thebitman
Offline

I'm sure a few of you have your Chipmaestro's, and I haven't seen much said online about people who are currently using them. Perhaps a few of you who have one can step out of the shadows and help me out.

I'm having trouble getting my Chipmaestro to act in "tracker" mode (as the tech notes call it) http://www.soniktech.com/chipmaestro/Ch … chDocs.txt when I am plugged up to Ableton live via a MIDI USB interface. I know for a fact that Live is sending signal correctly through the adapter, as it works fine with the Yamaha DX-7 at school. I've emailed Jarek and I have yet to hear back from him.

Despite being unable to get my full 4-channel goodness playing, I have managed to get a pulse channel to play with mild degrees of success. It treats "chords" in the piano roll as arpeggios to blitz through, meaning there is a chance my unit is in "instrument" mode, which is not friendly to sequencing but rather suited for live playing.

If anyone could help me out, I'd really appreciate it. I've been trying to make a MIDI Instrument rack for the Chipmaestro in Ableton Live 8.2.2 so we have an equivalent to what we had with MIDINES. Assuming I can get something USABLE slapped together I'd love to share it! smile

thebitman
Offline

Managed to fix my problem.

The tech docs say that the MIDI note controls are A# -1 up to B1, however, for some reason in Ableton I have to send the notes through an octave lower for the controls to work properly. Not sure if the discrepancy lies in the way I use Ableton (some transpose function is on?) or if the tech docs were simply rushed out there.

tl;dr in my version of Ableton (8.2.2) I had to voice the controls an extra  octave down, and everything fixed itself smile

kitsch
Offline
matt's mind

nothing was rushed about this project.

har har

thebitman
Offline
kitsch wrote:

nothing was rushed about this project.

har har

I'm working on the Max for Live patch this week. In talks with Jarek about making the thing a little more usable for Ableton folks.

Also, I am fairly sure that either the MIDI channel order for "tracker" mode is wrong in the docs (I have triangle for channel 2, pu2 for 3, pu1 for 4, and noise for 5), or tracker mode simply doesn't exist. Going to be figuring that out tonight.

thebitman
Offline

Update: got the channels working independently, sort of. Can't figure out how to send note off evens, nor do I know how to get pitch bends and the like functioning properly. Been trying all sorts of MIDI effects racks, not sure what the problem is. Getting super frustrated with this device, probably going to substitute it for a second DMG in my setup.

The lack of technical data such as how to set up MIDI control messages has me infuriated. There is no definition of what ranges work, and some of the control messages the cartridge "supports" do not register at all despite me trying countless configurations.

nordloef
Offline
sweden

A new batch is out. Ordered one yesterday, wonder if I might regret it...

thebitman
Offline
nordloef wrote:

A new batch is out. Ordered one yesterday, wonder if I might regret it...

They are typically mailed out on Fridays. Cancel your order if you feel nervous, after talking to other people it seems like a lot of people bought this and can't really use it. Extremely difficult to use, and it is not a MIDINES replacement like we all hoped for it to be.

I am quickly growing tired of mine, all it can do is drone notes I send it. Source code shows that it honestly can't do much more than that in tracker mode, but there is a way to flash new code to the thing. The whole thing is written in C++, and I feel like the run-of-the-mill MIDI libraries are what is holding this back, NOT the code made specifically for the Chipmaestro.

If someone were to make new libraries with a few optimizations, this could be a near-replacement for the MIDINES. I haven't ever programmed for MIDI, but it might be worth seeing how easy it is to pick up.


Will most likely use it as a coaster if things don't improve.

Last edited by thebitman (Oct 8, 2013 3:30 pm)

DSC
Offline

I don't use mine.  MIDINES is sooooo much better!

Hypnogram
Offline
Evansville, IN

I just got mine today.  I haven't really tried to make it play full songs, but that's not what I wanted it for anyway.  Getting used to playing a keyboard or guitar with only three note polyphony has been fun/challenging/maddening, but it does what I want, and at half the price of a midiNES, I ain't even mad.  I guess some legit documentation might be pretty nice.

Last edited by Hypnogram (Oct 10, 2013 7:23 am)

Pathogenic
Offline
New Zealand

I got one a few weeks ago and have been trying it out using a few different setups but always get an annoying click when notes turn off or change.

I've tried it on a PC using Cubase LE via a M-Audio USB to Midi (and a cheap no name USB to Midi) and on the Amiga using OctaMed via a Datel midi master.
I saw the update about changing the note-off messages, I tired this in OctaMED with no difference and couldn't see it in the manual how to change it for Cubase.

Are other people having the same issue?

TSC
Offline
Milwaukee, WI

@pathogenic: I'm not sure how knowledgeable you are with Octamed or what version you are using, but MIDI is generally pretty wonky with note offs on any version of Octamed I've used. Octamed 5 doesn't recognize proper patch changes via player command. Perhaps it's that?

Pathogenic
Offline
New Zealand

Thanks TSC,
I'm using OctaMED SoundStuido, I hooked up the Chip Maestro to the Amiga to see if it was just an issue with my PC Midi setup.
Haven't really used OctaMED with Midi apart from some failed attempts at slaving one Amiga to another.
I think I will keep looking into the midi settings in Cubase and see if I can change note off to volume 0 or similar.