… I still have the same problems with it I did 2 years ago…
I was just thinking I’ll write to ask if anything’s likely to change in the near future, but then I realise I’m probably starting to sound like a broken record…
I’ve been using Ableton Live for the last year or so - Great piece of software, just too fiddly for more detailed programming - Plus, that interface is like staring at a brick wall sometimes…
So I load Renoise 1.5 up for the first time in a while, try to sequence a simple arpeggio (for my Virus) that’d taken me about 5 minutes to get right in Ableton…
Sure enough, I’d got it down in Renoise in a matter of seconds, no problem, but then I play it back and it sounds… WRONG…
The timing’s just all over the place - I’m forced to use Directsound at the moment, as Renoise won’t work with my emi 2/6 - No big deal, I can always transport everything into Logic/Ableton when I’m done and mix down properly… So I thought…
So what am I to do? I paid registration, download the latest updates, report bugs, but here I am, 2 years on, and still can’t use it properly in the studio - Sure, it’s fine if I want to make MOD’s or whatever, but I bought it on the assumption that it could be used as a functional studio tool…
MIDI is far tighter with ASIO on (don’t know why though). It’s still not perfect though: program a hihat on every line on an external module, still I think it’s good enough for arps.
It’s definetly much worse with Directsound - I remember when I used to use it with ASIO on my old M-Audio card, I’d get stuttering every few events, but it was subtle, and certainly not too noticable on instrument parts…
But in Directsound, triggering a sequence of 16th’s just gives me completely random occassions of sound, with gaps, jumps and skips all over the place…
It’s a great shame because Renoise is the most inspirational interface I’ve ever found for writing primarily electronic music - The audio quality is also excellent and the sample manipulation features are far more flexible and much better sounding than you get in Ableton Live.
Too true, they certainly had no problems getting rock solid MIDI timing on the old 16mhz Atari ST’s! Where are Atari now when you really need them? Then again, it’s certainly more than adequate in Logic and Cubase.
Trackers aren’t too good at triggering monosynths, or monophonic patches…
I was sequencing 16th’s on an arpeggio sound, with some mono setting on it - Similarly, in the past I’ve often used MIDI’ed monosynths and Akai drum samples, also monophonic, or single-triggered…
I assume when two note on events are right next to each other in Renoise, there must be a very fast note off inbetween them… Too fast for most monosynths to deal with and successfully retrigger in time - So that explains why things were so off for me!
All those skipped notes…
I’ve been experimenting with Skale tracker in the meantime - The external MIDI timing seems very tight so far - And the interface is beatiful, even got those plug-in visualizations I’d so often asked for in Renoise! And some great keyboard shortcuts! Renoise 1.28-era… (why doesn’t Toggle Play-Edit-Stop work for me any more??? Now it’s just toggle Play-Stop - That’s slowing me down already…) - Might be one to watch out for in the future… For now Renoise still has the more intuitive interface - Skale can feel a little fiddly - Relocate some of the close windows buttons and they’ll be on to something!
Ignored? No. Its just that this topic came not up very often in the past, so it seems there are not many Renoise users using MIDI hardware at all, or they use ASIO cards with small latencies which gives better timing in general.
There is so much too improve, so much too add. We have to choose what to do first.
MIDI timing on Windows is a really ugly and time consuming topic. Windows was never made for fast and reliable multimedia timing, so its not just about fixing a bug or something like this. Getting rock solid MIDI timing with every hardware will require a lot of effort.
The only thing I can promise is that we will concentrate on this in the near future, if this is important for many Renoisers.
I thought external keyboards were “extra’s” in a tracker environment. Trackers were meant more for people who played it in note by note via “The KWERT”
I also use Renoise and got two external modules (VirusB & Proteus2k).
Can’t say that I’ve had that much problems with the timing (using a M-audio card and ASIO).
Everything can be improved as always, as with many other trackers MIDI doesn’t get much focus.
Understandable with the SW-synths sounding better and better but still, some HW gear just sound too good to pass on.
So far though I think that Renoise has one of the best MIDI implementations among the trackers.
Keep up the good work but don’t forget us MIDI users
Well, just do a search and see how many users use keyboards, synths, controller and so on. I guess there are many users who use Midi. If you want to claim Renoise as professional you have to support midi as discussed in known posted topics here. But it seems that you see the importance, it is good that you working on it.
When using midi I could report as well, that when playing the whole song, some notes aren’t played correctly. When working patternwise (repeating patterns to check the sound) every 3rd-4th trigger of the pattern will end up in heavy midi-garbage, that means some notes are not played or wrong played. Then only the panic-button helps to have the correct sound again (so you have to click panic every 5 pattern-starts…)
the timing is fine with my Unitor8s. even midi to CV stuff is fine. what is a problem is syncing shit like effects that rely on bpm and arpeggios on more modern synths (have that exact same problem with the Virus J Swift). think it’s maybe more to do with the tick timing than the midi timing.
Oh hey Aaron! Didn’t realise you’d made the move over from MED!
Yeah, I was having massive problems with arpeggios off the Virus - Certainly, I’ve found things improve a lot by making sure every patch is poly… I think it must be something to do with ticks and timing being out of sync and not giving each note enough time to recover, or something!?!
I guess guys with Midi toys aren’t talking as much as they should be. I use externel midi controllers as an alternative to the keyboard tracking interface. I’d like to use them more often, but Renoise lacks note recording precision from Midi interfaces. Upping the speed of the track improves the precision, but it’s sucks having to track the rest of the song at Speed 1, especially since I’m only playing slow enough to trigger between 1-3 notes over a tick. Recording per tick delays for note Trigger’s/Off’s (stored as an effect or such) would be awesome.
Just for reference, I have a pair of Midi devices I’m using. The first is just a standard USB piano like interface (with aftertouch and knobs), an EMU X-Board. The 2nd is more cool, a drum pad USB interface (with knobs and a few faders), the M-Audio Trigger Finger. Both devices record note volumes nicely, and work as excellent automation or effect controllers. Just it’d be nice to use them to record a more precise playing or drumming.
Wishlist: It’d be nice if you could hook up some midi commands to the interface. Like twist a knob, send a command, or trigger a note to restart the current pattern, clear the pattern (a bad take), etc…
There is hope out there - you might want to read this thread as well:
, i agree
