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

If you are talking about pattern select mode, maybe this will help:

"You can select one of 16 patterns using the Trigger buttons. Pressing one of the trigger buttons in pattern select mode causes the programmed pattern to be armed. The armed trigger button LED will flash. The armed pattern will begin playing at the next loop. The trigger button LED will be solidly illuminated while the selected pattern is playing. This feature can be put to good use in combination with the "Restart Pattern Fire Key" described on page 57."

XL-7 Manual, Rev G, real page 141, pdf page 153



"Holding PLAY and tapping STOP will instantly RTZ (Return-To-Zero) and
continue playing. The stop key may be pressed many times while holding
the play key to get a "stutter" sequencing effect. This also serves the purpose of instantly starting a new sequence if one is queued.
There can be a slight delay when restarting dense sequences, as there is no time to pre-queue the initial events. Simpler patterns will restart faster as there is less "pre-sequence" information to load."

XL-7 Manual, Rev G, real page 57, pdf page 69


If the RTZ is delayed by pre-sequence info, you might be able to edit that info out with an external midi file editor. The pre-sequence info is data--such as program/patch change info for each of the channels used in the pattern--that can be found at the beginning of the exported smf. Its been years, but I believe its all contained in as sysex data similar to the data found in a multisetup.  When the transport is stopped and you dial up a new pattern, that data gets loaded and sent.

I believe in song mode you can choose to use parameters only from the first pattern played (as opposed to having the settings change with each new pattern), but I am not sure about what happens in pattern mode when you select a new pattern. 

Hope this helps.

Steve