The much dissed Korg Microsampler: better than you think

[CULP]

I'm a huge fAn of the MS1 Korg... I copped one a year ago for 220. It was a steal. I have zero complaints. Using the compressor after bouncing your track to an external analog source gives the warmest sound. I prefer playing patterns and using effects live on it more so than the 404... Real talk, if my sp 'collection' was stolen I would be sad, but fine.
I figured out how to hook midi mpd pads making it pretty legit if I'm not feeling the keys for making drums.
Yo, you can use it to sample vst's too since it has USB/midi
It's a yeAr old and still super hype

The only negative is the lack of octave shifting****

FAUNA - did you try nanostudio? That app has a crazy sampler in it and works with the synthstation25

[LimpyLoo]

*CATS SHOULD LIST WHAT THEY GOT FOR PATCHES ON THEIR MS!*
(personally, I *love* lists )
I'll go first:

1) Kids' Glockenspiel
-I had one mallet and missing keys, so MS to the rescue(!)
-got an extra half-an-octave above and below
2) Casio SK-5 Flute
-got another half-an-octave below on this bad boy
-wish MS had adjustable polyphony/mute groups so I could play this patch like a monosynth (used to do "poor man's mono" on SK-5 by playing a 3-note chord w/ left hand and play lead w/ right hand)

and that's it so far
however, I *was* thinking of adding:

3) Other Casio Patches (with Tape Warble)
-throw some junk on the old Tascam and...well...you know
4) Sound of Water Dripping
-I am quite enamored with Musique Concrete, as well as the sound of water
5) Something Bowed
-maybe a guitar, maybe a proper bowed instrument, or maybe a cymbal (like Howard Shore does sometimes)

*THA END*

[blavatsky]

alright, i'll go : bank list

1. horror/kung fu movie quotes/chords/hits/ambience
2. a bunch of effected roland JV1010 samples - chords, etc - used on full song
3. goldbaby drum samples, some weird sitar sample from movie
4. same as 1
5. same as 4, more lofi movie samples
6. drum loops off of ESX, more movie samples (educational movies from 50s/60s), chord/notes/fx off of old movies (see a pattern?)
7. damn, same as 1 again.

Glad I did that, had totally forgotten some new samples on those banks!
that is the problem with having like 7 fucking samplers...

[fauna]

awright, awright. cuz i respect you guys more than anybody else really, i ended up getting a microsampler

i'm just getting into it really (been only a coupla days) but i'm diggin it so far.

first thing i did was d/l the vintage synth / keys patches, then export those samples to make zero-point crossings on the loops and re-imported them, so that i can do infinite sustain on these notes without pops. this is my first keyboard w/ software interface, so that took awhile, but the result is good (for the most part). this ^^ plus the Hold button allows me to do what i need. i REALLY like the little (but not TOO little) keys!

i'll be building a bank of pizzicato string notes, and pro'lly a toy piano bank as well.

@ Limpyloo: if the SK-5 flute is the same as the SK-1 flute - that is a DAMNED FINE flute sound! heartbreaking and awesome.

i haven't really even messed with it as a sampler yet! lol. but i'm looking forward to that, based on what i've read / tried. so good looks with all the positive feedback on here (and thx for fielding all my questions!)

@ CULP: yeah, the nanostudio is awesome, but it doesn't have the "hold" function. my FAVE is the xenon synth, but it can't Hold either. but those are great apps!

[Nothingless1987]

evening sp fam. quick question about the patches. is it possible to save effect settings within a patch or would i need to save the whole "project"?? are the load times a problem?? Also, how easy is it to manipulate the effects live?? looking to use it as a live instrument. going to cop regardless, just curious. can't wait to team up with the 404 and mx200.

can't beleive the hate for the ms over at the korg forums.

cheers

[blavatsky]

1. effects get saved per bank
2. load time is ok, maybe 20 seconds for a pretty big bank? usually a little less I think - compared to smart media its not bad
3. 2 fx control knobs do a good job - you can map to diff parameters. the MS1 has more effect parameters than SP samplers, for example in the delays/reverbs.

