Sequential circuits samplers

I mentioned in another post that I received five disks from Wine
Country yesterday - the sounds are great, but I'm noticing the sound
"loops."  I can hear an annoying thump in pretty much every sample.

Is this typical of all samples you purchase?  The onboard presets in
my Prophet 2000 don't seem to do this.

Thanks!

>>I mentioned in another post that I received five disks from Wine
Country yesterday - the sounds are great, but I'm noticing the sound
"loops."  I can hear an annoying thump in pretty much every sample.<<

is it possible that the production of the discs predates their
development of the crossfade looping software? I'd suggest, since you
can't do the discs any harm by doing this, that you load up the
samples & then have a look at the loop points yourself, see if you can
improve them. does your machine have the later software in it?

I got my 2002 in 1990 & struggled with v3 software for three weeks,
before tim (at argent's in denmark street) told me he'd got the
expansion kit & a copy of v4. well, I fitted the extra outputs but
hardly ever use them... the v4 software (required to drive them) also
had the crossfade loop thing, & the difference was amazing. I still
use the thing now, despite having e6400 ultras & the like, because
it's so easy to use & the sound is wonderful.

duncan.

Duncan:

I can't tell you anything about the disks, or this particular Prophet
2000.  I just picked it up used at a music store two weeks ago, for a
mere $75.00.  I was told the floppy drive was "bad", but it indeed
works.  I can load samples off of these purchased disks, and I can
format a blank floppy, as well.

I now need to learn how to identify what version this particular unit
is running - can you or someone else advise me on this?

Regarding the analog synth sample disks I just received from Wine
Country - I just received an email response from Kid NePro:



"No, all samples do not do that. If the sample is looped properly you
should not hear the loop. You might hear that on "some" of our
samples, but in most cases the loops are smooth. As you know, the
P2000 has that tiny display which back in the early days of sampling
was all that we had to work with. That made it very difficult to get
the loop right. That's probably why the WC disks are not looped
correctly. I have not heard all our P2000 sounds in many years so I
can't tell you for sure how all the loops sound on every disk, but I'm
pretty sure in most cases the loops should be smooth and you won't
have the same problem."



So, I'm still looking to purchase new samples, figure out what version
my keyboard is running, and figure out how to remedy these Wine
Country disks (with the bad loops).

Regarding the extra outputs, v4, and the expansion kit:  I have an
extra row of phono output jacks on the back of the unit, installed
above the normal or "default" outputs.  What does this tell me?

Any further comments would be greatly appreciated - I just joined this
group and I'm new to this (old) sample technology.  I can run MIDI
cables to my Mac, of course, and play with plenty of VST instruments,
but there's something intriguing about these machines, and these
potentially "lost" sounds.

Thanks.



--- In prophet2000@yahoogroups.com, "duncan" <ferrograph@...> wrote:

>
> >>I mentioned in another post that I received five disks from Wine
> Country yesterday - the sounds are great, but I'm noticing the sound
> "loops."  I can hear an annoying thump in pretty much every sample.<<
> 
> is it possible that the production of the discs predates their
> development of the crossfade looping software? I'd suggest, since you
> can't do the discs any harm by doing this, that you load up the
> samples & then have a look at the loop points yourself, see if you can
> improve them. does your machine have the later software in it?
> 
> I got my 2002 in 1990 & struggled with v3 software for three weeks,
> before tim (at argent's in denmark street) told me he'd got the
> expansion kit & a copy of v4. well, I fitted the extra outputs but
> hardly ever use them... the v4 software (required to drive them) also
> had the crossfade loop thing, & the difference was amazing. I still
> use the thing now, despite having e6400 ultras & the like, because
> it's so easy to use & the sound is wonderful.
> 
> duncan.
>

Get the free Yahoo! toolbar and rest assured with the added security of spyware protection.

>>mere $75.00.  I was told the floppy drive was "bad", but it indeed
works.<<

that's an exceptional price. mine cost me 800ukp, but that was in
1990! my keyboard version was about 250ukp (with a dead drive) a
couple of years later.

there are chunks of the manual in the files section here, which are
scans that someone (tim- you still here?) did from my 2nd copy a
couple of years ago. the quick start guide is a good place to start...

