Elektron-Users

Hello,

I just read the topic about MD MIDI sync not great posted by neonleg on 06/03.

It seems, whatever the poor man tries, he isn't able to sync the MD to his other gear. In our studio setup, we encounter exactly the same problem.

My setup at home is based around a Dual Core PC with an RME Fireface 400 and a Novation Remote SL. I use Ableton Live 6 and NI Komplete 4 for my music production and i am very happy with my setup. Rock solid performance and all down to 4ms overall latency, so no complaints!

One of my friends on the other hand, his setup is based on a P4 laptop, Yamaha O1X as audio and midi interface, a Virus TI and Komplete 4 with a Korg Elektribe and a Machinedrum. He is getting really depressed by now cause after hours and hours of work, he's still not able to sync his beloved Machinedrum to his laptop with LIve 6.

We used the MIDI ports on the 01X, the Virus, the Novation Remote, NI Kore and even the RME to get the MD synced as Slave but nothing worked! We always get that jumping BPM in the display of the MD. But, if i make the MD the Master of my RME and Live 6, it all works as a breeze. I can change the tempo in the MD and Live follows very smoothly.

If we sync just the hardware; Virus, Electribe and MD, we get a nice sync and everything works fine. But from the moment you bring in a computer with a software sequencer, your asking for trouble.

In an ideal world the machinedrum should simply lock to LIve and the other gear at the same time. Also, for recording solid audio samples from the MD into Live, a stable midi clock is necessary, no?

Whe are getting pretty desperate over here cause we tried a lot of gear and setups, emailed a lot to different support sites and forums, but still got no decent answer or solution for our sync problem. Some may say it's a computer- hardware related problem. I tried 4 different computers, no Mac so far, but PC's with different chipsets and they all have the same problem, so that seems a bit impossible if you ask me.

And what about Turbomidi? Is that what we need to get this solved? It sounds like it will speed and lock up our jumping BPM, but is it actually going to fix it?

So, quitte a lot but we would really appreciate it if someone could drop in a line of helpfull advice here.

Thanks and all the best,

Seppe

Seppe2097 wrote:
Hello,

I just read the topic about MD MIDI sync not great posted by neonleg on 06/03.

It seems, whatever the poor man tries, he isn't able to sync the MD to his other gear. In our studio setup, we encounter exactly the same problem.

My setup at home is based around a Dual Core PC with an RME Fireface 400 and a Novation Remote SL. I use Ableton Live 6 and NI Komplete 4 for my music production and i am very happy with my setup. Rock solid performance and all down to 4ms overall latency, so no complaints!

One of my friends on the other hand, his setup is based on a P4 laptop, Yamaha O1X as audio and midi interface, a Virus TI and Komplete 4 with a Korg Elektribe and a Machinedrum. He is getting really depressed by now cause after hours and hours of work, he's still not able to sync his beloved Machinedrum to his laptop with LIve 6.

We used the MIDI ports on the 01X, the Virus, the Novation Remote, NI Kore and even the RME to get the MD synced as Slave but nothing worked! We always get that jumping BPM in the display of the MD. But, if i make the MD the Master of my RME and Live 6, it all works as a breeze. I can change the tempo in the MD and Live follows very smoothly.

If we sync just the hardware; Virus, Electribe and MD, we get a nice sync and everything works fine. But from the moment you bring in a computer with a software sequencer, your asking for trouble.

In an ideal world the machinedrum should simply lock to LIve and the other gear at the same time. Also, for recording solid audio samples from the MD into Live, a stable midi clock is necessary, no?

Whe are getting pretty desperate over here cause we tried a lot of gear and setups, emailed a lot to different support sites and forums, but still got no decent answer or solution for our sync problem. Some may say it's a computer- hardware related problem. I tried 4 different computers, no Mac so far, but PC's with different chipsets and they all have the same problem, so that seems a bit impossible if you ask me.

And what about Turbomidi? Is that what we need to get this solved? It sounds like it will speed and lock up our jumping BPM, but is it actually going to fix it?

