Elektron Musical Instruments

Ok.. here it is again. 26 feature requests and 9 bugs. This really is 
an impossiable list on the feature side. Still there is many little 
feature requests that may be doable. While I gather this list I'm not 
going to judge which is feature request is added to list and which is 
not. It's not up to me. So people remember that this is just 
a 'brainstorming'-session (not 'these-must-be-done-list'), which may 
help Elektron in some way (maybe they get new ideas from here, if not 
to MD then to the future products). Well here it goes:


[MD FEATURE REQUEST AND BUGS LIST] 

[BUGS]

1. SONG-SLOT REMEMBERED WRONG
after a fresh restart of the MD, enter song mode then try to save the 
song; regardless of which slot the song was originally saved to, the 
MD will try to save it to the first slot; which pisses me off 
enormously because I've lost at least a few songs when I wasn't 
watching carefully enough (and didn't expect the bug)


2. THE FAMOUS MUTE-BUG IN SONG MODE
In song mode, if the scale setup LED is lit for the second portion of 
the pattern, then song mutes can't be changed; changing it to the 
first portion of the pattern fixes the 
problem (though clearly this isn't right)


3. LFO SPEED INACCURACY
Another inaccuracy in the MD occurs in the LFO's at high speeds. 
Here's an example using just 2 tracks. I set up the CH track to trig 
on all notes (16ths), with no locks. Then, I set up one (and only 
one) trig on the very first note of the OH track. I set up the LFO on 
the OH track to modulate the VOLUME of the CH track. I use a 50/50 
mix between a triangle and square LFO shape. I set the LFO to "TRIG" 
mode, and set the depth to 127. Now I press PLAY and set the pattern 
looping, and set the LFO speed to something slow (maybe9). Now just 
listen to that loop, what you get is some nice modulation of the 
hihat's volume. Because I've set the LFO to "TRIG", and placed one 
trig at the start of the OH track, the modulation resets at the 
beginning of each bar. This is a nice trick. Try tweaking the LFO 
speed a little (still slowish) and you get different variations in 
your hihat rhythm. The nice thing is that the modulation is not 
random like when the LFO is set to "FREE". The modulation resets 
every bar, so you get predictable results. Every time the pattern 
loops it sounds exactly the same, as it should. However, here's where 
the MD goes wrong: Try pushing the LFO speed up to 127. You'll notice 
that with each loop some variations start to creep in. At the low 
speeds every loop was identical, but at high speeds the MD can't keep 
up (with whatever calculations its making), and so each loop starts 
sounding audibly different. If you turn the LFO speed down, you 
should be able to find the speed at which  the MD starts to return to 
normal, with every bar sounding identical.

4. TRACK CLEAR UNDO DOESN'T WORK 
Fixing the track clear undo (which was implemented in the last OS 
revision but never worked) would be a nice start though :)


5. PARAMETER LOCK ERROR WITH LINKED MACHINES
Take one machine and link it to e12-machine (this is easiest to 
hear). Now sequence the machine and e12 triggers nicely. Fine. Now go 
to track with e-12 machine and put one parameterlock there with long 
retrigs. Now play the original pattern and you should notice that the 
e-12 machine stays on parameterlock after the seq has run over 
parameterlock and it won't change to normal. This makes it impossible 
to do velocity sensitive snareing with linkable snares, because when 
you do parameter lock on original machine the second machine has too 
much volume, ok you go to second machine track and fix it with 
parameter lock and then the volumes stays there and the next snare 
sounds wrong.


6. MONOMACHINE AND MACHINEDRUM MIDI LATENCY
I've been building my homestudio and been trying to setup everything 
to answer my musicmaking techniques. Ive setup the elektron gear this 
way: Cubase SX sends midiclock to both units via RME hammerfall 
midiport. With the midiclock it also sends transport commands (Start, 
stop, continue). Then I I've setup Monomachine and Machinedrum so 
that they receive transport commands, but do not use midiclock. This 
way because I want solid bpm timing and I'm using songmode (chopping 
patterns) a lot. So now I have dreamsetup where I can for example put 
cubase to loop 8 measures and when I hit play from cubase, all 
machines start ticking in sync and I can start sequnecing both MM and 
MD. Well I almost have it and here comes the problem: I've noticed 
and measured that Monomachine reacts to miditransport- command (play) 
in about few ms (4.5 exatcly on my rme midiport). But in the 
Machinedrum it takes about 25 ms!! So you can see it's reacting to 
play command pretty slowly, which makes hard to do groovy hihats 
(exepts if you want a really groovyones :) Is this something that 
have been overlooked possibly or somekind of bug or just the way it 
is and which can't be changed?? This is not a audiocard latency since 
I've tried it with  1.5 ms latency from rme card and I can get tight 
timing with Monomachine.


