser does not support the HTML5 audio tag.

 

 

 

 

 

 

pocari.mp3 1.28 MB · 74 downloads

 

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Beautiful! Drop the link when you finish 

  On 6/1/2020 at 3:46 AM, sheatheman said:

i managed to remake the pattern though. its a really good little machine. here's a snippet. i think its good enough to be a preset pattern!!! kind of sounds like plaid.

 

Your browser does not support the HTML5 audio tag.

 

 

 

 

 

 

pocari.mp3 1.28 MB · 85 downloads

 

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Damn that's gorgeous!

I've been messing with the Pyramid a bit but generally feeling a bit uninspired. It's definitely a crazy deep sequencer, but I haven't been able to gel with it yet. That said, I'm still in the mode of trying to use too much at once on it, and some of the things I'm trying to control (qy70, nords) just don't cope well with tons of MIDI information being thrown around. Shame, because there's tons of wacky CC stuff I want to do with my latest Nord Modular patch, and it just goes kinda wonky when I try to shove 4 channels of 18 MIDI CC messages into it (plus super fast notes) at once. 

I'm gonna try it with my Monomachine next, maybe I'll have more luck with that. They both support Turbo MIDI, so I wonder if that'll help. It seemed to work really well with the Cycles, getting to almost audio rate triggering of the tracks!

  On 6/1/2020 at 2:13 PM, modey said:

I've been messing with the Pyramid a bit but generally feeling a bit uninspired. 
....

I'm gonna try it with my Monomachine next, maybe I'll have more luck with that.

Please, let us know how that goes bc if it works as it should I might consider buying the pyramid.

  On 6/1/2020 at 12:09 AM, TubularCorporation said:

I'm really telling myself not to blow my tax return on the new 2.0 voice card PCBs that are coming out for the Kijimi (the original SSM2040 was finally reissued so they've designed new voice cards that use it)

Where's this from, is it on the Kijimi fb group?  That just about settles the decision for next diy job, I have 9 eurorack filters and the e440 is still my favourite 6 years after I got it.  Sometimes I'm tempted to sell the rest and just got 7 more e440s.

well damn fellas. i've made better stuff with the cycles in the first few hours than any other elektron stuff ive had.