Mono samples yes, but is the output Polyphonic?

Elektron Gear Digitakt
#10

I think it’s probably more of a creative limitation than specifically a processor limitation. I’ve said it before but I see Elektron gear—particularly this and the Octatrack—as an extended hardware version of the oldskool sample trackers of the 90s. If you want polyphony, use sample/parameter locks on a track that isn’t playing anything where you want the polyphony to appear.

Or perhaps with each track having its own filter and distortion, both of pretty decent quality, it increases processing power enough that it can only really handle 8 monophonic channels…?

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#11

I’d love for Elektron to make a hardware product that works with multisample libraries, polyphonically.

Would be great to bring all those Samples From Mars packs to (tactile) life!

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#12

It’d be interesting, but I think it’s a bit outside of Elektron’s design philosophy. I feel like it wouldn’t be easy to implement unless there were some pretty strict limitations, tbh.

#13

Elektron seem to intentionally avoid polyphonic sampling. Bugs me! Doesn’t seem like an issue to a lot of users tho so I guess it’s a valid decision on their part, but still… Would open up a ton of new ‘internal’ possibilities and faster/more convenient workflows (for me at least…) if they did it in an OT2 or added dynamic polyphony to DT…

#14

They’re monogamous… :smile:

3 Likes
#15

I’ll just leave this here :smile_cat:

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#16

Sweet :slight_smile: I can’t see what’s going on for that workaround? Is it limited to 2 voices?

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#17

all 8… it’s just midi out USB, mirrored back in, and cycling through channels 1-8 on each new note…

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#18

So I could do that on OT I guess? Weird no one really spoke about this much before when it’s been brought up!?

It’s a little over my head tbh. Would it be fluid/as natural as playing a legit polyphonic mode? Or are there note related boundaries etc?

#19

it’s just like playing a poly synth…
on input, you have this limitation of +/- 2 octaves.

a quirk is that when you’re live-recording into the sequencer, and playing chromatically from an internal track, it’s going to record into that track + the poly-target tracks… so you gotta delete the track you were laying from afterwards…

thinking of releasing this as an app… could have some extra bonus features like sending randomized customizable CC values before each note, for example to randomize the panning or other parameters for each poly note or somesuch…

5 Likes
#20

App sounds interesting :slight_smile: I’m still not sure I totally understand how it works, I’ll try to set it up on OT as a test run. Surprised more people haven’t been doing this before, totally slipped past me. Guess DT seems better suited for this than OT tho as from what I read you can hold multiple tracks down and use the Ctr-all on just those tracks. On OT it’ll be pretty disjointed/clunky making settings across separate tracks for filter etc. Tho stuff like different insert fx per voice etc could be interesting… And couple that with midi loopback scene/fader stuff :slight_smile: And OT has timestrech which’ll be better for some sounds… Depending how well this all works it might be enough to make me grab a DT tho. The workaround’ll eat up tracks and I already run out :wink:

Elektron should make a legit poly mode, it’s obviously possible. Something tidier/faster (and not stealing multiple midi tracks) would be great…

2 Likes
#21

If it’s not clear - I’m sending midi to my laptop which looks at the notes and sends them back to DT via USB…

you’ll need something which takes notes as input, and dynamically modifies the channel so it targets the right tracks in output… there are midi gizmos which do that I think, the midipal probably?

Control-All works fine if you wanna tweak all 8 tracks. You cannot choose individual tracks to be included in the control-all thing tho… software can help there too, if you wanna set it up in a way that e.g. only tracks 4-8 should be polyphonic…

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#22

Ah… When you said mirrored I thought you just meant in/out loopback… Still cool tho, something I’ll prob try to look at in future. Thanks for the heads up.

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#23

your software engineering solutions to Elektron instrument limitations are always appreciated.

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#24

Is there really a market for something like this nowadays?

#25

Hi guys, since yesterday I got this cable from retrokits.com (https://www.retrokits.com/rk-002/), it’s called the RK-002.
Now I can play my samples polyphonic which is cool:)
See this movie at youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liIISRzL8Us (not my movie by the way)
The same firmware as in the movie I have installed in the midicable, which allows me to play 4 notes polyphonic.
I also think it’s possible to play 8 notes polyphonic, have to check that out.
https://www.retrokits.com/rk-002/

You can use a masterkeyboard, or just the digitakt itself. Just connect the output of the digitakt to its input, no computer needed to play polyphonic. You only have to sacrifice one midichannel of the digitakt.

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#26

How would you use a keyboard to play poly with the RK002 on the DT ? If midi in out from DT are used by RK002…
(I 'm very fresh to this whole midi thing)

#27

It’s a midi lead , which has two ends

1 plugged to midi out on keyboard
1 plugged into midi in on digitakt

You would need to setup / configure the lead on pc / Mac via retro kits website
Details can be found on their website , which can be found via google which can be found via an internet browser .
Details on compatible interfaces etc is also there.

Or use forum search function , or videos on YouTube for more info.

#28

Cheapest way to try out polyphonic (chromatic play on multiple MIDI channels) if you have a DAW is using software like the midiChordSplit and midiPolyphony plug-ins from the Piz MIDI plugin collection.

Not that the RK002 isn’t a really nice product, but before spending money you can do a little homework to see how different gear (like the Digitakt) behaves and if you like what you’re getting.

In my experience the Digitakt sounds really nice when played polyphonically. Using an odd number of tracks (say like 3) and having slight variation in the loaded track sound makes for really nice movement to your playing.

#29

This is also a possibility if people who are interested use Ableton Live