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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Thu Sep 08, 2022 10:58 am 
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TGN wrote:
Thanks SP-USER for explaining. :D

When i was in italy i took the mk2 with me for doing some lofi uk garage house with the TR STYLE sequencer mode. Gonna finish this ep in the next weeks, but i already have some thoughts and complaints:

I like the possibility to set velocity, pitch, shuffle, sample start per step,but once entered it is not possible to see these details again, you have to guess them. So if you program fast hihats in a 2 bar loop with the heavy use of different velocity, pitch and shuffle settings, it is nearly impossible to recreate this pattern, because you can not comprehend afterwards what you were exactly doing. So a workaround is to resample the loop. Fortunately you can mute kick, snare, etc to get only the hihats.

And it is not possible to copy or alter notes like on the elektron machines. If you don't like, erase and do it again. Copy? Resample. Or crop and duplicate the pattern.

So when it comes to these things, nothing changed.

The overall behaviour of samples set up in TR-Mode is different, too. Normally if you have a pattern running, you can retrigger samples, which are also triggered by the running sequencer. Samples which were entered in TR-Mode can't be retriggered by hand while the pattern is running. If you trigger the sample, it plays on top of its own, polyphon. But on the one hand, the release of a fastly triggered kick drum sample is not cut this way. I always liked the sound of my MC-505 for this behavour.

On the other hand there is a disadvantage: If you have programmed a pattern in TR-Mode, the pitch (and maybe other parameters) of a sample is hardcoded in the pattern. if you change the pitch of a sample it does not affect the pitch of this sample in the pattern. But you can pitch down your sample and resample it and put this to the pad.

I like the sp-404mk2 for techno/house/4x4/ stuff, but you still have to find your workarounds on a luxury level now - what a luck, it would not be a SP if it wouldn't be this way. :)

Another thing - i recently bought an alpha juno 2 in good shape and i love this synth. So in wanted to sample it straight into the mk2. Unfortunately the stereo inputs do not tolerate a lot of gain. drum samples imported from SD-Card are way louder than my phrase samples of the alpha juno. Glad to have a compressor efx, but i wish the extern inputs would accept more gain/volume.

Can't comment on a lot of that cause I still haven't installed the update, but I'll force myself to get it done today after lunch!

Congrat's on the Alpha Juno bruh, very nice, but not sure why you're having gain issues. Are you aware of the GAIN tab hidden in the SYSTEM menu?

- Press SHIFT + PAD 13 to enter UTILITY mode
- Press PUSH/ENTER knob to enter SYSTEM menu
- Turn CTRL 3 knob to select GAIN tab

Do any of the settings on the GAIN tab help with that?

BTW, I just thought of an even better way to select the FX busses, in fact it's so good I refuse to believe that there's a better way.

We have a "BUS FX" pad and we also have pads that contain the numbers 1 to 4 (all on the same row even). So what Roland should do is make it so that when you hold down the "BUS FX" pad, pad numbers 1-4 light-up to represent the four busses. So in order to choose any of the four busses, you just press pad 1-4 while holding down BUS FX - simple as that!

That's it, perfect in every way and completely logical due to the naming of the pads involved (BUS FX + 1,2,3,4). Doesn't get any more logical and obvious than that. And when the four pads light up to show the busses, the currently selected bus should be a different colour to show which Bus is currently selected.

This means you could even hold down the BUS FX pad just to remind yourself which Bus you are editing without actually switching it, so it's the best of both worlds. Seriously, there is no better way to do it than that, there literally isn't.

If there is I would love to know what it is because the pads are all on the same row and are (literally) named perfectly with "BUS FX + 1,2,3,4", so I reckon that's the way Roland should implement it, and I'm surprised they didn't do so from the start.


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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Fri Sep 09, 2022 10:46 am 
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Man, how on earth do you stop the effects screen from timing out?

I feel like I'm in a constant fight with the machine. Why on earth does the effects parameters keep going back to the BPM display? It's a pain in the fucking arse and to make it even worse they have it so that switching between the two effects screens is a "hold down the encoder" operation instead of being a toggle.

So in other words, to get at the second row of effects paramaters, I've first got to turn a knob I don't even want to adjust (just to bring up the first row of effects parameters), then I have to hold down the encoder (ALL THE TIME) to bring up the second row of effects parameters, and then, for crying out loud, I am expected to have a third hand so that I can twiddle the knobs while holding down the encoder AND playing the pads at the same time!