7. MACHINEDRUM TEMPO DRIFTING!!
Machinedrum tempo seems to drift sometimes. It can be reproduced very 
easily. Make up quite long song with different kits and patterns (you 
can also set some offset's and mutes but maybe it doesn't matter). 
Now if you want to record every single sound to it's own channel 
throught MD Dynamix you need to mute other tracks than BD (for 
example) and play song from start to end with computer (or something 
else) recording it. Do record the BD two times with different tracks. 
After something like 60 bars you start to see drifting of kick sounds 
(and this happens when MD is Master!!). I've gotten over 30 ms 
differencies at the end of files. I know it can't be perfect, but 
this is just too much. Try recording snare and the hihats and you 
will see (and hear!!) how they drift at the end of files!. Should be 
corrected, if possible!


8. LOCK UP AFTER NOTE PASTE
During note copy and paste I often get a lockup of certain parts. 
Several parameters are highlighted on the pasted note and some mutes 
don't work or sounds don't come out. This all happens after I copied 
a note (which has some paramter locks of course) and just as I paste 
it while in record mode and while the sequence is running.


9. INPUT MACHINES
These could use some work. Sometimes I hear a sound when I think I 
shouldn't like with the gated machine. Maybe an updated manual that 
explains these machines better like you didwith the MnM. for example. 
if I use a kit with an input machine and then switch to one that 
doesn't have an input machine, I will still hear the input (usually 
the Sidstation using the input gate!).




[FEATURE REQUESTS]

1. DIFFERENT ACCENTS WITH DIFFERENT TRACKS
feature to adjust the accent parameter for each machine separately. I 
might want to add accents to the hihats, but not to the bassdrum for 
example. It would make the accent feature more powerful and usable.


2. INDICATOR OF PLAYING PATTERN
A blinking led for the pattern wich is playing when pressing bank 
select. That way you don't have to fiddle a knob to minimize the mute 
screen to look at the tiny pattern number.


3. DIFFERENT STYLE OF PLAYING PATTERNS
Id LOVE to see a way to jump to a new pattern without it being qued 
for playing, so you could: Have A01 playing, copy it. Jump to A02 
with A01 still playing, paste A01 onto A02. Make some changes, and 
then switch playback to the new pattern in A02. Would be really handy 
for live jamming
[NOT POSSIBLE ACCORDING TO DANIEL!]


4. NEW GND-MACHINES
I´d like to suggest the incorporation of new GND machines. More 
specifically 2 new machines with pulse (with PWM if possible) and saw 
waveforms. I guess these wouldn´t take up much memory since these 
waveforms are already used as LFO modulators and they would increase 
the sound possibilities of the MD a lot. Another one would be some 
sort of color knob for the noise machine.


5. FINER NOTE LENGHT WITH MIDI MACHINES 
I would love a finer setting possible for note length on midi 
machines... the current setting is way to coarse for getting what I'd 
like to.


6. SOME THINGS TO BE COPIED FROM MONOMACHINE
Monomachine seams to have better EQ and Distortion. Maybe these could 
be copied to MD also (especially the distortion, which seems pretty 
weka now). Mono have better way of using Midi-cc's. Could be done 
this way with Machinedrum also.
[THERE SEEMS TO BE A LOT OF DISCUSSION OF THIS, MAYBE COULD BE DONE 
BY SWITCHES IN GLOBAL MENU. ANY IDEA OF VOTING ON THIS (MAYBE NOT, 
SINCE NOT EVERY USER IS HERE)? THE ISSUE SEEMS TO BE ON THE 
DISTORTION, SRR AND EQ.]


7. TRX-B3 WITH PITCH ENVELOPE SPEED SETTING
TRX-B2 is a very good kick-machine but with one flaw. The speed of 
the pitch-envelope cannot be changed! It's is tuned way too slow and 
you can hear the 'ziiuuupp' very clearly. Ok, somebody want's it and 
some don't, but as I understand the machine is designed for special 
type of kick (let's call it the 'oommmpphh' kick) and makes it with 
really good hold parameter. I would like to see TRX-B3 with one 
distortion-knob taken away and put ramp-speed knob instead. I think 
molding the basic sound character (to fit the song) is way more 
important and effecting it with distortion or something else.


8. SCREEN FOR MULTIPLE KNOB ADJUSTS!
Imagine this in live-situation: A screen with one SRR, DELAY, AM, 
DISTORTION AND FILTER. Every knob in postion 64. Now you tweak the 
SRR to 96 and every tracks SRR value is moved +32, instat robo-
electro. You tweak it back and everything is normal again. Try same 
thing with delay, instat dub! Now tweak with you both hands, very 
nice live-possiability!!! If this could be also controlled from it's 
own track with parameter locks!!! Huh, what a machine!! This is 
basicly the same thing that Monomachine does with its joystick. Maybe 
this could be implemented to MD in a form of a screen, in which you 
would enter by pressing [function]+extended (extended tweak!) or 
something else! the tweaked values on such a page
shouldn't be absolute, they should be relative. so they should all 
start at 0 and then when you tweak SRR to 64, all machines have 64 
*added* to their SRR value. this is more useful (I think) because if 
a machine is set to 127 SRR and you start to tweak it globally, it 
might sound strange (and be left set to the global value when you're 
done doing global tweaks).


