-=[THE SYNTH ZONE]=-

I remember the look on the Craigslist guy's face when I handed over $300 for a PG-300, at the time I thought it was "a bittersweet parting with a beloved object".

Six months later I'm in the carpool parking lot, selling the PG-300 to a new Craigslist sucker, $300, and I know the bittersweetness was a chump recognizing a chump

It is awkward and large and somewhat unreliable and requires its own wall wart AC and a MIDI hookup. Fantasies of playing live evaporate in minutes. Even when I still had it lying around I had switched to using one of the virtual PG-300s that are available for download, where you can edit the patch names with your computer keyboard instead of dialling the new names in character-by-character. If you want dials and knobs you can program an Akai MPK or equivalent to act as a controller in less than an hour.

Bumping this thread because I just ordered a Volca Keys + Volca Beats.

Question -- I have a USB MIDI controller that I want to use to control the Volca keys and I want to sync both of them with each other and with my laptop (running Reaper) and to output audio through my interface. I was thinking I could plug the keyboard into my computer via USB, then run a MIDI cable out from my audio interface to one of the Volcas, then from the sync out of the first Volca to the sync in of the 2nd, and from the audio out of (one or both?) Volcas into my interface. Would that work?

I guess your USB MIDI controller doesn't have a MIDI out in addition to the USB output?

No, it's an Akai LPK25, it just has mini-USB out. I might get something nicer in a bit, but what can I do for the time being? Is there no way to make Reaper send a clock sync and also the MIDI messages from my controller out of my audio interface's MIDI out to the Volca?

See, 'cause I was going to suggest going from your controller's MIDI-out into your Volca's MIDI-thru and thereby simplifying things for you a bit. At this point I can't help myself from mentioning the Rube Goldbergian aspect of your proposed set-up. I'm thinking there's got to be a better way than what you described, but my MIDI knowledge/experience is hardly expert-level. Good luck is all I offer at this point.

I was thinking about going USB-to-MIDI from the Akai to the synth but the Akai is powered via USB so that wouldn't work, and also I'm not sure how I'd sync the devices to the computer in that case.

I think your original set-up might work. But don't you have an old keyboard that has MIDI out or something? It might simplify things a bit.

Hm, yeah I actually do, it's just kind of big and unwieldy for my workspace.

But let's say I do go straight MIDI out from one keyboard or another, I'm still wondering how I'd sync everything to my computer's clock, like if I've got other things playing on the computer. Or is that not possible?

And since the Volca keys is polyphonic, would it be possible to have some notes being triggered by the computer, and also trigger notes on top of that with a keyboard? Maybe with some kind of MIDI box?

So a simple keyboard is unwieldy but lots of cables going from/to your computer & interface aren't? Just get a Korg microKONTROL or something.

You can use MIDI quantization in your music editing program to sync MIDI messages to the computer clock.

A instrument that has MIDI-in capabilties should be able to recieve MIDI messages from two sources (computer and the Volca Keys keyboard)

The cables can be managed but the keyboard I have is too large for my space and I wouldn't want to take it to shows. The Korg micoKontrol looks like it only has USB like my Akai, so I don't see what it would offer me.

I guess I'll have to do some experimenting when these things show up.

Woops, didn't know the Kontrol doesn't have MIDI out! I'm sure there has to be a similarily small-ish MIDI controller.

I run a Arturia Keyboard to my laptop via USB, then midi out from my interface to Korg Monotribe, then sync out from monotribe ( which converts midi clock from Ableton) into Volca Beats, then Volca Beats sync out into my modular.

and audio from all three into my interface ( with modular using a stereo in).

not sure its tight enough for a professional recording but it works.

however, I've just bought a iconectivity mio for £25 so I could run two midi connections and control both Korgs

it'll allow me to run sequences to them both via Ableton.

Volca thoughts so far:

Still getting the hang of using these things and figuring out a good workflow with them, but I'm having lots of fun with them already.

So this was discussed upthread, although I managed to miss it, so to reiterate, audio output from the Volcas should use an 1/8" stereo to dual 1/4" mono cable. But there's no actual stereo going on, so leaving one of the 1/4" leads unplugged doesn't seem to matter unless you hate dangling cables.

Controlling the Keys with my MIDI controller is easy enough: keyboard -> computer via USB, audio interface (Focusrite Scarlett 6i6 in my case) -> Volca via MIDI. Then I make one track in Reaper with my MIDI controller as input and the Scarlett as a MIDI output, and another track with the Volca's audio out as the input.

But sending clock sync from my computer to the Keys, as opposed to just notes, seems to be of limited use, unless I'm missing something. If I send clock with "step trigger" off, the Keys will trigger my notes at the right time but the notes will only sustain for a 16th note value, even though my MIDI notes are sustaining and sustain is turned up etc. If I turn "step trigger" on, they will re-trigger on each 16th note for the whole time they should be sustaining.

