With the new Pittsburgh Modular Taiga just out ( thread ), it is notable how that synth is being compared to both the East Beast and the West Pest ( both by Loopop, and Sarah Belle Reid so far ), so that these two may give you some of the same possibilities less expensively, and that you can get specific parts in a more compact package.
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Oversynth just released overlays for the East Beast and the West Pest. Take a look and see what you think.
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Im such an idiot… Im cleaning EVERYTHING and I just got the west pest… Now I usually get everything labled right away, but I cleared off a desk and it went into a pile.
Can someone please verify what the wall wart PSU is rated at?
This is the only unaccounted PSU I have, and I even checked the international adaptors, and they fit and click.
Its just to ease my anxiety… and i dont want to wait till morning to call Sweetwater.
Thanks!
Here’s what I think it is, but the manual says ±12 for euro rack.
And the psu says 15 max.
I’m just trying to be extra extra sure.
That looks exactly like the power adapter for my East Beast. Output: 15.0 V.
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So here are some thoughts…
one) How in the hell do you patch this thing? I dont know what anything does.
two) I played around and got this little fun sound design. spooky.
and three)
This synth makes Pigments sound like dogshit. I love pigments and it sounds amazing, but the harmonics on the West Pest is crazy! It just sounds so much more fatter… no. not the right word… Oh… I got it…
juicy.
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FYI, as of August 2023, this still seems to be the case for Taiga firmware updates using an Apple Silicon Mac, too. Mine is an M2 Macbook Air running macOS Ventura (full version # 13.4.1 © (22F770820d))
When I bought the West Pest, I couldn’t get the midi cc to cv to work. It seemed to work fine after I updated the firmware, although I didn’t use it that much.
I put it in my rack yesterday (wanted to dive into euro again, bought a few modules…) and using OT lfos is particularly interesting to me when I can patch them into other modules. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t which is a bit frustrating…
Anyone found a solution?
Also the output jack is done…When I bought it, I thought it was one of the cheap 1/8’ to 1/4’ cables I had in a drawer, because it worked when I used another cable. Turns out, I just had it plugged in just the right way, probably just a poor solder joint.
It’s ok when it’s on the desk and I’m not patching it, but not so much when patching. Even leaving the cable plugged in on the WP doesn’t really work, because touching it already is too much and you’ll hear noisy crackling.
Anyways, I’m enjoying exploring some feedback patching with the West Pest. WP into Doepfer Wasp VCF and then one of the filter outputs back into the WP osc sync input for example. Add some Quadraverb and 
It’s still a great little synth/module, even not all the features are 100% stable all the time.
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I just picked up an East Beast and the Midi CC doesn’t seem to be working. I checked out their website and the latest firmware download is listed as 0.9 but when I run the updater and select that file to load, it says I have 0.11 already loaded. I assume mine is newer? But then did the whatever Midi CC fix the poster above mentions regress in newer versions?
I wrote with the support, very nice and helpful btw, they sent me the 1.0 and suggested it might be a problem with the Octatrack clock, although they said they have no idea what’s going on, OT clock doesn’t seem unusual.
I tried to disable midi clock and even filter it out completely, sequence from my DAW, still didn’t work.
After updating the firmware I still had no luck and wanted to give up, but guess what? I switched the midi channel to omni, just to check, no idea why I did it, but midi cc worked! I switched back to my normal midi channel and it still works!
Just drop support a mail, they’ll send you the 1.0 firmware.
Edit: Got another mail, they have a bug confirmed. Only CC01 works. I’m using CC02…so there seem to some bugs. Maybe CC01 works for you?
Yes, I emailed them as well. They responded super quickly and said it was a bug and they would address it in a future firmware fix. And yes, CC01 (mod wheel by default) works.
I’ll give the omni channel a try though.
Anyone that can’t get midi CC to CV to work on their West Pest or East Beast, I got a new mail from support today and apparently the CC assignment procedure was changed, but they never updated the manual.
To assign a MIDI CC, hold down the yellow button AND the G# button (channel, out/thru) buttons. This is normally the combination for checking or changing the MIDI channel, but it also now allows the synth to reassign midi CC.
No idea why I had CC02 assigned on my WP, I did perform a factory reset after updating the firmware, so it should have been CC01. Maybe I accidentially assigned CC02 while changing midi channels…
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I really need to applaud Cre8audio. I had the NiftyKeyz and the Niftycase and they both worked great. The Cap’n Big O is a very nice oscillator for the price. These two synths are fun and useful and I have the West Pest in one of my racks and will have the East Beast standalone soon…very well priced and a lot of fun.
