Xpantastic!

> Hi Karl,

Yeah, I was kind of blown away myself that Doidic answered, since he 
is the president of Line 6! It was a "long shot", but I thought what 
the heck. I think he is very proud of this legendary beast :) (Who 
wouldn´t be?)

And you´re very welcome btw!

Hmmm, yes, I´m thinking about doing a recap myself, since our 
moderator Tiitu did just that not long ago, which reminds me of a 
cool mod he mentioned that supposedly would make this beasts sound 
even better.

But I´m gonna wait a week or so before posting that you can soak the 
envelope mod up first. And I´ll probably wear a raincoat or 
something, just in case rotten tomatoes and eggs come flying :)

Cheerio


> Hi,
> 
> Wow, I am impressed that Michel Doidic even reponded to this after 
25 
> years. He obviously pulled out the schematics and gave it some 
> thought. Very kind of him. And thanks to analogholic for having the 
> guts to try. I am planning to overhaul (re-battary and recap) my M12
> soon. I might try this mod on one of my voices. I will report back 
If 
> I do.
> 
> Karl 
> 
> --- In xpantastic@yahoogroups.com, "analogholic" <publik@> wrote:
> >
> > Hi everyone,
> > 
> > When I read the "percussive like patches"-thread, I was reminded 
> that 
> > I while ago (when the Matrix 12 was my only analog synth) that I 
> (as 
> > many others) was a bit frustrated with the M12´s slow enevelopes.
> > 
> > SoI wrote an email to one of the creators of this beast(Michel 
> Doidic)
> > and asked what could be done. Here is our conversation:
> > 
> > "Mr Ryle, Mr Doidic, first off I want to thank you for being part 
> of 
> > designing (among other things) the fantastic Oberheim Matrix 12.
> >  I have the incredible luck to have found one (Matrix 12) for 
sale 
> in 
> > Sweden. Although this is very "off topic", I would be incredibly 
> > grateful and happy if you guys could try (who else could?) answer 
> the 
> > following question: Do you think it would be possible in some way 
> to 
> > modify the envelopes of the Matrix 12 to be faster ?
> >  I know they are software envelopes, but today there are a lot of 
> > softEnvs that are snappy, also on at least two analog synths 
which 
> > have softwareEnvs (one is Studio Electronics Se-1/x) where if you 
> > changed a resistor on the motherboard, the software envelopes 
> became 
> > dramatically faster and snappier, almost at Minimoog speed. 
> > Could it be enough to change resistors in the right place, or 
would 
> > it be necesarry to recode/reprogram the whole software for the 
> Matrix 
> > 12? I know this a hard question, but a solution,if possible, 
would 
> > mean that a fantastic synth would become the greatest of them all 
> > IMHO.
> >  I thank you once again and send you my best
> >  regards Attila" 
> > 
> > His answer:
> > 
> > "Hi Attila, To do the job right would be very difficult because, 
as 
> > you noticed, the envelopes are generated by the code of the 6809 
> > microprocessor. Short of using a faster 6809 (assuming that you 
> could 
> > get one) and modifying the code there is not much which can be 
done.
> >  The Matrix 6 and 12 were designed about 25 years ago, and 
> > microprocessors where a lot slower back then. There is still a 
bit 
> of 
> > hope however. The fastest time for the envelopes is about 2 
> > milliseconds.
> >  This could be reduce to 1 ms by changing RX51 for the VCA (where 
X 
> > will be 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7 according to which of the six voice it 
> > controls on each of the two voice boards) from 18K to 9.1K.
> >  The next fastest time is set by the microprocessor and an analog 
> > smoothing filter on the voltage control circuit (= Sample and 
> Hold). 
> > This time is set not only by the software but also by a resistor 
> RX14 
> > on each of the main voice PCB for the VCA control and by RX10 for 
> the 
> > VCF frequency control.
> >  You may want to try reducing these resistors from their original 
1 
> M 
> > Ohm value to let say 500K Ohm. This will reduce that time from 
> about 
> > 7 ms to about 3.5 ms. The draw back however is that you may get 
> more 
> > discontinuity in the shape of the modulation.
> >  The next fastest times however will still be determined by the 
> 6809 
> > software and that will not change. Give it a try on one of the 
> voice 
> > and see if that goes toward what you want. 
> > Hope that this helps a bit. Michel Doidic Line 6 CTO"
> > 
> > OK guys, what do you think?
> > 
> > I changed a resistor in my SE-1, and it become snappier (not 
> > fantastic, but better)
> > Also, the Chroma has a reputaion of very slow envelopes, but same 
> > thing there, if you remove a resistor or change it to a lower 
> value, 
> > envelopes supposedly become faster.
> > 
> > I would even go so far to check out the possibilities of putting 
in 
> a 
> > faster processor and find someone to recode the software. 
> > 
> > Brainstorming please begin :)
> >
>