SP-1 Stem Player / firmware / new things

I just pulled the trigger on one of these off stockx. Not sure what I’ll do with it, but ~$70 usd for teenage engineering hardware with a mod community seems worth it regardless. I’ll find some fun use for it.

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how things go when not bound to profit but interest, people are awesome for real.

What 2.0 adds on top of the 1.x looper:

** 16 songs in 4 banks, each a fully remembered performance state — loops, tempo/pitch, chop window, loop mode, mutes and grid tempo all persist per song across power-off. Hold FUNCTION and press a track button to jump to that bank; press the same track again to step through its four songs — all 16 songs under one hold.*
** Tapped grid + quantized capture — tap FUNCTION 4+ times along any music and that song gets a tempo grid: the lights become a metronome, the bank light blinks on the beat, and the sync jack sends MIDI clock at your tapped tempo (even while stopped). Recording then quantizes itself: the first take starts the moment you arm and places the downbeat, stops snap to whole beats (a loop can never contain silence), and overdubs count in and punch exactly on the next bar line — every loop stays locked with no timing precision required from you.*
** Loop chop — a live performance window over every playing track: shrink, grow, slide or reset it from the FUNCTION layer — or shape it directly on the faders (start / end / shift, any width), cross the edges to play the window in REVERSE, and color everything with the fader-4 DJ filter (see Controls). Non-destructive; the stepped chop is saved with the song.*
** Heads mode — hold FUNCTION and triple-tap PLAY: tracks 2–4 become three extra tape heads on track 1’s loop — one loop played in four phases, with a fader and a mute per head. Scrub the heads live on the faders, flip any head into reverse with a double-tap (see Controls).*
** Press-accurate loop capture — the stop lands on your press-down (the variable release latency is gone, and the remaining constant is backdated out of the take), so seams land where you play them.*
** Two-layer loop-length mode — the fixed/variable toggle now has a global default plus a per-song memory (see Controls).*
** Dimmable lights — LEDs run dim by default; FUNCTION + double-tap PLAY toggles full brightness.*
** Battery gauge — 1–4 LEDs while charging in standby, top LED blinking until the charger reports full. It appears whether you plug in an off device or power off while still plugged in.*
** Full-scale headphones — the −19 dB output pad in the codec init is gone; max headphone volume matches the stock firmware.*
** Long takes — up to 8 minutes per track at 1.0x (about 16 with the tape at half speed), on all 16 songs.*
** Transfer page 2.0 — 16-song aware, with one-click Download all, and WAVs round-trip at the pitch you actually hear on the device (fixes the upstream export-pitch bug): SP-1 loop transfer*

Inherited from the upstream release — Technics’ work, summarized (full notes in the upstream repo):

** Full 48 kHz; four independent tracks per song, each looping at its own length; hands-free latched recording that starts on the first sound.*
** Fixed and variable loop-length modes, switchable live.*
** Tape-style tempo/pitch rocker: 1 BPM per click, double-click for an exact semitone.*
** Aliasing-free recording at any tape speed, on a deeply hardened audio/storage engine (four tracks plus an overdub at 1.5× with zero dropouts).*
** Works on Windows, macOS, iOS and Linux (the USB Audio 2.0 host quirk is auto-detected); iPhone-friendly 100 mA power claim.*
** Phantom-tap-proof buttons (all five share one analogue sense line); MIDI clock out on the sync jack; loops survive power-off and re-flashing.*

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WOW, this is amazing! I need to flash mine over to tape-looper tonight

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Would like to see a vid of this in action before I flash, asked on Discord and nothing yet

from the SP1 (2.0) tape looper dev

flash it, it’s really tight and performative, 16 min latched recording per track (64 tracks), loop window, window shift really high output volume etc etc etc :dove:

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What have recent UK purchasers paid for this in total?

added SP1 tape looper 2.3 cheat-sheet :arrow_heading_up:

now with start/end/windowshift/notch filter on faders :cowboy_hat_face:

the notch filter is also a real time audio sculpting feature, so you can have an additional (fader controlled) filter for your synths :crystal_ball:

granular/reversed heads mode (4 tape heads on one track) inspired by the Norns tape script

the changelog is growing and growing everyday, updated the post above, get your SP1 case via Etsy, keychain case, really solid and smooth :duck::arrow_heading_up:

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how to does the pitcing sound on this thing, pretty similar to tape to your ears?

basically like the tape pitchdial on a tascam 424, smooth and natural :cowboy_hat_face:

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Nice, just ordered one! for using with my samplers!

Looks like it might come in next week!

Need to do some digging, but for $50 sounds like a fun utlity piece! I owned a 424 for a long time, and miss it and the pitching

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that’s nice :blush: you should read yourself thru the documentation because this is by now one crazy piece of equipment. the 2.3 update is a real biggy with the ability for more live fx and such but imagine a 424 with individual track lengths, faders for start, end, window shift and notchfilter, headsmode (where you have 4 individual tapeheads that you can freely scrub over one recording) maybe next up is speed, size , a/d envelope and audio rate stereo spread for the headsmode, each tapehead is spaced in the stereo field :firefighter::firefighter: call me a doc

2.4 is live with re-sampling (print to empty track) from the headsmode, simultaneously have these play in tapemode 🫰🏼
things will come :crossed_swords:

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This looks very interesting!

Is it possible to use the SP-1 as a basic 4 track tape recorder with overdub via the usb c input?

it’s totally possible with the SP1 tape looper firmware, you should read yourself into the docs.
unfortunately there’s no classical overdub but you can do a lot of other really cool things with it :women_with_bunny_ears:

firmware 2.5 of the tape looper dropped with high energy reworked timing/bpm structure improvements ^^

it’s now that after certain ideas and inspiration a working instance of the SP1 midi looper exists, barebones unquantized midi loop recording, based on the tape loop firmware with excellent controls :level_slider::level_slider:

let‘s see where it’s headed in a few days, it’s happening, the op1 tape with individual track lengths is it by now, it will be the midi tape aswell :space_invader:

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My SP-1 came in yesterday, flashed it with the looper bin and started jamming for a couple hours.

Still getting my time down, but super fun. The vari speed sounds nice too! Thanks again for your help @JohnnyEgo

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The looper firmware is awesome! I haven’t tried all the stuff with saving loops and exporting them, but this is everything I wanted for a “youtube sampler” and much more :).

This and an iPhone running borderlands or something could be super powerful as well

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2.6 is live :space_invader: massive :nerd_face:

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