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Put my new West Pest in my 9U case. Played around with some patching and sequencing with my Polyend Play. Came up with some very nice sounds…for $250, totally worth it. Now, need to get an East Beast and plug that into my rack.
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Do you know if Cre8audio is rumoured to drop something new for superbooth?
Very likely based on what Richard Nicol said over here ( post ).
They have several things almost ready to go, one at least especially good.
Anyone know definitively whether the MIDI jack on EB/WP is TRS A or B? I have the adapter which shipped with the device, but I was hoping to use a standard 1/8" TRS “headphone” cable and I’m not having luck so far. I have found exactly one place on the internet which claims to have heard from Cre8audio that this is TRS A…
The manufacturer’s web page (assuming it’s still available/in production) is usually the best source of definitive information:
In this case, the specs (scroll to the bottom of the page) say MIDI Type A.
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Looked in the manual but not on the web page. Thanks.
Now to continue figuring out why a standard 1/8" TRS cable between the East Beast and another Type A device isn’t delivering the intended results.
New updates for the West Pest and East Beast (v1.5)
Firmware Version 1.5 Changelog:
------Bug Fixes-----
• No longer misses note on and off signals when sequenced with an Elektron Octatrack with clock sync on
• MIDI CC can now be assigned to any channel
• External clock divisions are now properly saved on reboot
• MIDI is generally more reliiable now.
• Fixed midi note behavior so that C3, midi note 60 now corresponds to the bottom C of the button controller on the synth and also correctly responds to the octave buttons of the synth. To change the which midi note C corresponds to the lower C of the button controller, use the tap clock button with the octave+ and octave- buttons to shift the midi octave relationship.
------Feature Updates-----
//Arp Octaves
• Added a fourth octave to Arp Octaves
//Led Behavior
• Rewrote the LED behaviors for all of the settings to make the UI more intuitive/communicate a bit better.
//Multifunction Tool
• Rewrote the MIDI CC/MultiFunction tool behavior to make full use of all 8 scalings for each mod mode, and added MIDI CC control to the mod tool level:
• 0-5v Mode: Added voltage quantize to the mod tool value, which quantizes the incoming MIDI CC to a quantize level set with the multi control setting.
Quantization Levels:
• 0: Unquatized
• 1: 48 levels/volt (1/4 half-step at V/Oct Tuning)
• 2: 24 levels/volt (1/2 half-step at V/Oct Tuning)
• 3: 16 levels/volt (2/3 half-step at V/Oct Tuning)
• 4: 12 levels/volt (1 half-step at V/Oct Tuning)
• 5: 8 levels/volt (1.5 half-steps at V/Oct Tuning)
• 6: 4 levels/volt (3 half-steps at V/Oct Tuning)
• 7: 2 levels/volt (6 half-steps at V/Oct Tuning)
• LFO Mode: Fixed the phase relationship of the LFO and made the LFO update after changing rate rather than after finishing a full cycle to make it more responsive at low frequencies. Also, reconfigured the clock rates and gave MIDI CC control of the LFO amplitude.
LFO Rates:
• 0: 3 cycles per clock
• 1: 2 cycles per clock
• 2: 1 cycle per clock
• 3: 1 cycle per 2 clocks
• 4: 1 cycle per 3 clocks
• 5: 1 cycle per 4 clocks
• 6: 1 cycle per 6 clocks
• 7: 1 cycle per 8 clocks
• Envelope Mode: Rescaled the envelope lengths for all 8 values and gave MIDI CC control of the envelope amplitude.
Envelope Times:
• 0: ~ 60 ms
• 1: ~ 120 ms
• 2: ~ 240 ms
• 3: ~ 420 ms
• 4: ~ 900 ms
• 5: ~ 1800 ms
• 6: ~ 3600 ms
• 7: ~ 7200 ms
• Random Mode: Rescaled the random generation timings for all the values and gave MIDI CC control of the randomness amplitude.
Random Generation Clock Timings:
• 0: 4 generations per clock pulse
• 1: 3 generations per clock pulse
• 2: 2 generations per clock pulse
• 3: 1 generation per clock pulse
• 4: 1 generation per 2 clock pulses
• 5: 1 generation per 3 clock pulses
• 6: 1 generation per 4 clock pulses
• 7: 1 generation per 8 clock pulses
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