The Yamaha AN1x Synthesizer mailing list

All,

I've read the file "LFO to Hz NOW!!!" and at the risk of sounding 
like a wet blanket, I'm not sure that sending 400 copies of the 
letter to Yamaha is going to accomplish the desired result.  As an 
engineer who has both developed and supported consumer products, as 
well as a musician who has been using synths since the early 70's,let 
me provide a different perspective...

While an LFO numeric-value-to-Hz table is certainly a useful item, it 
is not in the category of something that a synthesizer manufacturer 
is "expected" to provide.  As someone else mentioned earlier, it is 
not something that is essential to making music.  I have owned over 
two dozen synths in my life, and none of them came with a conversion 
table such as you are requesting.  Music is predominantly an aural 
medium, and many players wouldn't use such a table, even if published 
in the owner's manual.  Please recognize a) that your request is 
something of a niche item, and b) that creating such a table after 
the fact is not a simple task, or someone on this list would probably 
have already done so.  The additional request for Hz conversions of 
EG data just clouds the picture further:  Attack and Decay values are 
almost universally specified in mSeconds, not Hz, and while a 
conversion between the two is possible, I doubt that it is something 
in Yamaha's database.  I don't think it's a case of Yamaha "hiding" 
the information; it's more likely that the data is either not written 
down, or is embedded in the source code for the product, which Yamaha 
is not about to give to the public domain.

Rather than expending effort chiding Yamaha for not providing the 
data -- which it appears they do not have written down in a format 
that they can give to customers -- let's look at ways that we could 
use the same amount of effort to gather the desired information.  
I've watched discussions of this item for the last week, and I've 
noted a few different approaches mentioned:

- Oscilloscope Measurements -- This is not as simple as it sounds; I 
doubt that an accurate table could be created with less than 30-40 
hours of work, and that's likely to be a low estimate.  The LFO is 
not directly available at the outputs, so one would have to play a 
sine-like audio wave while modulating the sound with the LFO, and 
look on the display for the repeat of an "accordion-pleat" 
oscillation in the tone.  Measuring this is much more complex than 
measuring a single cycle of a repetitive wave, and the accuracy is 
compromised by the fact that unless the audio tone is an exact 
multiple of the LFO frequency, the LFO cycle will not start at the 
same position in the audio wave in each cycle.

- Frequency Counting -- This is even harder to do, because the output 
will be a combination of the audio tone, the LFO frequency, and the 
multiplication of the two.  Unless the LFO frequency stands out, this 
method won't arrive at the planned result.

- Straight-line Approximations -- It has been suggested that if 2-3 
values were known, then the rest of the table could be calculated 
from there.  That works if the table is linear; how do we know it is?

- Synchronizing to a Metronome -- This is actually a feasible method, 
especially when using computer sequencer programs, which usually 
allow for a very accurate tempo, with fine resolution.  If the LFO is 
set to a square wave, and fed to the VCA at a high level, holding 
down a key and adjusting the tempo until it perfectly matches the 
pulsing will achieve the goal.  The trick here is to make sure that 
it's EXACTLY synchronized to the beat, not "pretty close," and the 
difficulty increases with the tempo.  I'll bet, though, if we had 10-
15 volunteers who own both a synth and a sequencer program -- I'd be 
one of them -- and all took a few of the values, we could have the 
answer in a couple of days.  Any takers?

Oh, and BTW, just one man's opinion:  If you're going to send 
a "petition" style note to a manufacturer, even if it's a petition of 
one, use capitalization.  I know that lower-case messaging has become 
fashionable on the Internet, but any effort that Yamaha (or others) 
take on your behalf is going to need the approval of higher-ups.  The 
higher you go on the chain, the less likely that the reader is net-
savvy, and outside of the Internet, all-lower-case typing is 
considered amatuerish.  If you really want action, take the extra 
effort to make your request look as much like a business letter as 
possible.  I recently got a major manufacturer to replace a $2K+ 
piece of musical gear for me, thanks to a well-crafted, capitalized, 
spell-checked email that got moved up the chain of command to the 
point where someone could authorize the swap.  I doubt that I would 
have had any success with a less formal document; certainly, none of 
my calls to Tech Support met with success.  Just something to think 
about...

Regards,

-BW

--
Bruce Wahler
Design Consultant
Ashby Solutions"
www.ashbysolutions.com
CloneWheel Support Group moderator
978.386.7389  voice
978.776.0096  fax
bruce@...


--- In AN1x-list@y..., "i don't have one!" <elektro_dan@y...> wrote:
> i uploaded a file to the an1x list FILES area. it's located in the 
> folder called LFO TO Hz. the file is called LFO TO HZ NOW!!!.TXT.
> there is power only in numbers and i hope everyone in this group 
will 
> listen to me. SEND THE FILE TO infostation@y... 
> 
> this file says that we want to know the lfo to HZ values for the 
> plg150an (an1x). i called them many times and they have never made 
me 
> happy on this issue.
> 
> my phone call or e-mails may not mean jack s@$* to them but if you 
all 
> send this file and mabye some words of your own, im shure they will 
> give us answers.
> 
> I HOPE YOU ALL LISTEN BECAUSE OUR 400+ COMBINED E-MAILS WILL MAKE A 
> DIFFERENCE!!!
> 
> REMEMBER, POWER IN NUMBERS!!!, IF WE ALL DO OUR PART WE WILL BE 
> SUCESSFUL!! WE ARE THE AN1X LIST AND WE ARE POWERFULL JUST LIKE OUR 
> SYNTHS!!!