[LimpyLoo]

can't beleive the hate for the ms over at the korg forums.

Yeah, it's kinda lame.

[the hate, that is]

[Nicknw]

The FX control knobs are verrrrrrry sensitive tho be warned!

Is it just me or do my samples not play velocity sensitively? The only thing which responds to different velocities is that preset bank of ROM samples, every time I sample something, there's no velocity sensitivity, tried plugging in MIDI controllers too. No dice. Nothing in the manual, nothing on korgforums.

Any of you know about this?


On noob note, does anyone know how to set this fucker up with an EMX 1 so I can record the electribe's patterns into the MS sequencer, but have the emx playing its drum sounds and the microsampler playing its samples. I don't seem to be able to change the MIDI settings on my EMX1 too, the 'MIDI' button that you use to acess settings doesn't work. Any of you encountered this shite?

peace

[ghost ghost ghost]

Yo I think most (all?) of the sampling modes automatically set velocity to fixed, but you can definitely change the velocity curve for individual samples, there just isn't a shortcut for it on the keyboard like most other settings. So trigger your sample then hit edit, go to sample, hit edit again and the velocity curve settings are in there somewhere, your FX control 1 should be around the 2-3 o clock position.

Aside from your MIDI problem, would you say the EMX is a good partner for the MS?

[Nicknw]

Much appreciated bro.

And well I only got it this afternoon lol but so far it seems to be a very good companion. The presets are a bit poo but they're very easy to fuck around with and get some interesting outcomes, effects are I think identical to the microsampler's, but you can use 3 at a time. It's very quick and easy to use aswell. Mines got JJ tubes cos apparently the stock tubes are really noisy (they were already installed I copped mine 2nd hand). Dunno how important this is to you but the build quality feels 10x better than the microsampler too.

From what I've done so far the synth is pretty terrible lol but I've got a synth anyway, I'm just gonna use this for the drums and microsampler for sampling/sequencing.

Will give a proper review once I've used it a bit more

[ghost ghost ghost]

Yeah if you could post your thoughts, that would be dope.

I basically want one to sketch out drum sequences and basslines. Electribes actually have some of my favorite drum sounds of any machine and I've wanted one since forever because of that and they seem to be pretty cheap used at the moment so I'm really tempted to cop on. The sequencer is really nice too. I've never had a chance to explore the deep enough to find out what kind of bass sounds I could achieve. I'm not really after any super complex sounds, just an average synth, with drums, effects and a step sequencer so that I can hit play and then trigger samples on the Microsampler and do some turntable work.

[blavatsky]

yeah the EMX is a fun piece, although you'll find the microsampler has different effects - they are kaoss pad based, for example the reverb is very nice on the MS1 and is a metallic shitpile on the EMX....some may be the same like the compression/grain shift stuff.

One thing about the EMX, you are LOCKED in 16ths (or 32nds w/ 4 bars), which is fine for trance/DNB and such but for looser humanized beats like this forum seems to prefer, i did not like it - the drums will always be lock step, although you can toss a little swing on there.

If i was in the market again for a sequencer/simple synth but with more timing options i'd look at a yamaha RMx1, or a RS7000, or an Emu command station.

[Nicknw]

When I wanna make 'loose' beats, I just sample the sounds into the microsampler then play it into that sequencer unquantized. Simple!

[ghost ghost ghost]

Almost everything I do that ends up getting recorded is around 170bpm with drums running in half time. It's just something I've always done because when I got my first MPC I was into really surgical stuff. So doing this on an Electribe would double the resolution of the step sequencer for drums, giving me 32 instead of 16 steps. I quantize most of my drums to 32 anyway unless I'm doing a beat only of the 404. I'm open to pretty much anything that fits my description in my last post but it just happens that Electribes are always available and at pretty good prices. I came pretty close to buying an MC909 not long ago but the auction ended up going over my budget.

[treezy z]

i saw a review that said timestretch reduced polyphony to 7 voices. does that mean 7 timestretched samples or 7 total?