“Double the price”. What do you mean? Double the price for the whole Device or just of the memory?
TL;DR: because the whole sample-based technology is pain & suffering.
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Idk, when I need to sample a whole song I just plug my phone into my sampler and stream it. I’m not sure why you’d need a separate device when you already have every recorded song ever in your pocket.
The samplers I came up on only had 512kB of memory, it’s hard to fathom that 64MB is now considered small.
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I assume more RAM would mean more and faster recall from the hard disk space, and faster load of new projects. I’m also no expert but I can’t think of any disadvantage in giving more RAM to the user aside from the device prices reflecting inherited costs. From the perspective of a company I’m sure the point of integrated systems and existing architectures is important as was already mentioned. That is to say, the parts, serviceability, and ability to reuse code bits and specialized hardware not in the sampler functionality but in the way the parts talk to each other and make efficient use of each other in a non UI capacity are tied into it.
That said, I wouldn’t mind faster load times and whatnot. Although this is all probably a direct reflection of the processor speed working with the RAM so it depends on what the processor is capable of and that will probably be on a case by case basis.
I’m talking more about resampling your performance, then being able to immediately do stuff with it. You might want to sample an entire external track too perhaps depending on the workflow.
One of the things I’ve been doing on the OT recently is using a couple of tracks for recording long minute-ish stretches of ambience or chords or something backgroundy, then looping sections via slicing while I do other stuff on the other tracks. I really like this technique but it can start to get a bit dicey with the RAM limitation. It’s still fine for now but I’m pretty sure as I improve I’ll grow into wanting a bit more, I can always use another device but it’s just extra faff and takes away from being able to use scenes and other OT goodies with it all.
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Exactly. I own a Digitakt and a tr6s.
When I got the tr6s which I bought so I can play stereo pads to accompany the Digitakt which cant do stereo . I read somewhere someone writing that they measured the memory and could import Some hundred MB of (cant remember how much but it was comfortably much) , samples in Stereo (Austin Power voice “Stereo”).
So I got mine and imported some basic samples. Like a few drum sounds and then some stereo Pads with a length of aprox 10-20 seconds each.
I started transporting them to the tr6s and WOOOOP! it was full. I then thought “No way this was hundreds of Mb like his person calculated. And then I went to Rolands page for the first time and lookd for myself . After my estimates it has 60-64 mb of memory max for imported samples.
Others say " Thats a lot of memory. I dont need more” etc etc … But I do…
Well who knows. I see no one here in this thread knows exactly till now.
Fascinating subject though
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Yep, long pads are another good example of something that will eat up memory in no time.
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i guess these days people expect something like multi-gigabyte-instrument-library-in-a-box.
Yes. And it’s really no biggie or too much to ask for is it now? Unless its forbidden to fire up stereo pads with a hardware sampler 
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because its a sampler and there is no reason to only play drums with it?
Unless its purpose is to replicate all and old drum machines only
" Like I understand the specs would look better on paper, but wouldn’t more ram just make this thing harder to use especially since it doesn’t have much of a GUI?"
Because I could have everything inside a little box and take it with me and not have an extra laptop and daw. Like someone wrote here “stereo pads” for example. You dont need a GUI but you need a lot of space for them.
I think of course it comes down to personal preference and people keep saying that 64 mb is more than enough but in short, if I agreed I would not post such a question.
So the answer “Nobody needs more” is something that I dont agree with
Of course thats my workflow only
Did not know the device. Just looked it up. Unfortunately not portable. But looks like serious fun
Rytm is not a sampler by design. It’s easy to run out of project RAM in Octa if you use it live, and that’s just a needless hassle to take care of — but then Octa is from another decade and still generous, plus it has flash streaming for longer files, etc.
storage and buffers (RAM) are often used differently, aren’t them?
could the reason be that larger buffers require more complex programming and more advance components, like CPUs, so the cost of development are not just monetary, and it’s not as easy as to throw in a larger RAM chip and charge $100 more?
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I don’t think so, at least I would strongly wager that that’s not a major factor with audio processing, which hasn’t really changed much in the last couple of decades. Also CPUs are also much faster+cheaper now.
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As a lot of folks have said in this thread these are designed to play back one shots and loops not minutes of ambience. I can see why if that’s what you’re looking for you’d find these devices dissapointing, but I’d also assume that that’s a very niche use case specific to you and GurtTractor (and one that’s very difficult to design an interface for).
Idk, maybe we have different definitions of “stereo pads” but it’s pretty easy to turn a 500 kb one shot into unrepeating hours of ambient with a few sample and hold LFOs. But yeah if you’re looking for something that can stream a bunch of 12mb samples then these aren’t products designed with artists like you in mind. (I do think the 1010 black box does that tho)
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I hear ya. By pads I mean for example sampling a pad of my minilogue xd for a few bars
I can see that my wishes are not the majority of people as I can easily read in the thread.
Not here to on a crusade to convince anyone of anything dont get me wrong
However still no one answered about the actual cost now that I think of it.
This would still interest me tbh
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There are quite a few samplers that do have large amounts of RAM and have design elements for longer samples, the 404 Mk2 is an obvious example that aside from the usual finger drum stuff is also quite usable for playing whole tracks and even DJing if you like. The upcoming Torso S-4 will have a gig of RAM, there’s the Blackbox yeah, the current MPCs, the SmplTrek, the Kaoss Replay, the Maschine.
Clearly those devices have a market and have people that might want to use that much storage/RAM, so tbh it’s bullshit to suggest that we’re just after a really niche use case and that it would be hard to design an interface for such a thing. It clearly already exists, it’s just that some manufacturers choose not to go for a more modern spec. And that’s often fine if they have a tight budget or some other design requirement.
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I mean if all the devices you described fit the need what are you complaining about?
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Idk maybe I’m missing something but you guys asked why there aren’t more devices with gigs of ram. I responded that it’s a niche use case, and your response is that it’s not a niche use case because there are more devices with gigs of ram.
Seems like you answered your own question no?
at least Roland got it right with 16GB internal sample storage on the SP 404 MK2 that destroys most samplers.
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