alesis sr18-akai XR20&pitchbend

[korakios]

Hi!has anyone messed around with these machines?I have a problem using a pitchbend on akai xr20...it's not working by shifting an octave,only 2 semitones so ,has anyone tried it?

[ellaguru]

hi man
i have an xr20 and i didnt use it since 2009. i'll try the pitch, but from what i remember it worked cool...

[korakios]

thanks ellaguru.When you find some time plz check it

[kel]

I messed with an XR20 for a couple of days recently and I know you can at least pitch it up or down 1 octave, maybe 2... but I don't remember how. cool percussion sounds.

[ellaguru]

unfortunatley i think kel is right...
i tried the machine and the manual and the only thing they say on it is about "trasposition" of the synth part, they never talk about "pitch" of drums....so you can have 3 octave synth (-1, 0, 1) and a "trasposition pattern" (-12, 0, 12) when you save (???) the pattern into memory...

...better get a dr202: it has pitch of synth and drums...and batteries...
i have this little beast too...

[kel]

Pitch of drums, synth, and battery power is possible w/ both machines if I'mnot mistaken. DR-202 is much cheaper (in price).... never tried one but i'd like to. Oh yeah and its orange buttons, I like it

[korakios]

I emailed akai and they answer me:
"Thank you for your interest in Akai Pro!

The XR20 can register pitchbend messages to move up or down two semitones,
as you have experienced. This is the function of you XR20."

so ,in synth mode by using a controller sending pitchbend ,you can't use it as an actual synthesizer and pitch the sound in a range of octave in realtime...too bad...
but I really like it(it's my first drum machine!),nice sounds,simple&tweakable(pitch,attack-release,eq/comp&reverb)
Although the headphone amp really sucks,I feel like it's raining by the hiss noise!
Thanks ellaguru&kell

[ellaguru]

i tried yesterday, but i didnt find how to pitch the drums (if it is possible)...
in any case this machine got some very cool drums.

[korakios]

i tried yesterday, but i didnt find how to pitch the drums (if it is possible)...
in any case this machine got some very cool drums.

PItchbend works only for synth mode.For drum and 1shot mode you have to manually set the pitch...
The only lack is that xr20 doesn't have many crash/ride samples...

[ellaguru]

PItchbend works only for synth mode.For drum and 1shot mode you have to manually set the pitch...

maybe is that that i remebered...
anyway how do you do it manually? i didnt found the parameters on the manual...

[korakios]

anyway how do you do it manually? i didnt found the parameters on the manual...

power up,press "drum set",go left untill page 6 and here it is: "pitch"

[ellaguru]

anyway how do you do it manually? i didnt found the parameters on the manual...

power up,press "drum set",go left untill page 6 and here it is: "pitch"

thanx!

[Headphones]

The secret is to use cheap pedals to do this on the drums. Especially Octave pedals or multi fx pedals that have Octave up their sleeve. Behringer, Boss, EHX, Line 6 and Earthquaker Devices makes them. I use a Behringer FX600 pedal for Octave on my RD6 and it works great. So that’s worth trying if your drum machine refuses to tune up or down a octave.