They have GOT to be kidding, right?

And to make matters worse, even if you finally get to that stage and have managed to bribe a DNA-engineering company into growing you a third fucking hand, the display of the effects parameters times out and returns to the BPM display if you stop twiddling the knobs for even a few seconds!

WHAT???

Don't get me wrong, I do love this thing big-time so I assure you that this rant has been held-off for as long as I can manage it, but I don't see any setting to fix this infuriating crap and it is totally destroying my enjoyment of the machine, it's a constant battle just to keep the parameters on the fucking screen while I twiddle them, so what the hell is all that about?

Either I'm missing something VERY obvious here or they have GOT to fix that because it is beyond sadistic if they expect people to work like that!

I tell you what, it is SO infuriating that I will indeed return this thing if there is not a solution to it before my return window elapses. This is just plain sadistic, there is NO WAY I am tolerating such a design so I REALLY hope there's a setting somewhere to fix it, or that there's something obvious I'm not aware of.

ARRRRRRRRRGH!!!
WHY won't you STAY on the FUCKING screen you STUPID **** ?


Deep breaths ... nice and easy ... nice and easy ... :roll:


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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Fri Sep 09, 2022 5:12 pm 
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Nevermind, I figured it out. It's a combination of pressing any of the MFX buttons and Remain. I tired that before and it didn't work, it seems you have to press Remain first and hold it down while you press one of the MFX buttons. Do it in reverse and it will not lock-on.

I feel MAJORLY sorry for any poor bastard who goes through life with a MKII not realising that this is all they needed to do. And Roland, for crying out loud, surely it should be in that mode by default, because if ever we want to go back to the BPM display, all we have to do is press Exit!

This is an awesome piece of kit but you totally messed-up on the default knob behaviour which should be set to "Direct" by default. The Bus selection method would be far better done the way I suggested in my first post at the top of this page. And now this, where instead of it doing what we want it to do by default, we have to go through a pointless procedure to lock it.

Surely just leave it in lock mode from the start, we can always press Exit to return to the BPM display when we've finished editing the FX. It does not make sense to keep timing out and switching back to the BPM display, it is an absolute pain in the backside, an abomination in design and is completely unnecessary!

I almost needed therapy after that!


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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Fri Sep 09, 2022 7:39 pm 
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Yeah, i think that roland thinks that the young gen just play live and push a fx and fiddle the knobs nearly randomly in 2 seconds. Maybe Roland was so smart and the screen stays at least as long as you fiddle the knobs?

Anyways, good you found the REMAIN + EFX.
Somewhere i read that you can control the efx via midi, but did not checked yet...

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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Fri Sep 09, 2022 9:38 pm 
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Blows my mind how these interface design desicions even passed quality control bruh :(

I would not be surprised if they sent out very early units to random YouTube nut-jobs who'd never used a 404 before, and took advice from them. I mean I literally cannot think of any other reason for such interface design fuck-ups to exist!

Like I said, it's an abomination of interface design and completely unnecessary, absolutely appalling, and you can bet yer fucking life I'll never see a 'Touch Wah' for voicing that opinion if they read this, but seriously, it had to be said and there's no polite way to put it because these decisions are just so bloody bad!

Anyway, looking forward to hearing your new EP bruh 8)


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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Sat Sep 10, 2022 12:12 am 
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SP-USER wrote:
Blows my mind how these interface design desicions even passed quality control bruh :(

I would not be surprised if they sent out very early units to random YouTube nut-jobs who'd never used a 404 before, and took advice from them. I mean I literally cannot think of any other reason for such interface design fuck-ups to exist!

Like I said, it's an abomination of interface design and completely unnecessary, absolutely appalling, and you can bet yer fucking life I'll never see a 'Touch Wah' for voicing that opinion if they read this, but seriously, it had to be said and there's no polite way to put it because these decisions are just so bloody bad!

Anyway, looking forward to hearing your new EP bruh 8)


youll find your workarounds, just adapt and it will work fine for you

the people i saw involved in this in terms of sending the machine out are respected and talented members of the 404 community who were also involved in feedback stages, they just probably had a likemindedness to not thinking what you hate about it as being a big deal. the bpm display switching on its own probably felt normal coming from people familiar with the 404s as they came before and was probably left that way aesthetically in the way other sps do it, but at least you can change it now

dont give up on it so early man keep it going theres still hope!!!!!