I have some additional documentation on the expansion kit & the extra
midi-modes (4 & 4B) designed to let you use one sample per midi
channel. these two things were supposed to allow the 2k2 particularly
(the same kit was seldom fitted to the keyboard version) to act as a
multi-output drum machine. so.... how many of these extra sockets are
there? should be 8, & an extra daughter-board fastened inside the lid.

um... let's see....  if you clear all the samples out of memory & then
adjust the size of one of the empty locations, does it go to 128 or
+56? this will tell you how much memory is in each side of the thing.
it took me a while to get used to the way the memory & voices are
split, but I did, & predominantly used the machine in mode 3B, or
bitimbral mode, with the two sounds hard left & right. 

as I mentioned, I got the v4 software with this output kit, & this
introduced the "FO" or forced-outputs option in the "dynamic
allocation" page. so if that option is there when you try it, then you
have v4. even if there are no separate outs.

but they also introduced the crossfade looping with this release.
before this, all you could do was manually nudge the loop points & let
the inc/dec buttons find the zero-crossing points by hitting each one
at least twice for both ends of the loop. 
to complete the crossfading process in v4, one then reselects loop
mode- "the loop that will be crossfaded will be the last one (sustain
or release) that was edited"- & press execute. the display goes to "-"
while it has a think. there's no "undo" so you have to reload the
sample from disc if it makes an arse of itself.

of course, you can just open the lid to see these things! the rom will
have the software version, & the memory expansion & separate outs are
reasonably obvious daughter-boards.

>>"You might hear that on "some" of our samples, but in most cases the
loops are smooth. As you know, the P2000 has that tiny display which
back in the early days of sampling was all that we had to work with.
That made it very difficult to get the loop right."<<

well, he may be right. I'm sure if he remembers making these sounds
for the p2000, he ain't a "kid" anymore! :-) all I know is I managed
to get some pretty good loops happening without the crossfade option
during the two weeks I was running v3.whatever.

there're two possibilities here. either I'm right & the discs were
made before they perfected the crossfade looping (in which case you
can probably improve them yourself if you have v4) or there are bad
sectors on the discs causing little glitches. 

are you experiencing any read-errors? do you ever see "ER" in the
display? I have some discs that do this- keep pressing "exe" until the
whole bad disc has loaded, then check the individual samples: select
sound, press "exe" so the dot comes on, & you right away have one
sample only mapped across it's whole useable range. 

do this for all the sounds in turn until you find the glitchy one(s).
you may be able to reload them individually- sometimes it's worth
having a quick look at the surface of the floppy- or cut out the
glitchy bit of the sample & resave the bank. I've fixed bad samples in
the past by loading them into two locations, cutting the beginning off
one & the end of the other & joining them back together with "append".

there was support in "sound forge" & one or two other apps for the 12
bit samplers including this one, but the midi-transfer takes so long
that I preferred to do all the work on the machine itself.
stevie wonder used the p2000- the small display obviously wasn't an
issue to him, & it does rather force one to use one's ears instead of
the fancy graphic waveform editing of later machines.

what sorts of sounds are you interested in? maybe we can do some
trading..... this would have to be snail-mail, though, as these discs
are proprietary-format. I have a lot of discs here... quite a few
factory things, but mostly stuff I've made myself from sample CDs &
other instruments.

duncan.

Thank you for your kind and informative reply.

 

I've had the case open once, but it requires the removal of many screws -
I'll have to crack this think open again to see what version I'm running and
how much RAM it has.

 

And, based on some of the responses I'm getting, I better read the manual in
its entirety.  I can load samples off of a floppy, but that's about all.

 

It's hard getting used to using headphones - some notes are placed LEFT,
some are placed RIGHT.  Chords sound the best, since they're placed both
LEFT and RIGHT.

 

*       are you experiencing any read-errors? do you ever see "ER" in the
display?

