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Looper's Delight
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hey folks, sorry for the off-topic mail - i imagine that the brilliant readers of this mailing list might be able to assist me (lots of oberheim edp and peavey pc1600 users here!) since i bought my awesome waldorf microwave 2 xt, i look to my other gear with a whole new level of expectations. last night, i revisited my neglected oberheim matrix-1000, seeking better midi realtime control of patch parameters (where are the knobs damnit?!!) at one point last year, i went through the process of setting up a couple control patches on my peavey PC1600 midi controller to allow me to tweak matrix-1000 patches in realtime. in particular, of course, i wanted to be able to adjust in realtime the filter cutoff and resonance, as well as various other things like wave shapes, FM amount, mix, oscillator frequencies, etc. i used sysex strings from the pc1600 to map the sliders and buttons to do these things. unfortunately, when adjusting some of the parameters in realtime, the synth would act strangely, hanging notes, etc. the worst of them all is the filter cutoff frequency. the matrix-1000 sysex chart calls it the "VCF Initial Frequency" which sort of implies that you're not supposed to be wiring this to a slider and reaming it with values... now, an alternative approach is to modify the matrix-1000 patch with a modulator to map a continous controller to filter cutoff frequency, and then set up a pc1600 slider to send that CC- this works beautifully. obviously, this is less than ideal, because i have to modify the matrix-1000 patch before i can tweak it from the pc1600, potentially clobbering something else in the modulation matrix... also, there are only 9 slots in the matrix, and only 4 or 5 possible CC's that act as sources in the matrix. so i can't really get control over a bunch of patch parameters simultaneously. (however, if this is my only option, i can set up the pc1600 with a button which sends out a big sysex string to change the synth's modulation matrix paths.) SO, now for the big mystery question. at the very end of the matrix-1000 manual, there is a paragraph which implies that you can control patch parameters from continuous controllers without the modulation matrix and without sysex. i however do not understand it, and after a couple hours experimenting with pc1600 midi strings, was unable to get any results. The "active continuous controllers" chart lists the following: 98 Non-Reg Parm LSB 99 Non-Reg Parm MSB 100 Reg Parm LSB 101 Reg Parm MSB Registered parameters: 00 Pitch Bend Range 01 Fine Tune 02 Transpose and then there is the following paragraph: "Non-registered parameters may be used to control any parameter by using the front panel parameter number. Matrix modulations must be controlled by use of the System Exclusive message. When using registered or non-registered parameter editing, all received data entry controller values are offset by 40h, except when the currently selected paraemeter is the register pitch bend range [...] this allows for transmission of negative numbers." this seems to imply that you can send one CC message with a parameter number followed by another CC message with a value. i tried sending CC 98 as the num and CC 99 as the value, and vice versa. i tried all kinds of things! unfortunately my original MIDI 1.0 spec doesn't discuss this, and the oberheim manual doesn't elaborate... i don't have a chart of "front panel parameter numbers" either. sorry for the lengthy email. i'm really hoping i can make my matrix-1000 more usable. thanks! -john ...................................................... john s cooper opcode systems, inc http://www.planetz.com http://www.opcode.com Please vote for my band, Z music, at www.bestband.com