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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Sat Sep 10, 2022 11:46 am 
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Yeah but there is literally no need to keep auto-switching to it, and the only reason we need that stupid "REMAIN + MFX" button press is BECAUSE the bloody thing keeps timing out!!!

Therefore, in order to fix both of those issues all they need to do is remove the bloody time-out! If it didn't time out in the first place there would be no need to press REMAIN + FX. I don't care what bullshit excuses are given for that crap, it is an absolute abomination in interface design and it is also completely fucking pointless!

It serves no purpose what-so-ever, cause naturally we are all capable of pressing EXIT if/when we want to get back to the BPM display!

That said, I've not given up on it bro. Thankfully there's a way around it with REMAIN+MFX so I'm keeping it, but the point is this issue should not be there, nor should the dials be set to "Catch" by default, I mean what crack-pot authorised that for fuck sake, to set "Catch" mode on the knobs of a 404 of all things?

"Catch" mode should not even exist on this device, nevermind be set as the default :lol:

Nor should the Bus slection be implemented so badly and I'm not surprised SPVIDZ keeps going on about it like he does, it's fucking ridiculous and totally pointless!

My posts prove there is a far better way to implement all three of these things, and I'm not even a seasoned 404 user! It totally baffles me how such appalingly bad interface design ever got the green light in the first place, it is mind-blowingly bad interface design!

If there was some limitation in the controls available then I could understand these decisions, but there are no such limitations because the pads are right there, appropriately labelled, right in front of their faces!!!

BUS FX + 1,2,3,4

I mean fucking hell, if they cannot get something as blatantly obvious as that right ... :shock:


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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Tue Sep 13, 2022 9:17 am 
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SP-USER, would be cool if you contact Roland and tell them your improvement tips: https://www.roland.com/backstage

Maybe you have to create an account and register your sp for that.

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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Tue Sep 13, 2022 3:05 pm 
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Nah, sorry bruh, I'm sick of all the data sharing that goes on with corporates, they nearly all think that the public are there to be data-mined and I doubt that Roland are any different.

Still, feel free to pass it on if you have an account (but edit out the angry bits first) :mrgreen:


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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Fri Oct 14, 2022 8:54 pm 
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I'm without an SP again, bloody thing would not power up on batteries!

To be honest it's gotten to the point now where it's just embarrasing. This is why I was absent from the forum recently, I was hoping to find another in stock without having to mention anything about it, but clearly that's not happening any time soon so the homies on here would have wondered why I still haven't joined in - so I'm just letting you know.

Even more bad news is regards the Roland JX-08 I was planning to pair with it. Well it ain't happening, they've crippled it, no SysEx and no way to manage presets either, so you basically have to import whole banks with no way to edit which patches those banks are comprised of.

No thanks, Roland.


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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Fri Oct 14, 2022 10:03 pm 
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SP-USER wrote:
I'm without an SP again, bloody thing would not power up on batteries!

To be honest it's gotten to the point now where it's just embarrasing. This is why I was absent from the forum recently, I was hoping to find another in stock without having to mention anything about it, but clearly that's not happening any time soon so the homies on here would have wondered why I still haven't joined in - so I'm just letting you know.



No thanks, Roland.



Don't know if it would be any help to you, but I got my mk2 from Japanese Amazon where they are always in stock.

Been waiting to hear something from you with all your talk on the forums (nodisrespect)

https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/ROLAND-SP-404-MK-II-Sampler/dp/B09J4NHRNM/ref=sr_1_1?crid=81NOTNZZIION&keywords=sp404&qid=1665784928&qu=eyJxc2MiOiIzLjQyIiwicXNhIjoiMS45NyIsInFzcCI6IjEuNzMifQ%3D%3D&sprefix=sp+404%2Caps%2C164&sr=8-1

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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Fri Oct 14, 2022 10:27 pm 
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spliffsoldier wrote:
SP-USER wrote:
I'm without an SP again, bloody thing would not power up on batteries!

To be honest it's gotten to the point now where it's just embarrasing. This is why I was absent from the forum recently, I was hoping to find another in stock without having to mention anything about it, but clearly that's not happening any time soon so the homies on here would have wondered why I still haven't joined in - so I'm just letting you know.



No thanks, Roland.



Don't know if it would be any help to you, but I got my mk2 from Japanese Amazon where they are always in stock.