So, quitte a lot but we would really appreciate it if someone could drop in a line of helpfull advice here.

Thanks and all the best,

Seppe

hi, i think that was someone elses problem.. i have perfect sync
is the 'problem' that the BPM jumps around on your MD? thats not a problem, its normal. sorry, i cant help with software related issues tho.
good luck

Hello,

Yes indeed, the problem is that jumping BPM in the MD.

You say that's normal? It' s like a beginner DJ who drunk to much and can't beatmix 2 records in a decent way!

The signal coming out of the MD is not in perfect sync with what i am playing in my sequencer. It looses pitch and jumps around, so i am not able to make decent, synced recorded audio loops. Routed or recorded MD audio won't play in perfect sync with my other audio material played by Live and the sounds coming out of my Vst's.

So when the MD isn't in perfect sync, i can't record it... Maybe you can fix these afterward with audio editing but that's very hard and frustrating work! And still, jumping BPM in a live setup?

All the best,

S.

get a Mac...

teknobryan wrote:
get a Mac...

Hey Bryan,

You seem pretty sure about what your saying.

Can you tell me about your setup please? Are you able to sync your gear to a sequencer on your Mac, and make the MD act as Slave?

All the best,

S.

Pc - Mac it dosent matter..

Any ways if your using live 6 to acts as you master(when you click play on live all your machines run).What you need to do is go into lives preferences tab, select midi sync, fine your fireface output midi channel either 1 or 2 (depends what the MD is plug into).

use the little arrow to expand all the settings for it, and under midi clock sync delay change the amount just to the right of it to a setting which will sync your MD..

The best way to do this is to have lives metronome runing with a 4/4 kik pattern on the MD, and adjust the clock sync delay until the kik and the metronome are bang on each other...

By the way i have the ff400 too and my sync time is -15ms..

You say that the MD syncs perfectly to hardware, but not to a computer, so it's the MD's fault?

MIDI clock is not an absolute value propagated between machines. Slaved instruments get their tempo by counting the pulses they receive from the master in a certain timeframe. If those pulses are not steady, then the BPM will fluctuate on the slaved machines. Computers are notoriously bad at this, starting from the multitasking nature of the platform and continuing with the occasional programmer who doesn't give clock messages priority over other MIDI messages and ending with the jittery USB connection to the MIDI interface.

FWIW, my MD works in lockstep with my Atari's master clock, when I feel like working that way.


CF Daniel Elektron's comments here:

http://www.elektron-users.com/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=2048&viewmode=flat&order=ASC&start=10

I think it is well known to many people that modern-day computers are cr*ppy when it comes to midi timing.

Myself after doing some tests on the basic midi timing jitter of my pc system, i would never try to use that as master.

I guarantee the MD's clock is steadier than the PC's signals, which means that if you see those timing values jumping all around, that's because they really are. IE your computer is sending out timing values that jump around badly. (I have also heard that Ableton is one of the worst for this.) If the md playback jumps around to follow, it is just doing what the pc told it.

I use my machinedrum or mpc as master clock, and everything works fine- personally that's my solution. (which does make me scratch my head and wonder-- hmm I guess either PC midi timing is better when _receiving_.. or the pc is compensating by smoothing the clock.)

Which brings up the question I am left with::
Is it possible that Machinedrum does less 'smoothing' than some other machines, of incoming midi clock? Perhaps this is a reason why it 'syncs great to tight clock' but leaves people complaining about bad syncing to bad clocks.

Would adding an 'extra smoothing' mode to the md's midi-clock-follow be possibly helpful i wonder? After all in many real-world scenarios we are simply stuck trying to sync to a sloppy clock, for various reasons.

I don't get it. All these people complaining about bad timing from a PC/Mac....

Just use a TM-1!!! That's what Elektron made it for!!!!!

PS. If I suddenly had extra time on my hands, I would create a digital-audio-click-to-midi-sync box. Then I could use the digital out from my audio interface to create a fairly stable master clock. (Jitter shouldn't be more than 1/44,100th of a second, the way I see it.) Someone make that, I'll buy it.