Roland SP-404 Mk2 (Part 1)

Go to Input Settings (shift + Ext Source) and turn the volume down.

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Mine is fine on the standard setting. Maybe a little loud, but not clipping and mixes well.

Anyone else getting latency or non-hits from their pads? I have a single sample loop on hold running through MFX Downer FX on it, filter turned down to 27, depth 25, rate 1, resonance 50 and Iā€™m trying to play a kit over it, and every pad I hit Iā€™m getting mega latency, and also quite a lot of non triggers when I hit the pads. So much so that I canā€™t play a beat.

EDIT: THE DRUMS WERE RUNNING THROUGH THE MFX TOO - OBVIOUSLY! USER ERROR!

Havenā€™t experienced this no.

I wanted to talk about the sequencer: I find it convenient to play rhythmical loops on top of one another, so as to retrigger them every bar or two bars. As there is no way to cut a loop to an exact beat value, if I leave them as looped samples they get out of sync fast. By sequencing them, they stay more tamed.

Anyone doing that differently? I guess I could do a round trip to the computer but I didnā€™t so far :slight_smile:

Yep Iā€™m just sequencing everything unless Iā€™m playing live quickly to resample. I find this works the best with loops. Iā€™ve never understood the problem with not being able to cut a loop to an exact beat value. Just sequence it to re-trigger every 1 or 2 bars and no problem. This it how we always did it back in the day.

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So right about the batteries- I was waiting for a myVolts cable to come through and tried some cheap zinc batteries- lasted all of about two minutesā€¦
Running off a powerbank with the myVolts cable seems to last pretty decently though, after my initial disappointment that it wouldnā€™t work using an old USB (B?) cable.
Highly recommended: Ripcord USB to 5.7V DC power cable compatible with the Roland SP-404 MKII Sampler

Just read over 500 post to catchup. I appreciate all the detailed replies. MKII looks/sounds killer! Still havenā€™t pulled the trigger but with all this SP love I had to break out my old friend. College football, beer, pork, and my SX. Life is good! Happy new year all!

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Birdcords are said to be more reliable than Ripcords. (I just ordered one for my SP404mk2 and one for my DT/OT myself).

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@198 @hausland Which powerbank is recommended?

My kind of party! Happy New Year!

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Right, after my first long weekend of actually being able to dig into the new SP properly, Iā€™m not sure itā€™s for me. Anyone in the UK want it before I return it the shop or sell it somewhere? Barely used, 100% mint condition. Only been out of the box a couple of times. PM me.

EDIT: How much are these going for online? I canā€™t find one listed anywhere.

EDIT: Might be interested in swapping for a 1010 BlackBox.

Iā€™ll put an ad up in the for sale section.

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I have a question about using the SP as an audio interface with my iPad. I am trying to record vocal loops in loopy pro through the SP, but I canā€™t manage to get it right. Loopy pro not only records my input from the mic through the SP but also records whatā€™s playing on the previous loops (even though i use headphones)? Anyone know how to route the SP inputs or outputs? Not even sure if itā€™s a SP or rather an loopy pro issueā€¦.

Are the loops playing in Loopy Pro or on the SP?

I went with this one:

because it is rated at 65W, has PD3.0 and QC4.0 which makes it compatible with a Birdcord PD -> 12V and thus compatible with a DT/OTmk2.

If youā€™re looking to just power the SP404mk2, I think literally any USB powerbank will do (the SP404 draws 1.1A at 5.7V), but maybe someone can confirm.

I read somewhere that 20000mAh should give you around 6-8 hours on the device, Iā€™ve read some people claiming they got 10hrs out of their SPs with that capacity. Mine is waiting in my mailbox at home, so once Iā€™m back from holidays Iā€™ll be able to tell you exactly :slight_smile:

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The companion app is great for this. If you can connect the SP to your laptop and open up the companion app, you can drag and drop easily any samples on your laptop. Also super easy import any audio back to the computer from the free app!

The vocal loops are playing in loopy pro which are recorded with a mic running in the SP. So I am basically trying to use the SP as audio interface for my iPadā€¦

The SD cards main functions:

Updating the sp.

Saving/ backing up multiple instances of the 16 internal storage projects.

Importing samples such as drum hits that you load on to your SD Card.

I got this one and it works fine. I wanted it because it has USB C and USB A on it, so I can use it with other devices as well.

I find the external battery pack good for many things, but youā€™ll need AA batteries if you want to sample over USB C, so rechargeable AAs turn out to be the most convenient. Or get both to have the best of both worlds as those battery packs will last forever.

Oh, and about SD cards. I think of it as storage and the way to get samples between projects (although the companion app is easier to load lots of samples as people have mentioned). In a way, itā€™s like the hard drive on the Digitakt.

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Iā€™m not an expert on Loopy Pro and havenā€™t even read the manual, but I managed to get it to record loops, although I havenā€™t done anything super complex yet.

The one issue I had was with monitoring on Loopy Pro. Use the pencil tool on Loopy Pro in the mixer mode (sorry this is where it is on the iPhone, not sure about iPad), and then click the pencil for one of the individual loops. In there is a switch for monitoring on Loopy Pro. I donā€™t know if this is your issue, but it was causing a feedback loop when I was recording guitar loops, so could be your problem. When you turn it off, you can still hear everything in LoopyPro via the SP.

Beyond that Iā€™m of no help, and I havenā€™t really dug into Loopy Pro properly and donā€™t plan to until get my workflow dialed in on the SP.

(I will add that in that menu, you can also change a loopā€™s property from looping endlessly to looping once. I found looping endlessly as the best for creating loops in Loopy Pro, but switching it to loop once is easiest/cleanest for sampling your loop back into the SP and keeping it as a perfect loop of X number of bars for sequencing in the pattern sequencer on the SP)

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Not if youā€™re using a Birdcord (USB to 5.7V DC), in that case you should be able to use the SP404ā€™s USB-C for sampling off the iphone/ipad :slight_smile: at least Iā€™m banking on that, lol, havenā€™t had a chance to try it yet.

I have 3 sets of 6x 2500mAh rechargeable batteries, but enjoy using the SP404 so much, that ā‰ˆ4hrs per set of batteries seems like not enough atm, hence the battery back. Iā€™m hoping 6-8hours min should be possible but letā€™s see.

Re LoopyPro/Feedback loop: saw your posts on this earlier and got really excited! I donā€™t have my SP404 with me atm but will try this as soon as Iā€™m back in the studio. If it worked for you, it will work for me! :slight_smile: thanks for the info!!!

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