Been waiting to hear something from you with all your talk on the forums (nodisrespect)

https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/ROLAND-SP-404-MK-II-Sampler/dp/B09J4NHRNM/ref=sr_1_1?crid=81NOTNZZIION&keywords=sp404&qid=1665784928&qu=eyJxc2MiOiIzLjQyIiwicXNhIjoiMS45NyIsInFzcCI6IjEuNzMifQ%3D%3D&sprefix=sp+404%2Caps%2C164&sr=8-1



i can vouch on this, got my SX brand new in an unopened box from a japanese music store off ebay lol


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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Sat Oct 15, 2022 12:17 am 
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spliffsoldier wrote:
Don't know if it would be any help to you, but I got my mk2 from Japanese Amazon where they are always in stock.

Been waiting to hear something from you with all your talk on the forums (nodisrespect)

Ah, but if you have seen my talk on the forums then you would be very aware that I don't support psychopathic, society and economy destroying W.E.F. corporates in any way, shape or form (especially Amazon). And if it's true that Amazon Japan "always have them in stock" while retailers around the world are going bust due to Amazon, then music retailers worldwide should file a lawsuit against both Amazon and Roland.

Jaytreaze wrote:
i can vouch on this, got my SX brand new in an unopened box from a japanese music store off ebay lol

To be perfectly honest, returning the MKII was as much a relief as it was a disappointment. Part of me was glad to see the back of it and I have to say I enjoyed owning the SP-404A a lot more than the MKII, so considering how much more powerful the MKII is, that just goes to show how much usability has taken a nose-dive!

Anyway it's not all bad news. I had a very hard think after having to return the MKII, and I was a lot happier before I started with all this hardware again, because before I got interested in Hip-Hop and the 404, I used to have a very simple software setup which was:

- Ableton Live 5 (Full Version).
- PG-8X (The best software version of my favourite analogue the JX-8P).
- TAL Sampler (The best, hottest and most authentic sounding Lo-Fi soft-sampler out there).

That's it, and because I prefer a quality 88-Key keybed, I'm thinking of buying this big old beast, connecting it to my computer and I'll be in audio heaven again. Big, chunky, built like a tank, has everything I need and nothing I don't:

HAMMER 88:
https://m-audio.com/hammer88

So I'm thinking of buying that HAMMER 88 and connecting it to the same old software setup listed above. This will get me into producing some sound and music, and then, when the MKII is readily available again I'll pick one up and sample from the computer instead of a hardware synth.

Makes sense really, cause instead of trying to get a suitable hardware synth to feed the 404, there's no such issue here and it's just as easy to sample from a computer into a MKII as it is to sample from a hardware synth into a MKII. I think I should have done this right from the start, cause it means I would have unlimited instances of the best soft sampler and soft synth around, and get to play it all using a proper, weighted, hammer-action keybed!!!

And although I said I wouldn't, I did end up retuning the ZOOM R8. There was no point me keeping it since I would have really only used that with a guitar and I'm not going down that route now, or at least not for the forseeable future. They let me return it as long as I use it as payment for something else, which was actually very good of them cause I'd had it over the return period. So, that even means I can use the ZOOM R8 return towards the HAMMER 88.

It also means that in total (apart from buying another MKII later on), my only hardware outlay would in fact be for the HAMMER 88 which is a very reasonable £350. That's a heck of a lot cheaper (and better) than what I was getting into before, when for example I had paid well over a grand for a MODX8 which was just a massive disappointment.

So yeah, that HAMMER 88, check it out, it's a proper no-nonsense beast of a keybed:
https://m-audio.com/hammer88

Plus, being a big fan of "Hammer Film Productions" I kinda like the name "HAMMER 88" :mrgreen:
And that's a very 'Gothic' black she's finished in too!!!

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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Sat Oct 15, 2022 4:08 pm 
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os 2.0 in case you didn't knew already
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Mn5nEoj6XI

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 Post subject: Re: SP-404 MK2?
PostPosted: Sat Oct 15, 2022 7:18 pm 
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Been out a few months now I think, pretty sure that's the one I updated mine to. There's a lot of nice additions but it remains an absolute nightmare in the effects parameters and Bus settings screens.

Not a single effect with trigger sync on the LFO parameters, and not a 'Touch Wah' in sight, all of which I find absolutely disturbing for such a device. They really need to pull their socks up on this one, big time. If this is the result of "listening to customers" then for once they need to quit doing that and start implementing the sort of stuff that a device like this should have by default.

They definitely added some nice stuff in that update though.


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