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Looper's Delight
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Quoting William Walker <billwalker@baymoon.com>: > Hello, I would love to hear feedback from anyone who owns one of the > following Loopers. > Would you be into providing your perspectives on the 3 Best and Worst > aspects of any of these products. > Hi, I have wanted to respond to this and I haven't yet read any other comments. I don't want to bias my comments by reading other people's observations. I own the LP1 and the RC50. Here are my observations: RC50 Best features: . Easy to hookup and supports balanced or unbalanced connections, professional levels (+4dbv). . Pristine sound quality . Built in Mic Preamp (with Phantom power), Instrument, and line inputs with seperate level controls. . Built in foot pedals . Easy to use . Calculates the tempo based on the length of your first loop. Can quantize all subsequent loops to a multiple or a fraction of the master loop. . Outputs MIDI Clock based on the tempo of the first loop. . Built-in rythmn unit that can sent to its own channel (i.e., can be used as a clik track) . User Manuals on Roland's website are easy to follow. . Loops can be in stereo or mono . Lots of memory (up to 40+ minutes of loop storage) . Can export and import loops as WAV files . Can change tempo without changing the pitch of the loops . Excellent for on-the-fly looping RC50 Worst features: . The included Owner's Manual is confusing. . It has trouble when slaved to other devices . Sync'd loops produce artifacts when slowed down or speeded up . Have to kneel down on the floor to make adjustments . The rhythm section keeps steady time but the rhythms are "unhip". . Midi implementation is extremely limited. . Feedback is either 0% or 100% -- nothing in between. One can work around the feedback issue via patchcords and a volume pedal -- clutzy but workable. RC50 Summary: The RC50 is a good all-around, stand-alone looper and master clock source. It has everything you need for looping (pedals, input mixer). It has impeccable sound qualtiy. Not particularly successful when slaved to MIDI Clock. The ability to control the RC50's functions via MIDI commands is extremely limited. No feedback control. > 3. Looperlative LP-1 Best Features: . Three stereo output busses . Professional levels (+4dbv) . Eight independent stereo loopers that can be quantized to a master loop on the fly . Outputs MIDI Clock based on the length of the master loop and the user-settable beats per measure (a length of one measure is assumed for the master loop -- when the beat is set to 1bpm then 24 clock pulses will be produced over the length of the master loop. At 2pbm, 48 pulses are produced, etc. . Extensive MIDI implementation. Supports CC events 0 thru 127 (at least). The LP1 can implement up to eight commands for each MIDI message. . Programming is easy . The user's manual is well-organized. Read it carefully! There are some features that are buried in the manual that aren't obvious. (For example, to create an empty loop that is the same length as the master loop, you select an unused loop and hit Play/Stop.) . Responsive, Excellent, and Personalized customer service Worst features: . Unbalanced i/o only (I'd really prefer balanced!) . To program the unit requires time and patience. While the programming interface is easy to use, one must use some trial and error to determine which commands to use. . For other than line level input, you will need a seperate pre-amp . Limited front panel controls -- you will need a MIDI controller Summary: The LP1 is a fully professional looping device. The basic looping functions are such that a beginner can start making loops immediately. The ability to chain functions and its rich command set provides a constant challenge for experienced loopers. -- Kevin