[sdiy] How to avoid clicking gates

[cheater cheater]

Just wanted to point out that Michael has it right but the wrong way around:
> no! You want the Gate signal to be sharp with the lowest slew rate
> possible.
> A low slew rate gives transients - that's what you probably hear.

actually, a high slew rate gives more high harmonics (it's not a
simple relationship like that, but it's a good enough explanation)

In other news, the click of the envelope that you'll hear largely
depends on the harmonic content of the gate your keyboard assembly
produces. Hence e.g. hammonds with their 8-point contacts or some
other number of them.
Is your envelope not snappy enough? Maybe the gate is just too slow.

Also:
oscillator phase reset is most useful when you have more than 1 osc.
Useful for unison hoovers and whatnot, and all sorts of stabs, as
well.
It can give you the machine gun effect, though.

Oscillator phase reset is absolutely shit if you want an organic,
pleasant sound, such as you would expect from a pad or a mellow organ
style sound. Free running oscillators are much better for that.

One classic way of doing both is to have a 'start phase' knob which
sets the start phase of the oscillator, and the knob is of the
'switchable' kind where the click past the leftmost position turns off
phase reset. How to do the start phase is left as an exercise for the
reader.

D.

On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 8:26 PM, David G. Dixon<dixon at interchange.ubc.ca> wrote:
> Well, I triggered the sync and patched a string bass-type of sound, and the
> difference was barely perceptible, and only at the very lowest frequencies.
> However, I can see how it would be important for bass drum-type sounds.  In
> addition, if one is using an oscillator for LFO applications, and wants to
> start the LF oscillations at the same point with every note, then triggering
> the sync would be useful for that as well.  In any case, it is an easy to
> do, so I'll keep doing it.
>
> One thing I discovered while playing the string bass sound was that, if I'm
> sending the keyboard CV to the filter cutoff as well as the oscillator, then
> if the oscillator's tuning range is adjusted, the filter's cutoff must also
> be adjusted to maintain sound quality.  Another good thing to know...
>
> Aren't these damn things fun?!?!?!?
>
>> Michael Zacherl. wrote:
>> >
>> > On Aug 10, 2009, at 8:12 PM, Magnus Danielson wrote:
>> >
>> >> David G. Dixon wrote:
>> >>>> Use an envelope/lag processor (same thing)
>> >>> Ah, in other words, don't plug the gate output directly into the VCA,
>> >>> but go
>> >>> through an EG first?  (Why didn't I think of that?  DUH!  Did I
>> >>> mention that
>> >>> this is my first synthesizer?  I'm actually a pretty smart guy, most
>> >>> days!)
>> >>
>> >> Yes. A common misstake is also that the gate needs to go to the
>> >> oscillator sync.
>> >
>> > Never patched up a bass drum or the like and wondered why it keeps
>> > changing it's punch?  ;-)
>>
>> Well, I already knows that, but for most synts you do not need it, even
>> if it is usefull for some sounds.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Magnus
>
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