Sequentix Cirklon - ES GIBT NEUIGKEITEN

[youkon]

Damn, ich will das Ding haben
hat jemand vielleicht von irgendwoher ein Vögelchen zwitschern hören, wie der Stand der Dinge nun ist?
"coming out soon" steht ja schon länger auf der homepage......

 

[dstroy]

Re: Sequentix Cirklon - weiss jemand was neues?

auf den warte ich auch

 

[Hallschlag]

Re: Sequentix Cirklon - weiss jemand was neues?

..ich auch!!

 

[[dunkel]]

Re: Sequentix Cirklon - weiss jemand was neues?

mal ebend gegoogle...oha das Teil würde mich auch sehr interessieren.
Wenns raus kommt bitte bescheid sagen
8)

 

[youkon]

Re: Sequentix Cirklon - weiss jemand was neues?

also dann:

Email Nummer 1: (mit der Erlaubnis natürlich)


I am arranging the order for the production enclosures this week.
That puts us about 4-6 weeks away from shipping units, assuming all goes to
plan with the factory.
There is one detail left to decide, so maybe you can offer an opinion.

The decision on what internal CV/gate connectivity to provide has been the
main issue for the last week or two.
Once you make something hardware, you can't easily change it...
The most recent pre-production units were fitted with a pair of CV/gate
outputs on quarter inch sockets.
It struck me that this doesn't give much advantage over using a CV convertor
via MIDI - with only 2 channels, the worst-case latency on a note is only
around 2ms.
In my studio, the best timing improvement would come if I could trigger all
my analogue percussion sounds direct, without any MIDI delay.
So I developed an interface mode to provide a serial multiplex of CV and
triggers along with a clock signal, to allow a simple external circuit to
de-multiplex up to 32 accent and trigger outputs.
I've had this driving my 808/909 clone module, and the difference in timing
precision is striking, even with only a couple of sounds triggering at the
same time.

My quandry at the moment is whether to provide any quarter-inch (or 3.5mm)
sockets for CV/gate on the rear panel of Cirklon at all.
Because of the space limitation, the most I could fit would be 12 sockets,
along with an expansion socket for a breakout box.
Or I could provide only a 25-pin D connector.
This would be configurable to drive either a passive breakout box or modular
format I/O panel, via a standard 25-way cable, with multiple sockets of the
user's preference.
25 pins allow up to 24 signal lines plus ground. That could be 16 CVs plus 8
gates, or perhaps fewer CV outs and some CV ins.

Alternatively, the interface could run in multiplex mode, where simple
external circuitry would be able to provide up to 32 CV and 32 gate/trigger
outputs, suitable for drum triggering, or less critical CV control.

How do you see yourself making use of the CV facilities ?
Would the lack of any built-in quarter-inch/3.5mm sockets be an issue ?

 

[youkon]

Re: Sequentix Cirklon - weiss jemand was neues?

und Email Numero 2:

Hi Julian,

> I wouldn't mind no cv/gates directly on the machine as I'd
> like to have the breakoutbox. I'm sure it offers more
> possibilities and that's what I want. Else, it would be
> little cheaper for the sequencer itself I suppose.

For sure, the price of 12 x Switchcraft 112APCX makes quite a difference.
I looked at 3.5mm sockets, but to get good enough quality, they cost as much
as the quarter-inch.
They could be optional for those who don't want CV at all, but that would
leave 12 big holes and redundant labels on the panel.

> "the best timing improvement would come if I could trigger all
> my analogue percussion sounds direct.."
>
> what does this mean for the sequences? I'm thinking of
> transporting the sequencer data to any DAW for further processing.
> Via midi, of course...

MIDI has a finite speed of transmission, but whether you hear the timing
error depends on how many simultaneous notes you want to send down a cable,
and also the nature of the sounds that those notes will trigger. And also
how fussy you are about timing to begin with
There is another issue at work in many cases - the latency of the MIDI
interfaces on modern PCs.
Even though PCs are now so much faster than in the past, they still run
general purpose OSes, with task scheduling and driver models that are not
optimal for real-time tasks like MIDI sequencing.
That has given MIDI a rather worse reputation than it deserves for timing.

I find MIDI timing to be no issue with my synths, as I have them split
across the five MIDI busses on Cirklon with no more than two or three synths
on a single bus.
For a monosynth, you can only play one note at a time anyway.
For a polysynth, unless you are using very percussive sounds, the timing
should be fine.
I usually share a bus between one mono and one polysynth. Using a lower
track number for the monosynth prioritises its data on the bus.

For drum triggers, it's a bit different.
All the drum sounds I use have instant attack times.
MIDI causes a spread of the attacks of even 3 or 4 instruments over the
couple of milliseconds it takes to trigger them 'at the same time', making
an audible difference to the sound and feel.
I may well be an extreme case, but having used direct triggering of my drums
with timing as good as the internal sequencers in the classic Roland drum
machines, I don't think I could go back to serial MIDI for percussion.

On Cirklon there is also a USB interface.
It appears as a class-compliant USB MIDI interface, and will install without
a proprietary driver on Windows or Mac OS.
USB MIDI can improve the transfer rate over serial MIDI by up to 16 times.
That would be the way to transfer MIDI to DAW.

> A question: may I post your mail in the german sequencer
> forum? there are
> many interested people. It would be a pleasure for them to
> get some news
> about the Cirklon

Sure.
I've been working too much on the sequencer lately to keep up with email as
much as I should.
But we are very nearly there.

Cheers,
Colin