Motif 1 vs Pad conflict (SOLVED)

[WaltCollinsMusic]

EDIT: SOLVED - this was never a NDLR bug, but rather a bug in the MPC firmware.

I'm a brand new user, having just received my NDLR two days ago. So far I'm loving it!

My setup here is I am running NDLR via USB into my MPC Live 2, where I've set up 4 midi routes (one for each of Pad, Drone, Motif 1, Motif 2) to my synth, which is a Yamaha MX61 (in Performance mode, which is multitimbral 16 channel). I'm sending the 4 parts from the NDLR to separate MIDI channels on the MX61, as follows:

• NDLR Pad to MIDI channel 15 on the MX, which is playing back with a synth keyboard patch.
  
• NDLR Drone to MIDI channel 5, which is a compressed synth bass patch.
  
• NDLR Motif 1 to channel 9, running a mini moog style synth lead.
  
• NDLR Motif 2 to channel 4, running an organ patch.
  

So, the bad news is that I'm having a small problem when playing NDLR with this configuration above. I can run Pad, Drone, and Motif 2 just fine. But when I add Motif 1, the Pad part (seemingly ONLY the Pad part) is "choked", i.e. it loses sustain, and plays much shorter notes. It sounds like the sustain pedal isn't working on the Pad part whenever Motif 1 is playing.

I can provide more information, but I'm new here and not quite sure what details to offer.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance.

[WaltCollinsMusic]

I think I've resolved this issue. In my settings for the MIDI output channels for each part in the NDLR, I had originally set them up as:

• Pad - USB 1, channel 1
  
• Drone - USB 1, channel 2
  
• Motif 1 - USB 1, channel 3
  
• Motif 2 - USB 1, channel 4
  

... which is the way I've set up many other pieces of multitimbral gear in the past.

But as I watched the MIDI notes come into the MPC from the various parts on the NDLR, if a note was the same as any other part, that part's sustain would terminate immediately, i.e. the MIDI "note off" message was being received by ALL channels, not just the one that sent it. This seems like a bug to me. Shouldn't "note off" messages (and presumably other MIDI messages as well) be restricted to the MIDI channel that sent them?

So that's when I thought about the purpose of having the virtual ports for USB 2, USB 3, and USB 4, since there's only a single physical USB port. Maybe they need to be manually isolated from each other in my settings? Yes, that seems to be the case.

Now I've got my ports configured like this:

• Pad - USB 1, channel 1
  
• Drone - USB 2, channel 1
  
• Motif 1 - USB 3, channel 1
  
• Motif 2 - USB 4, channel 1
  

... and everything now seems to work fine. Problem solved. This is what I presume others must be doing, but this is not what I would have expected based on my experience with other gear. To be honest, I consider this more of a workaround, not a solution.

Normally when using either a MIDI DIN or USB port, if you put a part on a different MIDI channel, it should not interfere in any way with messages sent over the same port, but which use a different MIDI channel. They should be isolated by default, and thus there should be no need for NDLR's virtual USB ports 2, 3, and 4.

Unless this is possibly by design? Maybe there's some reason why one would want MIDI "note off" messages to span across all channels. But I can't think of one.

[Royce]

I think I've resolved this issue. In my settings for the MIDI output channels for each part in the NDLR, I had originally set them up as:

• Pad - USB 1, channel 1
  
• Drone - USB 1, channel 2
  
• Motif 1 - USB 1, channel 3
  
• Motif 2 - USB 1, channel 4
  

... which is the way I've set up many other pieces of multitimbral gear in the past.

But as I watched the MIDI notes come into the MPC from the various parts on the NDLR, if a note was the same as any other part, that part's sustain would terminate immediately, i.e. the MIDI "note off" message was being received by ALL channels, not just the one that sent it. This seems like a bug to me. Shouldn't "note off" messages (and presumably other MIDI messages as well) be restricted to the MIDI channel that sent them?

Hi Walt,
I have my NDLR going into a PC and I connect Port USB 1 and separate channels to the program MidiOx.
MidiOx that routes it to a Yamaha MODX with a multi timbral setup on different channels and I don't have any of your problems.
I can see the data coming from the NDLR midi stream in MidiOx and all the note offs are on the correct channel.

Can you connect the NDLR to a PC and use MidiOx to see what is happening?

All the best
Royce

[Jesse Johannesen]

Hi Walt,
It's great to have you here, welcome. What you are describing is definitely not by design, and I am inclined to agree with Royce that it may be worth a try to have a peek with MIDI Ox if that is something you have access to (it's not available for Mac). Let me know if you need a hand getting it up and running.

I know that Akai only recently released the firmware update with the MIDI routing functionality and my guess is that you may have found a bug on their end. I would have been able to try to reproduce the issue, but I just traded my MPC Live a couple weeks ago.

Generally the reason for the 4 ports is that in PC standalone soft-synths they don't like sharing ports with other software and since you could potentially be running 4 different synths for the four parts, we included 4 virtual ports. That said, if it makes your setup work to use all 4, I'd call that a win.

Best regards,
Jesse

[WaltCollinsMusic]

Thanks for your replies. After further testing with MidiOx and Ableton Live VSTs, I believe you're right and this now seems to be a bug in the MPC, and not in the NDLR. When I take the MPC out of the middle, the problem disappears completely.

Sorry if the rest of this message is off topic, but... Jesse, may I ask why you traded away your MPC Live? Was it a Live 2, or the older Live? I've just got the Live 2, and I'm considering trading it away for one of the new Maschine Plus that's coming out on October 1.

[Jesse Johannesen]

Thanks for your replies. After further testing with MidiOx and Ableton Live VSTs, I believe you're right and this now seems to be a bug in the MPC, and not in the NDLR. When I take the MPC out of the middle, the problem disappears completely.

Sorry if the rest of this message is off topic, but... Jesse, may I ask why you traded away your MPC Live? Was it a Live 2, or the older Live? I've just got the Live 2, and I'm considering trading it away for one of the new Maschine Plus that's coming out on October 1.

As far as the MPC it was the MPC Live V1 and I accepted it as partial trade from a friend who wanted to get into eurorack, but didn't have much of a budget, so I built him a good beginners setup. It worked out great, as now we get to do modular jams (from a distance). I had big plans to make use of it, but it ended up not getting much use. I ended up selling it back to the guy I traded if from in the end.

I like the MPC but I'm really into playing modular more, so when I sit down to make music, that's what I reach for 9/10 time. I think I would have played it more if I had more pads. I was pretty close to getting a Launchpad Pro 3 to pair with it as a "keyboard", as I love playing on the push, but the 16 pads felt like too small of a range for me (in chromatic mode).
I'm always getting gear just to check "the fit" though, so I often end up with less used gear and when I want something big I just sell everything and buy it. Most of the gear keeps it's value, so I kind of think of it as my savings account, with benefits.