 

Actually, no.  No problems reading a floppy disk at all, besides the
incredibly slow speed reading a floppy.  How did we ever put up with this?
:-)

 

I'd be interested in trading disks, sure.  I still need some basic piano
sounds, as well as strings, woodwinds, etc.

 

I better start reading the manual, and learning how to dump samples to this
keyboard.  Any further suggestions?  

 

I can NOT dump .wav files to this keyboard, is that it?  

 

Thanks so much,

 

Tom Hanser

Seattle, WA

 

 

  _____  

From: prophet2000@yahoogroups.com [mailto:prophet2000@yahoogroups.com] On
Behalf Of duncan
Sent: Sunday, July 22, 2007 8:17 AM
To: prophet2000@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [prophet2000] Re: Purchasing Sample Disks

 

>>mere $75.00. I was told the floppy drive was "bad", but it indeed
works.<<

that's an exceptional price. mine cost me 800ukp, but that was in
1990! my keyboard version was about 250ukp (with a dead drive) a
couple of years later.

there are chunks of the manual in the files section here, which are
scans that someone (tim- you still here?) did from my 2nd copy a
couple of years ago. the quick start guide is a good place to start...

I have some additional documentation on the expansion kit & the extra
midi-modes (4 & 4B) designed to let you use one sample per midi
channel. these two things were supposed to allow the 2k2 particularly
(the same kit was seldom fitted to the keyboard version) to act as a
multi-output drum machine. so.... how many of these extra sockets are
there? should be 8, & an extra daughter-board fastened inside the lid.

um... let's see.... if you clear all the samples out of memory & then
adjust the size of one of the empty locations, does it go to 128 or
+56? this will tell you how much memory is in each side of the thing.
it took me a while to get used to the way the memory & voices are
split, but I did, & predominantly used the machine in mode 3B, or
bitimbral mode, with the two sounds hard left & right. 

as I mentioned, I got the v4 software with this output kit, & this
introduced the "FO" or forced-outputs option in the "dynamic
allocation" page. so if that option is there when you try it, then you
have v4. even if there are no separate outs.

but they also introduced the crossfade looping with this release.
before this, all you could do was manually nudge the loop points & let
the inc/dec buttons find the zero-crossing points by hitting each one
at least twice for both ends of the loop. 
to complete the crossfading process in v4, one then reselects loop
mode- "the loop that will be crossfaded will be the last one (sustain
or release) that was edited"- & press execute. the display goes to "-"
while it has a think. there's no "undo" so you have to reload the
sample from disc if it makes an arse of itself.

of course, you can just open the lid to see these things! the rom will
have the software version, & the memory expansion & separate outs are
reasonably obvious daughter-boards.

>>"You might hear that on "some" of our samples, but in most cases the
loops are smooth. As you know, the P2000 has that tiny display which
back in the early days of sampling was all that we had to work with.
That made it very difficult to get the loop right."<<

well, he may be right. I'm sure if he remembers making these sounds
for the p2000, he ain't a "kid" anymore! :-) all I know is I managed
to get some pretty good loops happening without the crossfade option
during the two weeks I was running v3.whatever.

there're two possibilities here. either I'm right & the discs were
made before they perfected the crossfade looping (in which case you
can probably improve them yourself if you have v4) or there are bad
sectors on the discs causing little glitches. 

are you experiencing any read-errors? do you ever see "ER" in the
display? I have some discs that do this- keep pressing "exe" until the
whole bad disc has loaded, then check the individual samples: select
sound, press "exe" so the dot comes on, & you right away have one
sample only mapped across it's whole useable range. 

do this for all the sounds in turn until you find the glitchy one(s).
you may be able to reload them individually- sometimes it's worth
having a quick look at the surface of the floppy- or cut out the
glitchy bit of the sample & resave the bank. I've fixed bad samples in
the past by loading them into two locations, cutting the beginning off
one & the end of the other & joining them back together with "append".

there was support in "sound forge" & one or two other apps for the 12
bit samplers including this one, but the midi-transfer takes so long
that I preferred to do all the work on the machine itself.
stevie wonder used the p2000- the small display obviously wasn't an
issue to him, & it does rather force one to use one's ears instead of
the fancy graphic waveform editing of later machines.

what sorts of sounds are you interested in? maybe we can do some
trading..... this would have to be snail-mail, though, as these discs
are proprietary-format. I have a lot of discs here... quite a few
factory things, but mostly stuff I've made myself from sample CDs &
other instruments.

duncan.

