Using Dr.T in the Modern Era for a CM-32L

[Sbeehive]

Hey guys,

Finally got around to learning some basic midi/music skills and I've been having a blast using Dr.T's Mt-32 editor with my CM-32L.

I actually managed to get it to play my patches through Roland Zenbeats.

One issue I've been having with Dr. T itself is that sometimes a 4 partial timbre will randomly drop partials for no apparent reason. I'm wondering if it is because the CM-32L has a 2 partial limit on channel 2 by default (forgive me if that's incorrect). It seems better if I reboot everything but that is getting to be a pain.

Anyone have any tips and tricks for such a setup?


Thanks

[Spikey]

Hey there,

Welcome to the forums! If you're interested, there's a group on Facebook called 'Sierra Music and Memories' which you're welcome to join, and a related Discord.

I'm wondering if it is because the CM-32L has a 2 partial limit on channel 2 by default (forgive me if that's incorrect).

Did you hear/read this somewhere, or are you just wondering this because of the problem?
Obvious test, put the patch on a different channel.

Are you exceeding the overall partial/polyphony limit when this is happening? Simultaneous notes really eat it up per channel, too.

Not sure why rebooting would help? Exceeding partials is temporary, when the file stops playing (or you stop it), it should immediately go back to normal.
What is 'solved' by rebooting?

If you can upload the file, that'd probably be useful too.

Regards,
- Alistair

[Sbeehive]

Hey Spikey,

Thanks for responding!

It's odd in that it sounds like the partials are getting swallowed up. I have no other way of describing it. I definitely need to troubleshoot what is going on a bit more. Dr. T defaults you to channel 2 (as far as I'm aware) which is where the manual specifies that limit. Changing channels doesn't seem to change as much as I would like. I was wondering if it was a quirk of the synth itself.

Would love an invite to that discord.

I'll have to upload a file of what is going on this week. Sorry for the late response!

[Spikey]

It's odd in that it sounds like the partials are getting swallowed up. I have no other way of describing it. I definitely need to troubleshoot what is going on a bit more. Dr. T defaults you to channel 2 (as far as I'm aware) which is where the manual specifies that limit. Changing channels doesn't seem to change as much as I would like. I was wondering if it was a quirk of the synth itself.

OK. So are you only playing a single channel in this scenario? Need more info about what you're actually doing. File will help too.

Discord can be found in this forum under topic title "Sierra music Discord". Look forward to seeing you there.

[jaffa225man]

Hey Spikey,

Thanks for responding!

It's odd in that it sounds like the partials are getting swallowed up. I have no other way of describing it. I definitely need to troubleshoot what is going on a bit more. Dr. T defaults you to channel 2 (as far as I'm aware) which is where the manual specifies that limit. Changing channels doesn't seem to change as much as I would like. I was wondering if it was a quirk of the synth itself.

Would love an invite to that discord.

I'll have to upload a file of what is going on this week. Sorry for the late response!

If you click on Dr. T's "SYSTEM" button in each instrument you've programmed, you'll find its partial reserve for each part, and can modify them there. As an alternative, I've created two standard MIDI format files containing the SysEx to set "part 1" and/or "part 2" to their maximum of 32 partials (part 1 is on channel 2 by default, so the "part 1" file is probably all that's needed - for even channel 1-8 mode). It seems to me, though, that if only one channel is playing any notes, the partial reserve shouldn't be a factor, as it still should reserve all 32 partials to that one and only channel that's playing. I could be wrong, though.

Another possibility could be that your programmed sounds don't decay quickly enough and so they keep layering and eating up partials. Waiting until you hear nothing before playing more, may help you diagnose that.

The SysEx to set Part 1 to 32 partials is:
F0 41 10 16 12 10 00 04 20 4C F7

And Part 2 to 32 partials is:
F0 41 10 16 12 10 00 05 20 4B F7

Here's my SMFs of those:

mt-32-partial-reserve-all-to-part1-or-2.7z

(305 Bytes) Downloaded 2103 times

I hope that helps,

Lucas