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 Post subject: Importing Patterns and Loops Flawlessly
PostPosted: Tue Jan 31, 2012 9:14 pm 
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Hello,

I recently purchased the SP-404SX and I have a question about creating/importing patterns.

I'm not really looking to use my 404 as a 'production workspace'. Rather, I'd like to use this to play pre-recorded parts and loop them and sequence them as need be for a live performance.

I do all my song writing in Apple Logic and my hope is that I can put the individual bounced sections into my 404 for a live performance. Here's my problem:

It seems like the I can drag and drop samples using the provided software, but is it true that I can't drop my audio clips directly into the pattern banks? Once I do drop them in the sample banks, is the only way to get them in the pattern bank to do it 'real time'?

When I bounce the parts in logic I have my parameters set to specific bars at a specific bpm, so it should in theory be ready to loop/sequence without having to trim/edit anything. When I've dropped them in as samples to the 404, I've had to put them Real Time into the pattern bank, but if I'm a little bit off in my timing I have the nuisance of having to trim it little by little to loop perfectly. This doesn't seem very intuitive.

Question: Is there anyway I can avoid converting my samples to patterns Real-Time on the 404? Can I just drop my ready-to-go patterns into the pattern bank via computer?

Sorry if my question was was so long, I just wanted to be detailed.

Thank you SO MUCH in advance!


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 Post subject: Re: Importing Patterns and Loops Flawlessly
PostPosted: Tue Jan 31, 2012 10:49 pm 
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stream of consciousness troubleshooting

well, you are aware of the quantize function right?? just hit the quantize button at any point during the pattern recording process, use knob 2 or 3 (can't remember which one) to change the value you are quantizing to, and then lay stuff in, then if you wanna change the value you quantize to for another part, you can do it all while the pattern record mode is just playing away, i'm also assuming you know how to delete things from a pattern, so if not check out the manual for a description, its super easy

now the problem lies in whether you keep all your loops and songs in whole number tempos, cause if not your gonna end up gettin real aggravated trying to achieve perfection with 6 different loops playing over each other, also, if you want to play different patterns at different tempos, you have to change the tempo in real time, which can be super annoying

my advice might be to try and just let things loop live, i don't know exactly how your loops are laid out on the computer with respects to one another, but if you have everything precise and in whole bar sections, you might be able to get by with just letting things loop, and retriggering parts as needed every so often if they drift at all, and maybe when you first introduce trigger them by hand and don't turn on loop til you know you triggered it close enough to being in time

you can also mess with adding a little empty space before your loops (resample the loop playing two times onto another pad, but with space in between the two plays, then mark the second one) if quantize isn't giving you the precise points you need, then you can quantize to the nearest without going past point and add a little air in the start point to get it to fall in place, the issue with this in your case is that you have full bar loops that repeat back to back and it would play that air everytime the pattern went through, so you would need two copies of the loop playing back and forth, which would mean your patterns would be twice as long, and sometimes switching between patterns could get complicated if you have something triggered at the very end of a pattern, cause then you need a dummy pattern to lead into new patterns

i'd say work with some of this stuff, and keep in mind what works and what doesn't for different things, so then when you prepare loops from your songs in the future you can set them up in a way that will work well with the 404

also, somebody with knowledge of that pattern program some dude on here made might be able to drop some knowledge, it was like a sequencer program they made that was a mock of the 404 sequencer right down to however many clicks per beat it has, and it let you do like a step edit for all the different pad banks, and then it used a MIDI sync with the click of the count in on the SP to start the pattern playing on the comp in time with you recording a pattern on the SP so you could record those patterns you created in the SP sequencer, it sounded really tight but i don't have a MIDI interface to try it out

hope there's something in there to help you out


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 Post subject: Re: Importing Patterns and Loops Flawlessly
PostPosted: Sat Feb 04, 2012 7:23 pm 
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Thank you for your response Dr. V.N,

So am I right in saying that the quick answer would be NO, there is not a way to dump pre-timed, pre-trimmed samples into the Pattern Bank from your computer?

So I do have to manually, in real-time, hit a Sample Bank pad to get it as a Pattern Bank pad?

And also, do you know where I can locate this 'mock sequencer' software/add-on that the guy made?

All my loops are pre-recorded to whole number tempos, already trimmed perfectly ready to loop. I just want to be able to get them in Pattern Bank without having to re-edit or time it out. The reason I want it in the Pattern Bank is so I can (for example) hit Pad 1 and trigger (queue) Pad 2, so it will immediately start playing after Pad 1 is finished playing.

Let's say I have a bass line to a song that's got Section A and Section B. I would like to assign my pre-done, pre-tempo'd, pre-trimmed region to Pad 1 for the A section. And I would like to assign my B section bass line to Pad 2. My goal is to start the A section with Pad 1 and before it's done playing hit Pad 2, so the B section bass line comes in in perfect time once the A section is finished. I hope my example isn't making it confusing.

Thanks in advance for any replies


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 Post subject: Re: Importing Patterns and Loops Flawlessly
PostPosted: Mon Feb 06, 2012 8:52 pm 
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@tuntus:

I am in the EXACT same situation as you are. I'm trying to recreate songs I put together on my computer in a live setting, and have decided that triggering samples will be the least painful way of doing this.

However, figuring out how to get precisely trimmed samples assigned to these pads has been like trying to solve the perfect crime! Nowhere on the internet does there seem to be a "How to do this" one-stop tutorial.

I even found this video, which tragically cuts off right at the moment I was waiting for: http://youtu.be/hYdlRtXKGWI

What I've been able to piece together is that there is software available that will allow you to drag wavs or aiffs to your compact flash card and assign them to specific banks. You can download it here: http://www.roland.com/support/article/?q=downloads&p=SP-404SX

There are apparently severe limitations on sample rates and what info you can include in the files. Those limitations are detailed here: http://www.roland.com/support/article/index.cfm?q=faq&p=SP-404&id=1832355

Also, you'll need an external usb compact flash drive to pull this off. Something like this: http://www.amazon.com/PQI-USB-2-0-CompactFlash-Reader/dp/B000W4T9KG

I am literally in the middle of setting this up for myself tonight, so I'll report back to you on what I discover along the way, and whether or not I end up being successful.

Either way, I hope the above info is useful to you!


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 Post subject: Re: Importing Patterns and Loops Flawlessly
PostPosted: Mon Feb 06, 2012 8:57 pm 
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Furthermore! The manual (p. 36) has instructions for doing this without the program I linked above: http://lib.roland.co.jp/support/en/manuals/res/14997200/SP-404SX_egfsipd01_W.pdf

I bought my 404SX w/o a manual and somehow ended up with a manual for the plain old 404. Apparently, it is very different!


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 Post subject: Re: Importing Patterns and Loops Flawlessly
PostPosted: Fri Jan 15, 2021 8:26 pm 
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Necroing an old thread here, but I'm basically looking to get an SP-404 A or SX to do this. Can anyone confirm that this works on those machines?


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