Korg Poly800/EX800 Users

Hi Poly fans,

good news! I've made some real breakthroughs with improving the speed
of handling the LFO's in the HAWK-800 software. It's truly amazing
what you can get a little 8 bit CPU to do if you know how to use
pointer jump tables.

The result is that, I will soon be releasing a software upgrade that
remaps the extended parameters into a sensible arrangement since the
existing layout is, to be quite honest, awfully confusing.

And, along with the existing two LFO's we will add another two SLFO's.

The waveforms available for all four LFO's are triangle, sawtooth,
sine, PWM and random and all can be inverted!

In addition, the SLFO's can modulate the rate of the LFO's.

And, the a single LFO and SLFO can be additively applied to the depth
of DCO (either bend or MG or both) and VCF.

Stay tuned for that software release coming out soon.

And for all of you who think that the AtomaHawk is never coming. I've
been working on that too and currently have FM-800 under EG3
influence. And if the total CPU cycles don't get exhausted soon, the
Moog Slayer will be able to be modulated by LFO and EG. It's not ready
for prime time just yet.

Mike.

On Mon, 25 Aug 2008, korgpolyex800 wrote:

> The waveforms available for all four LFO's are triangle, sawtooth, sine,
> PWM and random and all can be inverted!

================

i'm curious... what algorithm are you using for random LFOs? assuming that
it's pseudorandom(???), what's the period?

> In addition, the SLFO's can modulate the rate of the LFO's.

=============

LFO FM??? with four modulators??? and each of the five LFOs can be used as
modulation sources?!?!? and some of the LFOs can be synced to MIDI
clock!?!?!

> And for all of you who think that the AtomaHawk is never coming. I've
> been working on that too and currently have FM-800 under EG3 influence.
> And if the total CPU cycles don't get exhausted soon, the Moog Slayer
> will be able to be modulated by LFO and EG. It's not ready for prime
> time just yet.

=================

samples?? videos??


--
...atom

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On Mon, 25 Aug 2008, David Mochen wrote:

> And now... OK, I know this is not a priority for you, but I'd like a
> show of hands from all interested people here: is there anybody out
> there who considers it a worthy addition to have velocity sensitivity
> implemented in the Hawk kit? Can you imagine the filter cutoff and
> resonance opening and closing according to MIDI velocity? I'd go
> yahooooooooooooo about that. Just think about new levels of expression
> with our Poly 800's.

===================

i've already mentioned it, at the top of my wish list -
http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/korgpolyex/message/2891

but some of the other features are pretty fscking impressive...

and i have to admit... with a hardware controller and real-time control of
everything, velocity does seem less important. but with a mono-portamento
mode... let's just say it would make a unique 303(-style) emulator with
velocity control...


--
...atom

________________________
http://atom.smasher.org/
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"Democracy and capitalism have very different beliefs about
the proper distribution of power. One believes in a
completely equal distribution of political power, 'one man,
one vote', while the other believes that it is the duty of
the economically fit to drive the unfit out of business and
into economic extinction, and inequalities in purchasing
power is what capitalist efficiency is all about. Individuals
and firms become efficient to be rich. To put it in its
starkest form, capitalism is perfectly compatible with
slavery. The American South had such a system for more than
two centuries. Democracy is not compatible with slavery."
-- Lester Thurow, The Future of Capitalism

Hi Poly owners,

The new batch of HAWK-800 and AtomaHawk boards have come in.

The AtomaHawk has a small correction on it. Other than that, the
AtomaHawk is no different to previous versions.

The HAWK-800 has some important differences to the previous board design.

First of all, the new board is double sided so that there's no need to
install jumpers (well actually, there are now only three jumpers).

Second, the board has been designed to support the Poly-800 MK2. I've
not had a chance to test it yet in a MK2 yet since I am still waiting
on some more chips to arrive but I am confident it will work just
fine. The most time consuming part of the MK2 kit is about to begin
which is the software development to support the MK2 echo and EQ. This
will probably take a few months to do.

