JJ OS V2 - Feature Requests

I figure i just put it here since the other thread seems to be for the jj os 1.

i would love to have:

1. the ability to stream samples from harddrive and/or cards. (yes, it is possible and a very elegant way to overcome the limitation of 128 mb ram. example: (although the rest is not so funky about this machine): the roland sp 555

2. a sort of split screen of the main screen and the track mutes. why? i play live quite often and mute and unmute tracks, but would love to be able to add some drums via note repeat at the same time, which is not possible at the moment, i always have to change to track mute in between. it would be very nice if i could have samples to trigger on the right side (8 should be enough) and tracks to mute on the left side. that would definitely bring the mpc to another level as a live machine.

3. the ability to incorporate your own quantizations via midi. this way we would not be limited to the quantization of the mpc but could also use the groove/shuffle from other nice machines (tr 909 and so on)

1 isn't possible.
2 interesting idea, but probably might make the main screen a little less efficient, or you'd have to remove some of the stuff already on there to make room.
3. this is interesting, but you can ultimately do this yourself with quantisation off and some time nudging notes back and forth.

1 - why? the sp 555 can do it, because it can read from a card, just as the mpc can read from a harddrive and cards. if you you press play when you want to prelisten a sample on the mpc, its possible to listen to files that are a lot larger than 128 mb (okay, you have to keep the finger on play for a long time, but its just a prove of concept). so i think its possible.

2. very interesting indeed. codewise maybe hard, but gui-wise, not a problem. should be optional, thats for sure. and in the best case, should be possible to determine how many mute tracks and sample tracks you want.

3. i know a workaround when i see it but the thing is, i meant it as something you would want to use live, therefore nudging stuff back and forth is not what i am after in this case.

1. the data bus to which the hard drive/cf card are connected to isn't capable of streaming more than one sound at a time (why else do you think the sequence stops when you go to the load screen?

are you sure about this? i think that any data bus that is not older than 5 years can handle at least 4 streams of 16-bit audio, and the sequence stopping could be just a codingproblem.

bump

doppelhorst wrote:are you sure about this? i think that any data bus that is not older than 5 years can handle at least 4 streams of 16-bit audio, and the sequence stopping could be just a codingproblem.

no, i seem to remember jj said something about this. i've had a look on his website, but he seems to have removed some of the FAQ section where it was.

I'm interested to know why you think it matters what the sp555 can do. Is it based on the same Renesas SH7727 processing platform as the MPC1000?

Also, when you say

doppelhorst wrote:are you sure about this? i think that any data bus that is not older than 5 years can handle at least 4 streams of 16-bit audio, and the sequence stopping could be just a codingproblem.

does "any data bus" include PDA class stuff? That's usually a few years further behind "standard" computers -- and the SH7727 is already how many years old? USB 2.0 was already the computer standard when the 1000 came out but the PDA platform won't do anything past USB 1.1.

JJ's explanation of the drive streaming issue in the past had to do with insufficient system resources to run both the drive access and the rest of the MPC at the same time. This is not a multitasking environment

But hey, don't take anybody's word for it check the platform docs and report back here to let us know what you've found out, we are interested:

http://www.renesas.com/fmwk.jsp?cnt=sh7 ... 727_group/.

doppelhorst wrote:I3. the ability to incorporate your own quantizations via midi. this way we would not be limited to the quantization of the mpc but could also use the groove/shuffle from other nice machines (tr 909 and so on)

I've been doing this since the machine came out. I turn off the MPC quantization and record the externally quantized sequence from midi for direct or edited playback. I can't say if the playback is accurate down to the mega-microsecond or anything but I can't imagine any other way you could use the MPC to reproduce another machine's quantization via midi. Can you?

BETTER FILE MANAGEMENT

USB1.1 sucks. When I have to copy large numbers of files to the HD on my mpc (like right now) it takes hella long.

It'd be cool to be able to copy files to a flash card, put it in, then use the mpc to copy those files to the HD. Why can't we do this already?

Also, copying back and forth would be the shit. Copy programs from the HD to the CF card, so you can back them up, or transfer samples to your computer.

Come on JJ!

cynic wrote:BETTER FILE MANAGEMENT

USB1.1 sucks. When I have to copy large numbers of files to the HD on my mpc (like right now) it takes hella long.

It'd be cool to be able to copy files to a flash card, put it in, then use the mpc to copy those files to the HD. Why can't we do this already?

Also, copying back and forth would be the ****. Copy programs from the HD to the CF card, so you can back them up, or transfer samples to your computer.

Come on JJ!

because you can't access both at once, they are on the same data bus, why else do you think we have to switch between the two in the load/save screens? you could have a workaround where the data gets loaded to the tramfirst, but that would give you a 128MB limit.

elektrik_muz wrote:I'm interested to know why you think it matters what the sp555 can do. Is it based on the same Renesas SH7727 processing platform as the MPC1000?

Also, when you say

doppelhorst wrote:are you sure about this? i think that any data bus that is not older than 5 years can handle at least 4 streams of 16-bit audio, and the sequence stopping could be just a codingproblem.

hey elektrik,
i just think it is comparable pricewise (that is, a lot cheaper) that is my main reason for comparing it, and i really like the streaming feature and i really feel limited by 128 mb ram. i am not a coder, so i can not really judge the specs when it comes to the streaming thing (although i did, sorry), but since (according to the specs) this chip is a USB host (and therefor should also be able to act like one, eg it should be possible to connect an external harddrive and read from it) i still think there could be a way to accomplish it....

elektrik_muz wrote:I've been doing this since the machine came out. I turn off the MPC quantization and record the externally quantized sequence from midi for direct or edited playback. I can't say if the playback is accurate down to the mega-microsecond or anything but I can't imagine any other way you could use the MPC to reproduce another machine's quantization via midi. Can you?

i am not after something that is "accurate down to the mega-microsecond", to me it would be something i would like to be able to use live, that is, using it with the note repeat feature. it is no problem to use it now (i know), but having it right on the knobs, being able to load in different quantizations via midi, would really make my day.

the sp555 came out this year - the underlying mpc 1000 processor design, as already stated, is over 5 years old

doppelhorst wrote:hey elektrik,
i just think it is comparable pricewise (that is, a lot cheaper) that is my main reason for comparing it, and i really like the streaming feature and i really feel limited by 128 mb ram. i am not a coder, so i can not really judge the specs when it comes to the streaming thing (although i did, sorry), but since (according to the specs) this chip is a USB host (and therefor should also be able to act like one, eg it should be possible to connect an external harddrive and read from it) i still think there could be a way to accomplish it....

So, as earwolf pointed out, you want this year's hardware functions added to the functions of a 5+ year old product. I have a solution for you:

Buy an SP 555 and connect via midi!

As to the USB, you know, you could be right. It might be possible, with the right code, to use it a a host (w/a USB turn-around cable, of course). The question is, how much processing power would be left over for it to do anything else while the drive is being hosted?