Hi, Got my 555 a few months ago, been lurking here since then.
Just thought I'd let people now you can record the D-beam movements as a midi signal, all you have to do is turn on the v-link. This doesn't seem to be in the manual, but it's been really usefull. I've been having a lot of fun using it to control soft synth and effects parameters in cubase.

So far, the 555's been everything i could've wanted with only a couple of flaws... 1. Can't pitch the samples by speeding them up or slowing them down (much better sound than a pitch shift effect). This is crazy, it's a standard in samplers ever since the 80's, even my zoom sampletrak can do this.
2. the loop capture save to pad stops the sound.... yeah, it's annoying, but i still love and use the loop capture a lot.
3. You can't resample patterns. Again, I can do this in the sampletrak, it seems simple enough. All they'd have to do is let you play a pattern when resampling.
odd

That's pretty cool man, I'd like to own a 555 someday.

D-Beam to MIDI sound sick, there's a few controls in Ableton Live which could really benefit from that. I'm not surprised it was left out of the manual, the Roland manuals I have are pretty vague about things.

lack of sample pitching is a real pain, seems only the Sp-505 had this feature.

anyway, welcome aboard man. how's London? i'm keen to get back there

I hear you one the ptich ! they are killn us with that ! but, that aside the 555 is fresh. I get around the pitch thing by using my EPS along side it. The 555 + EPS is one hell of a combo !

I now know why the SP family samplers have these limitations. They almost all are called Groove Boxes. Thus it is like a 'limited' sampler. I guess thats why they lack some of the main features. They are pushing us to buy MV or other gear to do this stuff.

True but I wouldn't need to buy an MV for those features because my computer can pitchshift anything to match if I need to do that stuff. It's a little longer of a process overall to but I don't mind at all.

The pitch shift actually isint to bad if u use it on real clean samples....like the kind u buy in those CD packs. But for us crate diggers its not of much use. Ive used i effectively in the past on some things.

I actually use the pitch shift effect with great results it's just a little finicky, but after using the 303 for so long I have interesting uses for all the effects.

Yeah, that pitch effect can be cool, but for a lot of situations it sucks. I'll just carry on using audition for all of that...

Drewzle - London's ok just cold and grey. and trains are never on time...

odd

Hmm, reminds me of Seattle.

might be visitin london in sept. my favorite movie director is from England. Terry Gilliam! he is the best.

Brazil is fresh, but so is 1984. Also the movie he did with Robin Williams and Jeff Daniels.

"Fisher King"
i just watched "Brazil" again a few days ago, such a bleak but startling movie. of course i also love "Time Bandits" "Fear and Loathing" plus my fave is "Twelve Monkeys" I've seen that movie so many times i've lost count. "brothers grimm" was just all right though. hope he gets back on the horse for one more classic.

check here:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000416/

such a legend that guy is. anyway sorry to steal the thread, i'll give it back now.

I have 12 Monkeys on my DVR right now. I love anything about Hunter S. Thompson so I have a copy of Fear and Loathing on dvd.

it simply takes way to to to much juice to resample every single note and octave instantly , remember these things have a computer similar to that found in a timex watch. if you want keyboard pitch shifting where it speeds up and slows down, cant you use dj fx looper? i found this to be amazing.