9. WAY TO CHANGE OTHER TRACKS VOLUME
Press [function] and twist Level button and every other tracks level 
is changed. Very handy in situations where you need more volume to 
snare, but it's allready in maximum!


10. NEW MACHINES OF COURSE!!
New machines would be nice as always. Anything. (There's been mention 
of 909-hihats.) It would be nice to see more EFM machines, they're by 
far my favorite. and I think a couple backwards machines (like a 
backwards crash and snare) would be very useful.


11. BLANK PARAMETER LOCKS
it would be SOOOO nice to be able to have parameter locks on any 
step, like the Monomachine does. there's so many subtleties that can 
be captured this way that cannot be done with note-only parameter 
locks and slide. I know the issue with this is conveying which steps 
have note trigs and which have parameter locks only, given that the 
LED's are one color. but I'm sure there's a way to do it...


12. MORE INFO ON KIT LIST
An important information is missing : at what pattern a kit is 
assigned! Now if i want to erase some kit (for exemple when there is 
no more free slot) i have to test ALL the pattern to check that I 
don't make a big mistake, boring !
It would be nice to press "function" on a kit (in the kit list) to 
show a window with the name of all the pattern whitch use this kit.


13. CLEAR KIT ON KIT LIST
Just like Monomachine has (or had?), it's basic function.


14. SAFE KIT SAVE/ERASE
Add this kind of message when erase or save on an existing 
kit : "Warning ! This kit is used by another pattern, are you sure 
you want to do this ?" (I have messed a lot of pattern because of 
that).


15. MORE INFO ON GLOBAL SETTING
Add the possibility to name the slot of the global setting and when 
pressing "function" a window show (just show) a list of all the 
choice of this setting (more fast to check the global setting i need, 
because after 3 month of using i can forget the setting i make)


16. SAVING OUTPUTS
I would like to see some of the things in the global menu saved in 
the kit. Especially something like routing outputs. It would be nice 
to save it to each kit as a kind of option.


17. MIXER IN MASTER EFFECTS
It would be nice to have just a master mixer menu to get all the 
levels changed easily possibly in the master effects menu. Something 
similar to the Akai mpc. Have the 16 parts in rows going across. Each 
row has the bar for the volume like each machine currently does. Use 
the encoder to switch between channels.


18. DYNAMIX NEEDS TO SHOW GAIN REDUCTION IN dB's
Dynamix would be much more easier to use if it would show occurring 
gain reduction in dB's somewhere.


19. MASTER EQ SHOULD SHOW FREQUENCYS AND dB's
This could be implemented this way: you start tweaking the knob and 
at the same time there popups a little sreen showing where you in 
frequencys. You let off button and the little screen goes off. This 
would be very nice.


20. LIVE MIDI NOTE RECORD
This would be great. All you'd need would be for the MD to recieve 
note information not length. It would make sequencing much easier.


21. CONTROLLER MACHINES!!!
I want a controller machine, that is, a machine that can control
parameters in other machines. I want to be able to assign whatever 
parameters from other machines to the knobs of the controller 
machine. This way you can choose to create a minimixer, filter 
sweeper, whatever. Configure which machines and what parameter to 
affect on some pages, let the first one be the actual
tweaking page. This would make both machines even more live friendly.
Very attracting suggestion!!


22. COMMENT ROW IN SONG EDITOR
When doing lots of offset's and stuff or repeating lots of same 
pattern in song editor, it can become quite unclear where you are at 
the song. Monomachines way to display current bar is ok, but there 
could also be something like 32 Comment rows. No need to type here 
anything, they could be named like "Comment Row 1" and "Comment Row 
2" and so on. The point is that these row don't do anything. MD jumps 
over them, but with them you can set for yourself some landmarks, 
like "I know the tracks mood changes after Comment Row 5", so it 
would be very easy to see where you want to edit your song.


23. LFO TRIG TYPES
It would be cool if MD would also have trig-types like "One" 
and "Half", like Monomachine have. Also it would be _really_ usefull 
to have lfo-waveform, that starts from parameters current value (like 
pitch =23) and goes from there to maximum or minimum, depending how 
much depth you dial. I've understood that there isn't that kind of 
waveform yet. (it's on Monomachine (ramp and trig-type half).)


24. ABILITY TO SET HOW KNOBS WORK
In global menu: push-to-smooth-change or push-to-large-change. People 
could pick what they want. what I would love to see in the MD is a 
global setting for the increment value, So you could have it set up 
how it is normal +/- 1 regular, +/- 7 pressed for studio  work and 
set it to +/- 4 regular +/- 12 pressed for live.


25. REVERSE CURRENT TRACK OPTION
With [Function] + Left/right you can `rotate' the current track (in 
record mode of course). It would be cool to use [Function] + up/down 
arrows to reverse trigs order (turn the track backward, but play of 
course would go forward). Good creativity choiche for making 
different variations of one pattern. For example turn hihat's other 
way around, or snare or something and then continue from the new 
freshstarting point.


26. PATTERN TEMPO
each pattern works best at a certain tempo. it would be great if we 
could store that ideal tempo with each pattern. Same is true for the 
monomachine BTW.