Stereo To Mono Sampling Suggestion

We all know the upcoming Digitakt samples and plays in mono, even if you sampled from a stereo source. Both channels will be combined into one.

I would like to suggest to the folks of Elektron that when someone samples a stereo source from a CD or youtube, could it be possible to keep both channels seperate and save the incoming stereo source into two mono samples instead of both signals mixed into mono?

This would save time instead of sampling the stereo source twice.

Thank you and please express your thoughts and theories.

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Elektron will be releasing an OT2 eventually that will be their answer for people wanting to be able to utilize stereo samples.

6 posts were split to a new topic: Pointless personal bickering

I think the main reason why the DT is mono is because of the OB bandwidth limitation. stereo samples would use twice as much bandwidth. I don’t think they will have that limitation completely removed any time soon?? I do hope for an OT2 though.

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Don’t forget that by making it stereo you’re doubling the processing power required for each track. Depending on implementation the overdrive in particular might need a lot of cycles.

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Surely that’s not a legit reason for mono on a £650 box in 2017? We’re only talking about 8 tracks!? Unless the distortion/filter/timestrech etc are insanely next level cpu hungry processes it shouldn’t be an issue? OT handled it years ago… I don’t really know what I’m talking about tho, just judging against old tech like OT and more recent like es2, Deluge, mpc live etc…

I think the issue is probably more to do with overbridge bandwidth. If it’s using the same protocol as the analog machines, it wouldn’t be capable of streaming 16 tracks + 2bus at once over USB.

:frowning: If that’s the case then it’s gonna suck if Elektron have to continue catering to that ITB related bottleneck on OTB hardware. Hopefully an OT2 or whatever big boxes they make next will have physical separate outputs and stuff like USB bandwidth will be less of a driving concern…

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But this is off-topic. This topic is about how to handle the stereo input signal.

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USB 3.0 - would solve all problems :wink:

Stereo Input Signal should be treated as follows:

  • recording it on the Machine sums it to mono - always! (for obvious reasons!)

  • Routing of the Input Signal to the Main Output should be possible and this should keep the Input Signal in Stereo (for recording the unprocessed signal, i.e. Post Mixer)

  • grabbing the Input via Overbridge in the DAW - in full Stereo - should be possible too (could be an OB Premium Feature though)

Those are my two cents on that. Dont mess it up Elektron :wink:

…

[edit] Btw: Got a message from Bax Shop today. They changed delivery date. To May, 30th :scream: Thats FAR away from mid May, where Thomann, Just Music and the like start selling it. I’m sooo pissed …

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Without knowing the details of the chipset of the Digitakt, or the algos that Elektron are using I can’t say for sure, but it’s easily possible. I do real-time audio on a SHARC platform and these things can be expensive, even when they’re written efficiently. Nature of the beast stuff.

  • Overdrive is expensive, MIPS-wise, because you (hopefully) up/down sample the signal by a few x to avoid aliasing, and upsampling by a factor of 8 gets you a lot of samples to process.
  • Filtering can be expensive if you’re doing zero-delay-feedback with nonlinearities & have to use an implicit solver and iterate.

My super-rough guess would be that this box has/uses substantially less processing power than the OT (depending on the code, I wonder if you could run this thing on one SHARC plus a micro for the UI & sequencer), and that doubling the processor load with stereo tracks isn’t possible.

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It doesn’t always sum, you have the options when sampling, l, l+r, or r

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Yes, that would be a good feature for the sampler section, a choice of L, L+R, R. My MV8800 has those kind of options and saves the hassles of pulling out and pushing in cables.

Honestly, I don’t care about the mono thing. Especially with 8 seq tracks in which I can control something in stereo.
But, if you really want stereo, I have a simple solution. You can’t do this while sampling with perfect results though.
Find a stereo sample you want to use. Throw into Audacity. Split stereo tracks to mono. Export both tracks, import to DT. Sequence one half. Copy all seq parts to track with second half. Viola.
Again, not perfect but you get you’re stereo and this means you get up to 4 “stereo” tracks.

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