>>It's hard getting used to using headphones - some notes are placed
LEFT, some are placed RIGHT.<<

that's the dynamic voice allocation. you can switch it off, & then
what happens is that the left keyboard map uses the left channel
voices & the right keyboard map uses.... but I'm a bit rusty here.

probably need to spend a few hours on my 2002 & get up to speed again.
I used to be (excuse me blowing my own trumpet here) sh*t hot at
programming the thing, but it's been a while. I used to gig with the
2002 & the 2000 keyboard, even. I made super-discs with half-a-dozen
different instruments crammed into the memory.... the crossfade
looping meant I could take the tiniest scrap of timbre & turn it into
a reasonable facsimile of a real instrument. I spent hours at it...

for each keyboard map in each preset, there are global & per-sample
adjustments for all the "synth" parameters. this means that you can
create interactions between (say) the global keyboard filter tracking
& the same setting for each sample. things like this enable you to
extend the useful range of each sample beyond what seems possible,
i.e. where it would normally be sounding a bit rough due to aliasing
artefacts.
I also used to alter the pitch of what I was sampling (using a
varispeed 1/4" deck) so that I could use a smaller sample & pitch it
down in the prophet. effectively, this is the same as sampling at a
lower frequency than the prophet allows; useful technique where one
would normally have wasted some bits, especially if the sound has
little or no high frequency content. it also changes the range over
which the sample will play. I need to refresh my knowledge of this,
but I think at the lower rate you got about an octave & a bit above
the root, & maybe an octave below it, for each sample. sampling the
sound at the wrong pitch changes it's natural location within this
spread, which can be useful.


>>incredibly slow speed reading a floppy.  How did we ever put up with
this :-)<<

40 seconds, for some reason, springs to mind as being the time for a
full load. I guess I should know this... it's another way to tell how
much ram there is in the sampler. I always use to verify after a save
aswell, so I drank a lot of tea back then..... :-)

>>I'd be interested in trading disks, sure.  I still need some basic
piano sounds, as well as strings, woodwinds, etc.<<

I'll dig some stuff out. I think I have some spare discs. I used to
keep two/multiple copies of important stuff too.

>>I better start reading the manual, and learning how to dump samples
to this keyboard.  Any further suggestions?<<

no wavs, no, it's 12-bit this machine. but as I say, there was a way
to use the midi sample dump to get things in & out of it. this is fine
if you're a fan of watching paint dry.... I tried it a few times (with
sound forge) & besides the fact it took ages, the prophet was actually
better at looping than sound forge. so I gave up.

the manual is great once you "get it", where "it" is the underlying
architecture of the machine. took me a few reads to grasp it, but then
I was away.... "oh, so it's in two halves? & they are mirror-images of
each other? each with 4 voices.... half the memory...." which is about
the time I started making my 2-channel bitimbral discs & treating it
almost like two mono samplers (i.e. left & right outputs on fixed
assignment & appearing as two mono instruments on my mixer).

you might find that reverse-engineering an existing disc is the best
way to start, but the factory discs aren't quite as tightly packed as
the ones I made. I'm blowing that trumpet again.... :-)

ok. I've asked for it. I will deconstruct one of my more elaborate
discs & write a story about it for the files section.

d.

Excellent! That would be great. I'd be very keen to read 
such a story.

Cheers,

John :^P

duncan wrote:
> 
> ok. I've asked for it. I will deconstruct one of my more elaborate
> discs & write a story about it for the files section.
> 

-- 
John Pallister
john@...

Excellent response, and I can't thank you enough.