The Keys is mostly working like a charm though. Not sure if I'll have much use for the built-in delay, but I've gotten some neat sounds already by sending it through my Corona Chorus pedal.

I'm having some trouble getting the beats to sync with my DAW properly though. It seems to basically work, I'll hit play in Reaper and the Beats will play, but it won't be on the right beat and it'll be slightly late like there's some latency. I might be missing something. I also wasn't able to get it to respond to my MIDI controller. I found the MIDI spec on Korg's site so maybe later I'll be able to make sense of that. This snare mod for the Beats seems intriguing too.

anybody seen this yet?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCyiDaM3boc

thinking of going this sat in la

i'm kinda interested but i have been 100% cured of all modular desires which dulls the interest a little. looks well made by all accounts

I really enjoyed it and it made me wanna get a system 700!!

nobody needs to justify wanting a system 700

just looming there looking all knobby

old sound on sound review says doepfer used to sell eurorack s700 clone package - sounded spendy, but

"I Dream of Wires" -- Documentary on the Modular Synth

i find it very comforting to have zero interest in modular synths.

that lack of interest will save you money, that is for sure

in related news, was in Austin last weekend and visited Switched-On, and the vintage keyboards they had available to play in the showroom there pretty much blew my mind. Prophet T-8, two Putneys, a Fairlight Mark I, all kinds of generic but absolutely beautiful 70's piano/clav workhorses (Roedelius-land), and a hefty Makenoise / Euro rack. It was very educational. And the guys have a service where they let you track in there using anything in the showroom for $25 an hour, which is remarkable.

http://www.switchedonaustin.com/shop

My monotron has died. Just stopped working. I have another but I can't get the output to work - is it worth taking the working one apart to see if there's a loose connection or something? Bearing in mind I haven't soldered since I was at school.

poor monotron :(. i'm pretty sure the sound of mine has changed, maybe it too is on its way out...

guys can we do drum machines in this thread or are they not synthy enuff

fine w/ me

ok, good! got roland TR-8 a couple days ago.

pluses:
- sounds are good. dat modded 808 kick, bewwwwwwwww.
- does indeed have the promised 'analogue' variance in the sound, without being like obvious gross fakery.
- sequencing is exactly what you'd expect.
- the onboard delay and reverb are... pretty dece! also got several varieties of each to suit yer taste.
- sidechaining of external audio feature is pretty sweet - get that throbbing sound on the beat. probably easy for you DAW types, but still!
- not a metal enclosure, but the knobs and faders are top notch, it's really well built.

minuses:
- the manual is hilariously useless. didn't roland used to write good manuals?
- each pattern has an A and B variation, you can use either one, or both for a 32-step pattern - but can't copy from A to B or vice versa. so dumb! they'd have to be rectifying this in the update.
- 'scatter' mostly lollllllll. although a couple of options are ok as variation if you were performing live at lighter depth settings - there's a nice distortion mode and a reverse beat one.
- I guess more advanced users will want 'parameter locks' and what have you - think the full MIDI implementation is out there now (also missing from the manual!) so that stuff could be handled by the DAW set.
- could probably do with ability to make the green highilghts another colour. you can change the sequencer button colours apaz, I haven't yet.

didn't roland used to write good manuals?

i've not read it but i'm led to understand the original 303 manual was vaguely baffling

I missed this thread even though I started this board!

In reference to Juno-106 - great entry level synth. Start here and end here if you plan to own house or children. Only issue is that the oscillators like to burn out, and replacing them involves ordering chips and soldering.

That's not true. For years the problem was one of the voices would go all crackly and the initial response was swapping them out for clones. I did that when my first voice chip went and was satisfied with the result. Then a year or two later another voice went. At that point there was new research. What was happening was that the chips were coated with some kind of plastic which was melting over the years, and that would short them out. Somebody discovered if you remove the chip, soak it in acetone or something to dissolver the coating, and put it back in, it was good as new! Think about all those chips people probably trashed thinking they were bad. So I had like two more dying voice chips and found a guy on eBay and sent him my entire motherboard. He removed all the voice chips, soaked them, put them back, tuned and calibrated it and sent it back, and it hasn't given me a problem since.

In any case, I love my 106. It never sounds bad to me, but I find myself focusing on a few basic types of sounds. It has it's limitations, but it just has such a nice sound to me, a lot of my tracks are built out of 106.

I also have a Juno 1 which I bought because I wanted a controller and figured I could spend 50 to 150 bucks on a midi controller that didn't make any noise, or spend 125 (the going rate at the time) on an alpha juno. I love it. Got a javascript app sysex programmer thingy that makes editing it nice and quick. Have never seen a pg-300 for reasonable price. I think about buying the Kiwitechnics Patch Editor, which looks great, but costs more than the Juno. If I ever own a few more synths that it works with,maybe then it'd be a good buy.

