MBSID V2 Superpoly Teaser

MIDIbox SID
1

Well, this is really an unfair teaser, as a superpoly option won’t be officially supported in V2.0 (maybe in V2.1)

But there will be a freaky (well hidden) option which will allow you to configure the MIDI handler of the Lead engine, so that 4 cores cycle the voices which are received over the same channel. The resulting effect is like polyphonic playing (with some quirks which will be solved later).

So, how is this possible: instead of using the CAN interface for controlling the voices from the master core, each core keeps track over the voice allocation locally. So long they are assigned to the same MIDI channel, they will receive the same notes, accordingly each core “knows exactly” which notes are played by the other cores, and can spend his own (stereo) voice whenever it’s free, or it can kill it’s old note.

How it sounds:

http://www.ucapps.de/mp3/midibox_sid/mbsidv2_superpoly_experiment.mp3

Note that I’ve recorded the parts (strings/bass/lead begin/main) seperately, each time three cores were playing a single track. (Three and not four, as my fourth core is stuffed with 6581 SIDs which have a different filter)

And to already answer a question which will probably asked first: this “quick hack” works only with lead voices. It isn’t possible to play two seperate lead voices from a single core (so that 8 voices could be played in parallel).

Such an option could only work with the multi engine, but I’m not planning to integrate the same superpoly option into this one for v2.0… maybe later.

Best Regards, Thorsten.

2

yet more awesomeness

3

Wow, MB Sid is really developing some nice (non-typical) sounds!

4

i don’t know (still) what you all talking there about, but the quality of sounds this thing is capable for, leaves me with my mouth open  :-[

there will be no change in pcbs, right?

5

I had no idea a sid could sound that good. I’m so glad I got in on wilbas boards. Thanks again for such great work.

Luke

6

I had no idea a sid could sound that good

a sid can’t sound that good.

6 can, though! :slight_smile:

I must admit, I was rubbing my hands with glee to hear this one.. I was expecting a typical TK arp line, only *6 :smiley:

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I’m really trying not to overuse this “smiley”, but sometimes I just can’t resist since it expresses exactly what I feel:

8

Paging Richard Wright…

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Wow I listened to this at work yesterday on some shitty PC speakers and then just listened to it in my studio and I can’t beleive how warm and rich that sounds… Is that straight out of the SID or is there some FX added?

10

there will be no change in pcbs, right?

no, don’t panic! I was talking about a software solution. :slight_smile:

I must admit, I was rubbing my hands with glee to hear this one.. I was expecting a typical TK arp line, only *6 :smiley:

ok, next demo will be an arp line again for the fan club in down under!

:wink:

Wow I listened to this at work yesterday on some shitty PC speakers and then just listened to it in my studio and I can’t beleive how warm and rich that sounds… Is that straight out of the SID or is there some FX added?

Yes, I used EQs to seperate the sounds in the spectrum, a simple echo on the lead, and a phaser effect on the string line.

The raw output already sounds very rich thanks to different modulation tricks, e.g. inverted modulation on opposite audio channel and carefully adjusted ADDSR rates for the filter EGs.

Best Regards, Thorsten.
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ok, next demo will be an arp line again for the fan club in down under!

:wink:

Well your acid lines are great, but this one was nice and fat just the way it was, thank you :slight_smile: I’m looking forward to using this for those big 80’s style string solos like yours :slight_smile:
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tk thanks for real

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;D ;D ;D

I want to hear some more  :wink:

14

Hi guys,

I hadn’t checked the forum for a couple of weeks because of moving to a new appartement, but I’m back on the forum now :). So to the point now: WOW! This polymode is amazing. Tonight I changed the lines in the code that I need for my hardware and recompiled and uploaded the HEX files. I’ve played with it for quite a while and I’m really deeply impressed. It’s amazing what those SID’s can do! I still haven’t used the 8 Moog filters in this new polymode, but I assume that these will even add to the fatness of the sound.

A more practical question by the way: is anyone currently working on a PC editor for the MBSID V2? If not, I’d be happy to start working on that. I myself would really like to have an easy patch/bank-manager as well as an editor (since I only have a simple control surface).

Greetings,

Rutger

ps. Does anyone know if the MBSID V2 responds to bank messages? I think it would be nice. I can send those from my Korg Triton to my Yamaha S30 to select a certain bank and patch number. Maybe this would be cool for the MBSID V2 too? Or is that already implemented and did I miss something?