 

I'll write more later, but I think I better get cracking at that manual.

 

Thanks again,

 

Tom Hanser

Seattle, WA

 

 

 

  _____  

From: prophet2000@yahoogroups.com [mailto:prophet2000@yahoogroups.com] On
Behalf Of duncan
Sent: Wednesday, July 25, 2007 4:14 AM
To: prophet2000@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [prophet2000] Re: Purchasing Sample Disks

 

>>It's hard getting used to using headphones - some notes are placed
LEFT, some are placed RIGHT.<<

that's the dynamic voice allocation. you can switch it off, & then
what happens is that the left keyboard map uses the left channel
voices & the right keyboard map uses.... but I'm a bit rusty here.

probably need to spend a few hours on my 2002 & get up to speed again.
I used to be (excuse me blowing my own trumpet here) sh*t hot at
programming the thing, but it's been a while. I used to gig with the
2002 & the 2000 keyboard, even. I made super-discs with half-a-dozen
different instruments crammed into the memory.... the crossfade
looping meant I could take the tiniest scrap of timbre & turn it into
a reasonable facsimile of a real instrument. I spent hours at it...

for each keyboard map in each preset, there are global & per-sample
adjustments for all the "synth" parameters. this means that you can
create interactions between (say) the global keyboard filter tracking
& the same setting for each sample. things like this enable you to
extend the useful range of each sample beyond what seems possible,
i.e. where it would normally be sounding a bit rough due to aliasing
artefacts.
I also used to alter the pitch of what I was sampling (using a
varispeed 1/4" deck) so that I could use a smaller sample & pitch it
down in the prophet. effectively, this is the same as sampling at a
lower frequency than the prophet allows; useful technique where one
would normally have wasted some bits, especially if the sound has
little or no high frequency content. it also changes the range over
which the sample will play. I need to refresh my knowledge of this,
but I think at the lower rate you got about an octave & a bit above
the root, & maybe an octave below it, for each sample. sampling the
sound at the wrong pitch changes it's natural location within this
spread, which can be useful.

>>incredibly slow speed reading a floppy. How did we ever put up with
this :-)<<

40 seconds, for some reason, springs to mind as being the time for a
full load. I guess I should know this... it's another way to tell how
much ram there is in the sampler. I always use to verify after a save
aswell, so I drank a lot of tea back then..... :-)

>>I'd be interested in trading disks, sure. I still need some basic
piano sounds, as well as strings, woodwinds, etc.<<

I'll dig some stuff out. I think I have some spare discs. I used to
keep two/multiple copies of important stuff too.

>>I better start reading the manual, and learning how to dump samples
to this keyboard. Any further suggestions?<<

no wavs, no, it's 12-bit this machine. but as I say, there was a way
to use the midi sample dump to get things in & out of it. this is fine
if you're a fan of watching paint dry.... I tried it a few times (with
sound forge) & besides the fact it took ages, the prophet was actually
better at looping than sound forge. so I gave up.

the manual is great once you "get it", where "it" is the underlying
architecture of the machine. took me a few reads to grasp it, but then
I was away.... "oh, so it's in two halves? & they are mirror-images of
each other? each with 4 voices.... half the memory...." which is about
the time I started making my 2-channel bitimbral discs & treating it
almost like two mono samplers (i.e. left & right outputs on fixed
assignment & appearing as two mono instruments on my mixer).

you might find that reverse-engineering an existing disc is the best
way to start, but the factory discs aren't quite as tightly packed as
the ones I made. I'm blowing that trumpet again.... :-)

ok. I've asked for it. I will deconstruct one of my more elaborate
discs & write a story about it for the files section.

d.

new users of the prophet 2000/2002 should probably read the whole
manual eventually, but most of the important stuff is covered in
section 13, which is in the files section here as an independent entity.
luckily for me, it's also been done as text rather than a scan or a
pdf. this means I am able to annotate a copy of it with some of my own
notes, in an attempt to clarify some of the operations & pass on one
or two "super-user tips" :-)

so that's what I'm going to do. I've re-read this quickie guide myself
just now, & it's all come flooding back. I have spent many hours on
these machines- especially the 2002- & so hopefully I can offer up
something useful. I'll upload something shortly- watch this space!

duncan.

