Emu XL-7 & MP-7 User's Group

Nice detailed reply here!! I have added a few comments (basically footnotes) below. Hope they help.
Steve

--- In xl7@yahoogroups.com, Bruno <brunorc@...> wrote:
>
> 2012/10/13 nikitsanpsix <nikitsan@...>:
> > (There is only one edit buffer which is used by the current preset (the preset shown in the display). You can edit only one preset at a time via SysEx commands, although these presets can be edited independently of the current preset edited using the Front Panel. Remote Preset selection is independent of the edit buffer. Changing the current preset erases the edit buffer.)
> 
> I don't know why do you think it's bad news.
> 
> System Exclusive is nothing more than writing to the RAM memory of
> your sound module. So at any given time you can use SysEx to edit any
> of the presets stored in one of the User banks. This is not the same
> as editing any preset (including the factory ones) from the level of
> the front panel, as front panel is actually using the edit buffer.

Steve: I was under the impression that there are in essence two edit buffers: one for sysex editing and one for parameter editing. I am not sure if I tested this. 

 
> Probably due to rather complex structure of sounds (and its number) in
> P2K platform, E-mu uses a kind of "point & edit" attitude - first you
> send a SysEx message which selects one of the User presets, and then
> you use universal messages, which mean for instance "change the arp
> pattern of the selected preset" (in most other synths you would rather
> use a parameterized message, like "change the arp pattern of the
> preset number X").
> 
> So, I assume that "you can edit only one preset at a time via SysEx
> commands" means that you cannot make a MIDI controller to alter TWO
> different presets at the same time, since instead of sending SysEx
> "change the filter cutoff of user preset 1" and then "change the
> release time of user preset 2", you would rather send:
>  - select user preset 1
>  - change the filter cutoff
>  - select user preset 2
>  - change the release time
> which can easily create a SysEx storm, not to mention wearing the Flash RAM out.

Steve: I think the wearing out of flash RAM is a good point. Somewhere there is a discussion of the life span of the RAM. 

Steve: I do believe you can stack parameter edits within a single sysex message by specifying sets of parameter id and value pairs. (Please double check me on this.) If I am right, you could change (for example) the edit layer pointers and the values for each of 4 layers all in one sysex command. 

Steve: Perhaps to not wear out memory and create sysex storms, it might be possible to filter what gets sent out such that if a slider on the controller goes from min to max rapidly, not all of that gets sent out.

Steve: Is the intent of the controller 
 (1) to have a single knob or slider change at the same time
----- (a) the same arp parameter on different channels? 
----- (b) different arp parameters on different channels?
 (2) to have multiple knobs or sliders changing different arp parameters on different channels?
 

> 
> I would also say that - apart from arp patterns - many sound params
> are mappable to realtime controllers, and there are 16 of them, so the
> best idea would be to use the edit buffer to experiment with the
> sounds until you know what params you want to have the hands-on
> control, and then use the CCs to adapt it on the fly. As for the arp
> patterns, they can still be changed for the preset in the edit buffer
> without paying the Flash price (hmm... sounds like Magic the Gathering
> term).

Steve: Yeah!! This is kinda what I have had in mind--the ability to tweak a whole bunch of sound parameters on different channels. The 16 E-Mu knobs are nice, but you still have to flip channels (unless you have the different channels programmed, but you are still limited to 16 at once).

> 
> And if you want to change arp patterns for multiple presets at once
> AND you know upfront the relevant combinations, you can use multis,
> pointing to the same presets but with different arp patterns. Not sure
> though, how fast it can happen - after all you recall almost complete
> sound module setup, with 32 presets, FX settings etc.

Steve: Hmmmmm. Its been a while since I switched multis on the fly; not sure how much of a glicth there would--mainly because there is a bunch of data that gets changed with multis. Instead, it might be better to have an external controller with buttons to switch just those parameters that need to be switched--basically emulating multis, but without changing everything. For example, 16 buttons to send out "psuedo multis" (just the data needed) with some sort of toggle to select banks of 16 multis.  

> 
> Hope this helps,
> 
> Bruno
>

Steve: I think this is a great discussion! It is making me want to carve out time to get back into designing my ardunio-based midi controller.