EMUSIC-L Digest Volume 40, Issue 07 This issue's topics: waldorf wavedump (4 messages) Your EMUSIC-L Digest moderator is Joe McMahon . You may subscribe to EMUSIC-L by sending mail to listserv@american.edu with the line "SUB EMUSIC-L your name" as the text. The EMUSIC-L archive is a service of SunSite (sunsite.unc.edu) at the University of North Carolina. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: Thu, 28 May 1992 13:21:39 EDT From: ronin Subject: waldorf wavedump ok, ok, i'm convinced... i just finished a fairly extensive audition of the microwave, and am completely sold. i'm starting to save for one now, and should have one by the end of the year. a quaetion, though... presumably for nick. the manual said something about being able to load one's own wavetables into a ram area. i gather that this occurs via midi sysex. is this in fact implemented? how many words in a wavetable? how many bits per word? i get the impression that the wavetable is a serial collection of single-cycle waveforms. a version of one of the above questions is: how many words per cycle? am i dreaming, or does this mean i can load just about anything into it and do tricks? also, some noises have been made here about memory/voice expansions for the thing, which i have paid only marginal attention to. would you mind filling me in? the eight-voice limit becomes quickly (mildly) disappointing, as i discover that those outrageous, complex timbres are essentially monophonic. but overall... nice. nice. know anything about the design history of those filters? like what older manufacture (if any) they are based on? -----------< Cognitive Dissonance is a 20th Century Art Form >----------- Eric Harnden (Ronin) or The American University Physics Dept. 4400 Mass. Ave. NW, Washington, DC, 20016-8058 (202) 885-2748 ---------------------< Join the Cognitive Dissidents >------------------- ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 28 May 1992 15:41:18 EDT From: metlay Subject: Re: waldorf wavedump The latest version of the PD utility glib has a microwave editor that allows wavetable edits, or so I'm told. As for extra polyphony, I don't think that's really a big issue; eight voices of Microwave is an awful lot of power. I usually use mine mono! -- Mike Metlay metlay@minerva.phyast.pitt.edu Atomic City, P.O. Box 81175, Pittsburgh, PA 15217-0675 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 28 May 1992 20:01:00 GMT From: "Bromley, Jay W." Subject: Re: waldorf wavedump In article , HARNDEN@AMERICAN.EDU (ronin) writes... >ok, ok, i'm convinced... >i just finished a fairly extensive audition of the microwave, and >am completely sold. i'm starting to save for one now, and should >have one by the end of the year. Pretty nice, eh? Good luck with the saving. >a quaetion, though... presumably for nick. the manual said something about >being able to load one's own wavetables into a ram area. >i gather that this occurs via midi sysex. is this in fact implemented? >how many words in a wavetable? how many bits per word? i get the impression >that the wavetable is a serial collection of single-cycle waveforms. a >version of one of the above questions is: how many words per cycle? >am i dreaming, or does this mean i can load just about anything into >it and do tricks? This is in fact possible (in fact, just recently I asked the same question and so know a little about it now.) It is done via MIDI SysEx, but since I don't have the SysEx spec I don't know the codes involved yet. If I recall correctly, each wavetable has 60 waves plus pulse, saw and triangle waves. The sample size is 8 bits. but since the Microwave simply inverts the data to get the second half of a cycle you get 9 bit resolution. Each wave is made up of 128 samples. Yep, sounds like you could do a lot of interesting stuff with these user wavetables. In terms of actually using them, for the PC you'd need something like Xor, GLIB, or Midiex, or the SysEx spec so you can write your own editor. For the Mac I'm not too sure, but Xor exists for the Mac, and I believe Nick mentioned using MAX to do the trick. >also, some noises have been made here about memory/voice expansions for >the thing, which i have paid only marginal attention to. would you mind >filling me in? the eight-voice limit becomes quickly (mildly) disappointing, >as i discover that those outrageous, complex timbres are essentially >monophonic. For memory expansion you can get RAM cards. The Microwave uses the same cards as the Korg M1, so you can use these to give yourself room for another 64 sounds and another 64 multis. For more voices you can either get another Microwave and use the Overflow mode or get the Waveslave. The Waveslave adds 8 more voices for something around $850 (US). Makes it almost worthwhile to just get another Microwave (at $950). >but overall... nice. nice. know anything about the design history of those >filters? like what older manufacture (if any) they are based on? Not too sure here, but the Microwave is closely related to Wolfgang Palm's PPG 2.3. Well, regards. jay bromley | "We're making a meal out of stainless steel" jaywb@juliet.caltech.edu | ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 29 May 1992 13:58:35 +0000 From: Nick Rothwell Subject: Re: waldorf wavedump >a quaetion, though... presumably for nick. the manual said something about >being able to load one's own wavetables into a ram area. >i gather that this occurs via midi sysex. Yes. >is this in fact implemented? I've loaded stuff, and I think Adam has an editor of sorts. >how many words in a wavetable? 60 or 61 or something, plus sin/saw/square at the top. >how many bits per word? 8. >i get the impression >that the wavetable is a serial collection of single-cycle waveforms. No, it's a collection of wave numbers drawn from a global pool of waves (some in ROM, some in RAM and loadable). Or, parts of the wave table can be left empty for smooth interpolation. >a >version of one of the above questions is: how many words per cycle? 64 I think, but I believe each cycle plays the wave data twice with an inversion in the middle. >the eight-voice limit becomes quickly (mildly) disappointing, >as i discover that those outrageous, complex timbres are essentially >monophonic. Hmm? I find 8 voices plenty given the richness of the sound. Nick. ------------------------------ End of the EMUSIC-L Digest ******************************