>>I'll upload something shortly- watch this space!<<

ok, so I spent a few hours trying to put myself in the shoes of
someone who's just managed to get themselves a prophet 2k sampler &
doesn't have the first idea how it works.... the chapter 13 document
in our files section here is really a quickie recap of the original
huge manual (which is also here, but for heaven's sake, life is short!)
so.
I have annotated a version of chapter 13 & stuck in a few tips & stuff
of my own. I hope it's useful.

duncan.

OK, sorry for the delay in posting.

I'm having some fun with my Prophet 2000, but I've yet to crack the
case open (again)to see what version OS I'm running, or see what chips
are installed.

The loops are annoying, no doubt about it.  I'm not sure I'm
interested in updating the chips and/or OS.  So, I'm wondering if
anyone can help me with these disks - can the sounds be "fixed",
copied to a new floppy, or the same floppy, and sent to me?  Or is it
an OS update that will resolve this problem?

What's involved, exactly, in fixing these sample files?  

My apologies if I've overlooked the obvious - maybe this is spelled
out somewhere in the database.

In other news:  what's a reasonably priced outboard unit that would
load samples (from other sources,like .wav files), that could be
cabled to this keyboard?  I mean, why rely on floppies all the time?

Thanks so much.



  --- In prophet2000@yahoogroups.com, "duncan" <ferrograph@...> wrote:

>
> >>I mentioned in another post that I received five disks from Wine
> Country yesterday - the sounds are great, but I'm noticing the sound
> "loops."  I can hear an annoying thump in pretty much every sample.<<
> 
> is it possible that the production of the discs predates their
> development of the crossfade looping software? I'd suggest, since you
> can't do the discs any harm by doing this, that you load up the
> samples & then have a look at the loop points yourself, see if you can
> improve them. does your machine have the later software in it?
> 
> I got my 2002 in 1990 & struggled with v3 software for three weeks,
> before tim (at argent's in denmark street) told me he'd got the
> expansion kit & a copy of v4. well, I fitted the extra outputs but
> hardly ever use them... the v4 software (required to drive them) also
> had the crossfade loop thing, & the difference was amazing. I still
> use the thing now, despite having e6400 ultras & the like, because
> it's so easy to use & the sound is wonderful.
> 
> duncan.
>

>>The loops are annoying, no doubt about it.  I'm not sure I'm
interested in updating the chips and/or OS.  So, I'm wondering if
anyone can help me with these disks - can the sounds be "fixed",
copied to a new floppy, or the same floppy, and sent to me?  Or is it
an OS update that will resolve this problem?<<

hmm.... y'know, it's a long time since I had a chance to try this, but
I'm pretty sure that when my p2000 keyboard was working, I either
moved the v4 rom into it or continued to prepare sounds on the 2002
rack machine. either way, I think that samples looped using v4 (i.e.
with crossfades) played out of the v3 machine with the crossfades
intact. that is, the crossfade is a permanent modification to the audio.
if you really can't fix these sounds by re-adjusting the loops- & I'm
going to assume you've read all the documentation on the subject- then
there may be a problem with your machine finding zero-crossing points,
or it may be that we're all that bit more fussy about loops twenty
years on.... :-)

anyway. which factory sounds are you having trouble with? I may have
copies of the same ones here. where are you based? 

it's a shame there's no way to exchange these files electronically. I
don't know what the disc format is- possibly old mac or o/s-2 or
something- but in any case the audio data is 12-bit. I did manage to
make the 2002 work over midi with soundforge, but it was generally
faster to use the 2002 on it's own.

I think of the prophet as an instrument, & my emus & so forth as mere
recording devices. my emu 6400 has an internal hard drive & many
thousands of samples, which I can burn onto flash rom for my various
proteus boxes. somehow, though, I'm happier with the 2002 & a box of
floppies- it just sounds nicer.

duncan.