15

I guess this is the place to ask something i’ve been wondering about for a while.

I want to know what 8xSID’s sound like playing two handed chords, maybe with PWM in a Juno style, things like that.

Given that V2 now supports 8xSID’s, can somebody (TK ::)  ) record some full on poly stuff? I know there are demo’s and things, but they tend to be illustrating a certain feature.  If I had the webspace, i’d host a page myself in the style of www.synthmania.com

I’m sure there are a lot of people eager to hear what this thing can do!! Can anybody oblige?

16

WOW! This polymode is amazing.

I’m glad that you like it - note that this was the quick&dirty implementation :wink:

more practical question by the way: is anyone currently working on a PC editor for the MBSID V2? If not, I’d be happy to start working on that. I myself would really like to have an easy patch/bank-manager as well as an editor (since I only have a simple control surface).

Last discussion was here: http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=9855.0, but I guess that nobody has really started yet

ps. Does anyone know if the MBSID V2 responds to bank messages? I think it would be nice. I can send those from my Korg Triton to my Yamaha S30 to select a certain bank and patch number. Maybe this would be cool for the MBSID V2 too? Or is that already implemented and did I miss something?

It is implemented :slight_smile:

Banks are switched via CC#0

Some synths are sending/receiving bank changes with CC#32 (Bank LSB) instead, maybe this is the reason? Does your keyboard allow you to change the CC number for bank changes? (you can use MIDI-Ox to check the used CC number)

I guess this is the place to ask something i’ve been wondering about for a while.

I want to know what 8xSID’s sound like playing two handed chords, maybe with PWM in a Juno style, things like that.

Given that V2 now supports 8xSID’s, can somebody (TK ::)  ) record some full on poly stuff? I know there are demo’s and things, but they tend to be illustrating a certain feature.  If I had the webspace, i’d host a page myself in the style of www.synthmania.com

I’m sure there are a lot of people eager to hear what this thing can do!! Can anybody oblige?

currently superpoly is only supported for the lead engines, which means: 4 note polyphony (stereo)

with a trick it’s possible to play 6 notes with 4 oscillators, in this case the multi engine has to be used (runs on 1 core with 2 SIDs -> 6 oscillators), and it has to be played unisono (so master and slave assigned to the same MIDI channel). But in this case, the capabilities for using the filter are very limited.

If you want to get an individual demo: just record some tunes into a MIDI file and send it to me :slight_smile:

Best Regards, Thorsten.

17

If you want to get an individual demo: just record some tunes into a MIDI file and send it to me

Hehe, no, I have a better idea :). Let’s make a website that allows to listen to (audio) and look at (webcam) your MBSID V2 in real time! Users can upload MIDI files in a playlist that will be played on your MBSID ;). That would be a totaly cool new approach to working with hardware synths by the way. To not buy a synth but buy some ‘online time’ to control it over the internet and use the produced audio in a song ;).

Ok, back to a more serious note now. I’ll start programming on a dedicated MBSID V2 editor and librarian then. Is there a preferred programming language? Maybe Java? Or C++? I think having an .exe executable program would be really nice. Or can I assume that everyone has Java installed?

Greetings,

Rutger

Greetings,

Rutger

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All MIDIbox users have Java installed, otherwise they wouldn’t be able to upload code with MIOS Studio :wink:

Please consider to use Java, so that MacOS and Linux users are able to execute the application as well.

Best Regards, Thorsten.

19

Alright then, Java it is :). I hope I’ll get used to the syntax quickly. I’ve used Java before, but in the past few years I mostly used Matlab so I might need some time adjusting to Java.

Greetings,

Rutger

20

On my TODO list is to add the MB-SID V2 patch editor into the Java-based MIOS Studio.

Unfortunately, I’ve run out of time to do this now, still very busy with other things (like selling SIDs, developing my MB-SEQ, etc.) so it’s not something I will get time to do soon… so I’m hoping someone else will take it on.

I just wanted to suggest that using MIOS Studio as the base framework might be the easiest starting point, as all the work of MIDI routing etc. has been taken care of, and you can see how things like the hex upload and virtual keyboard work. This will be a lot easier than starting from nothing.