4 Likes
I wouldnāt recommend the Blofeld. Itās a pain to load samples via a very old software, and itās really not quite qāa sampler. Samples as oscillators rather (from wsh at Iāve used it in this context, a while ago)
1 Like
Yep. And no round robin iircā¦
1 Like
Deluge can kind of do it, but it would mean loading all the samples wanted in the round robin, then using x/x playback trigs, so a bit laborious, to say the least.
3 Likes
Iāve not tried this as I hadnāt encountered round robin sample playback before now, but this makes me wonder if the ESX-1, which can assign different samples in a slice to individual keys, might then allow sliced drum sounds be played individually into a sequence to humanise a drumbeat somewhat? Slices are not an LFO target, however.
But the ESX is definitely not Digitakt-sized, and sadly doesnāt have FX per track either. It does have bus stereo overdrive with the valves though, and assignable 3+4 outputs as well.
Just a shot in the dark, but could this be achieved with polymeters? For example, have a snare on 5 and 13 of every page of a 64 step loop, slightly different sample on each hit. But cut the number of steps for that track to 56 instead of 64, then the first hit of every 64 step loop will gradually move through the 7 samples. Hope that makes sense?
3 Likes
Is it that important that there are never any repeats? Iām thinking that with the random LFO, youāll get a lot of variety, and if you couple that with a second LFO that is free running and alter some other parameter like maybe decay or perhaps pitch, and then you also program some velocity variations into the sequence and leverage the velocity macros - wouldnāt you get enough of an illusion of no repeat samples to call it a day? 
Rossum Assimil8or is what you want
1 Like
If you mean Maschine Micro, that requires you to have it connected to the computer for it to work.
1 Like
ā¦ though thatās the easiest thing in the world to do on a Digitakt (plock sample slot) ā¦
ā¦ and this a natural extension of this method (if the rhythm allows for it) ā¦
ā¦ in the end, maybe ā¦ but that still doesnāt give Digitakt stereo ability or bus distortion (at least one that sounds better than misusing makeup gain on the compressor) 
2 Likes
This is one feature in particular (along with those lovely LFOs to use with it) that does make me think that Iād quite like a Digitakt some day.
2 Likes
This is a topic that is dear to me. Iāve bought the Digitakt twice now and both times, I just canāt get over the fact that itās a mono sampler and that it has such limited effects. So I went and bought the SP-404 MKII to give that a try (first day today, no real impressions so far).
Anyway, I used the MPC One for almost 18 months prior to getting hooked by the Syntakt, and others have already laid out the details of what it can do (4 layers of proper round robin, not more). But, it also can do per-pad insert effects, up to four of them. So you could easily stack a few effects like distortion, transient shaper, compressor and maybe a subtle pitch modifier and they would run independently of the round robin.
It ticks all your boxes you listed (included all the ones you donāt care for, like pads etc!), with one potentially big problem: itās basically a DAW in a box. So itās maybe not ideal anyway, because it may feel like overkill, both from a features and a size point of view. But in terms of āproper round robinā, I think itās definitely as close as you will get on a hardware sampler. It even has a bunch of independent randomization features that can modify the pitch, start point of the sample, velocity etc etc - all while the round robin and all four insert fx are running on that same pad!
The SP-404 has no round robin whatsoever from what I can tell. No LFOs or other forms of live modulations of a sample either, except its MFX, which I doubt is what youād be happy with. But itās a relatively small stereo sampler with some crazy distortions and drive! I just tried to sample a Syntakt drum loop into it and then spice it up with distortion and compression, and it kind of sounded like your music all of a sudden. 
It definitely can mangle samples a lot more than the Digitakt can if you ask me. But on the other hand, it sucks in the turn-sample-into-synth territory (which the DT and the MPC both excel at).
I wrote in the MPC thread last week that my dream sampler would be an MPC Mini that is smaller and strips out most of the synth+DAW+mixer+looper capabilities and just focuses on being an excellent stereo sampler instead. Sounds like that might be appealing to you too.
4 Likes
If you arenāt hung up on actual random/round robin, and just want to prevent the machine gun effect, I think you could maybe get away with doing that on the SP404 by sampling multiple instances of drums.
I hate the machine gun effect and like really realistic drum sounds, which is why I often use software instruments (Addictive Drums 2 is my favorite for the kind of drums I like). While you could never achieve the level realism on hardware that you can with drum software, I often sample different hits of the same drum from software to the SP to get rid of the machine gun effect. You could have rows of drums (4x snare, 4x kick drum, 4x high hat, etc) and just hit the different sample each time (or program it).
Because itās such a low-tech solution and you donāt have to set up any settings on the SP, itās not time consuming to work this way, and you have tons of sample banks, so space isnāt an issue. I can usually get all the drums sounds I want in two banks and then everything else is free. When I get it set up, I even save the finished program and use that as a template so I donāt have to do it each time. This way you can make a few kit templates.
I think I saw you use a Volca Drum. Another option is just sampling that in bars if you know you donāt want to change your drums up too much for a particular track, and build your track around those drums. If you have several different four bar sequences, you could alternate those to get variety as you go.
Anyway, good luck!
1 Like
ā¦ thx, same as the methods mentioned above on other gear, here excels the Digitakt since plocking the sample slot is super fast be done. On a side node, itās actually even faster on the Circuit Rhythm ā¦
1 Like
To each their own. I didnāt really enjoy doing drums on the Digitakt. I think itās had some updates since I got rid of mine though. For instance, I hated sample management on it.
I gave the OT a try recently, and actually found that I just donāt like working with samples in general. And spending even more money on a box 
And the OT showed me even more, that mangling samples is not something I find interesting. (I knew before that I have no interest in manipulating loops.)
I use samples only to spice things up with sounds from the real world, a secondary use would be to steal sounds from another piece of gear. So itās actually a very simple use (hence I said ādumb samplerā above).
Edit: Though using it as a wavetable synth is nice, since I donāt have any wavetable synth.
I come back to thinking that Digitakt is still the best I can get, everything is possible at least with workarounds (including stereo) - it just needs some external stereo distortion - thatād make the boring effects better too.
2 Likes
You could get close to round robin with the step components on the OP-Z (probably a combo of random and velocity on a sample chain on one of the drum tracks). Samples arenāt going to be stereo though, but thatās no different than the DTās output.
ā¦ round robin is not random ā¦
Kind of a similar feeling here. Though, I like resampling. And for that, stereo is everything to me. Sample a drum loop from the Syntakt, crush it to the max with distortion and what have you, shave off the low end and then play it behind the actual Syntakt drum loop. Thatās a 1-minute job that makes a massive difference if youāre into that sort of thing. For that, the SP-404 might just be ideal.
Yeah, this is why I got the SP-404 MKII. Itās really dumb. But, given your round robin requirementā¦
ā¦ I think youāre right.
One possible workaround here might be to just process the sample in the DAW before bouncing it back into the DT? Skip the hunt for the perfect sampler and just embrace the best tool there is. This could might as well be the future me giving recommendations to myself.
Does the Polyend Play tick any of these boxes? Itās not a sampler per se, but a sample player. I think it has saturation/distortion. I donāt know if it has round robin, but it seems like it might have a ton of sequencer flexibilityā¦ Maybe it could be approximated?
Never mind. I think it plays mono samples