I also have an Arp 2600 that I use a lot but it's very broken. Finally thought about sending it to CMS for their repairs and some of the basic upgrades, didn't hear back from them until he wrote to apologize and say he was busy on Pete Townshend's Arp. By that point I decided I could not afford to fix it, but one day.

Recently bought an Arturia Beatstep to control the Arp. A whole lot cheaper than an Arp Sequencer.

Also if you haven't seen this....

http://kiwitechnics.com/kiwi-106.htm

it's pretty cool.

I think about buying the Kiwitechnics Patch Editor, which looks great, but costs more than the Juno. If I ever own a few more synths that it works with,maybe then it'd be a good buy.

i have it, and it really is great, but also i have (i think) 7 synths it can control so it is worth it. one of them being the mks-80, the controller of which is $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Izotope Iris looks amazing, like what I've always wanted. Anyone messed around with it?

(not gonna lie, I checked it out after reading that Arca interview)

i sprung for it, it's pretty amazing what it's capable of and how easy it is to use, and it's even easier to spend an hour drawing pictures and fiddling with sounds. not sure yet if it will result in usable sounds for the kind of records i want to make.

also i've been having a lot of fun w/my pocket piano (Critter & Guitari). getting a little sick of the sound, but the next thing i want to try is running midi out to record crazy arpeggio patterns, then using that to drive a sample-based soft synth.

Iris is a lot of fun, very good for textural and sound design-y stuff. I can see with a bit of application you could makes some more musical or melodic noises, but I haven't really tried yet.

that's my experience so far, it would be amazing if you were scoring a horror movie or just need some background noise. i'm hoping to get some nice glassy organ-like sounds out of the right sample though.

even if i never use the crazy spectral manipulation functions, it still works as a sampler plugin and i was in need of one (since i don't use Ableton or Kontakt).

Does anyone know of any good tutorials for Korg Gadget for my friend who just purchased it as his first music production tool?

Also any thoughts on the Oberheim Matrix 6? I see it mentioned a few times way up thread. There's one that just arrived at the music shop down the street, listed for $600. I looked at and was turned off at first by the interface, but researched some more and was thinking I should grab it.

I was in the store today ready to buy it and figured I had to test all the functionality first. I played every key, messed with the levers, browsed the presets, tweaked some patches, and everything seemed in order. But when I plugged into the right audio output, there was no sound except scratchiness when adjusting the volume slider what seemed like faint crosstalk from the left channel. And the store didn't have any way for me to check the headphone out, pedal jacks, or MIDI functions. So I guess I should go back there with headphones, my laptop, a sustain pedal, and an audio interface and make sure all that shit works? Maybe if the headphone out is fine then it's not a big deal that the right output doesn't, assuming they can come down a little on price? And how should I check out the MIDI stuff -- I've heard this thing requires particular software to program and sequence.

No special software to sequence, same as any midi synth. For programming there are sysex programs you can find, probably more than most other synths because the architecture is the same as the matrix 1000 which doesn't have any ability to program without the software.

http://www.tonetweakers.com/used/access_matrix.1.htm

hardware version too, if you prefer that sort of thing

http://www.matrixsynth.com/2014/10/the-harvestman-iron-curtain-electronics.html

how badass does this look??

access matrix would be a lot more useful if the mod matrix was accessible but sadly not - i think unless you were mad collectro it would be a pretty disappointing experience vs some of the p good software editors

There's also this slightly expensive but totally awesome editor:

http://kiwitechnics.com/patcheditor.htm

I can't justify buying it just for my Alpha Juno, (and hope to use an iPad app instead if I ever get one of those), but if I had a few of those synths maybe I would. They also have this crazy 106 upgrade that ads all kinds of features.

I think it's great when people hack these old synths. I have a broken Prophet 600 that I've been waiting to get fixed for years, and I'm glad I waited because someone came up with new software that apparently makes it a ton better.

oh yeah, I see me talking about the Kiwi editor just a page or two up there. sorry.

haha i probably did too. PE is ace

I have the 6R. Love it. i use a now no-longer-updated iPad editor for it.

I am curious how many people who have somewhat involved synth/electronic live setups use a laptop at shows, why/why not, and what do you use if not?

i hate having a laptop onstage for a litany of reasons, mostly associated with experiencing countless fuckups back in the days when i did.

i have an mpc1000 for all my drum sounds & sequencing now

I would be curious to hear about how exactly you use the MPC. I'm kind of ignorant about non-software-based workflows.

i'm p much just using it as a "dumb" midi sequence playback machine (i create the sequences in pro tools then export em) plus programming the drum patterns directly into it, really only using a tiny tiny fraction of what it's capable of. it's super reliable and really quick to get set up at shows/rehearsals..