Third, the new board is designed to support a bank switched flash rom.
This will allow implementing parameter banks (probably four banks)!

You may not see much in the way of new features being implemented
right now. There's a very important reason for this. We are almost out
of flash memory which means there's virtually no room for new
features. So I've been slowly working on moving all of the patch,
global and sequencer data into flash rom areas. Once that is
completed, I'll be asking all HAWK-800 customers to obtain an
additional flash rom that will replace one of the static rams. And a
new version of the firmware will come out that is both MK2 ready and
uses only flash memory for patch storage.

I will make a paypal option available on the web site for obtaining
the additional flash rom. And I will keep the old firmware available
for those who choose not to upgrade (not a good idea).

However, the new version of the firmware will use different SYSEX for
patches because the patches will be much larger than they currently
are. That is because we need somewhere to put the EQ and efx
parameters. Also, as part of the general firmware upgrade, we need
more parameters and space to support new features (such as EG accenting!).

So sometime this year, there will be a large firmware upgrade that
will alter the patch sysex format. I will make a software utility
available that will remap the old patch format to the new format for
those of you (and me) who already have patches saved in the old format.

And finally, storing patches to tape will be gone forever!

For those of you who are not familiar with the HAWK-800 kit, check out
www.hawk800.com

Cheers,

Mike.

sounds like good stuff... thanks!!!

so, for those of us with the original hawk board, we'll just need to swap
out one chip and upgrade to a newer firmware?

will patches be compatible between the mk1 and mk2? excepting of course
that some parameters get dropped.


--
...atom

________________________
http://atom.smasher.org/
762A 3B98 A3C3 96C9 C6B7 582A B88D 52E4 D9F5 7808
-------------------------------------------------

"As soon as men decide that all means are permitted to fight
an evil, then their good becomes indistinguishable from the
evil that they set out to destroy."
-- Christopher Dawson,
The Judgment of Nations, 1942

On Sat, 28 Feb 2009, Michael Hawkins wrote:

> before I answer your questions, I have a question for you. How is the
> HAWK-800 and AtomaHawk working out for you? I mean, you're the guy that
> came up with the original Atom Smasher Moog Slayer, so when you put the
> HAWK-800 and AtomaHawk into your EX-800, what was the result? Did it
> come out and up as well as you thought it should? Any suggestions,
> comments, ideas?

==================

the AtomaHawk is still in the box, and i still haven't played with the
HAWK-800.

over the next few days i'm expecting to get something in the mail (tapco
link.midi) that will (i hope) work between my ubuntu box and everything
with a midi connector. i'm also still planning to transplant my EX-800
into a 1U (or 2U, if i have to) case. hopefully i can do a 1U, and i'm
thinking the UI will be a sparse front panel, with just about everything
being done via midi. until i get further along with that case mod, i'm not
in a hurry to do the AtomaHawk.

i wish i had a more exciting update. i also wish i had more time to spend
with my toys.


--
...atom

________________________
http://atom.smasher.org/
762A 3B98 A3C3 96C9 C6B7 582A B88D 52E4 D9F5 7808
-------------------------------------------------

"Believe nothing because it is written in books.
Believe nothing because wise men say it is so.
Believe nothing because it is religious doctrine.
Believe it only because you yourself know it to be true."
-- Gautama Buddha

Hi Poly fans,

Well, I've had a couple of customers have problems with their HAWK-800 kits lately and it has become clear that a few extra features need to go into the software in order to help customers troubleshoot their HAWK-800's after they install it.

So, I have been working hard on a checksum validation of the flash copy process. That is now completed, so after each file is copied into flash memory, the HAWK checks the data against a checksum value to make sure that the copy was successful.

Also, the HAWK-800 does a memory test at start up and reports errors if any of the memory fails.

This should help customers troubleshoot their HAWK-800 after installation. I'll be posting the new firmware soon.

Also, I continue to work on the LFO modulation of the harmonics. I think quite a few of you will enjoy the result.

Mike.