SetBFree rotary sometimes does not respond to controller

I’ve noticed that sometimes when loading a sub-snapshot, the setBFree rotary control does not respond to the midi controller assigned to that control. If I select the chain, it then responds, but this could be problematic in the middle of a gig when I have to switch between songs quickly.

I recently rebuilt my main gig snapshot by exporting chains out of my old master and merging them into a new snapshot, which seems to have resolved some of the issues with chains not loading correctly in response to sub snapshot loads. I’m just wondering if I perhaps need to start completely over from scratch, or even start with a new clean build of Oram.

Any thoughts on how to make the sub-snapshots load more reliably? Do you recommend starting over from time to time if you’ve been making a lot of edits to the chains in a snapshot?

Thanks in advance!
TK

There are 2 types of MIDI learn:

  • Chain MIDI learn: One click. The MIDI learn legend in the control widget turns Green. Chain learned controls are bond to active chain. In this way, you can learn the same knob to several parameters from different chains and the knob will control only the active chain.

  • Global MIDI learn: Click twice. The MIDI learn legend in the control widget turns yellow. Global learned controls are bond no matter the active chain.

This is explained in the User Guide:

https://wiki.zynthian.org/index.php/Zynthian_UI_User's_Guide_-_Oram#Chain_control

Perhaps it could be explained with greater detail :wink:

Regards

3 Likes

Thanks @jofemodo. I will try reassigning the controller using the Global MIDI learn method, as I imagine it might have to do with whether or not the setBFree chain is the active chain.

Hi,
I’m new to zynthian (5.1) just of yesterday. And by the way thanks to all the team for a smooth start with it due to good building / starting instructions!

And I ran into the same issue with contolling the (wonderful) setBfree rotary.
I don’t know @tkc whether you found a workaround in the meantime but here is what I did for now:
I realized that “unlearning all controllers” did the job, and restored the original internal routings in setBfree, (i.e. sustain FT (CC64) switch to toggle rotor speed, modwheel to change between the two rotor speeds). But alas it didn’t keep all routings “unlearned” upon saving the snapshot or Z3. I had to do the unlearn operation after every boot.

What works better now for me was
Uncheck the FTSwitch (CC64) in the corresponding “chain filter pass through to chain processors” (chain options)).
It would be great though to have a better solution.
There seems to be some conflict. Maybe of help, I found (in my snapshot-latest json file) that CC64 seems to address rotary switch AND speed, maybe this is related.
I’m still new to this so forgive my if this is BS :smiley:

Best
Frank

2 Likes

Hi @emuse !

Welcome to zynthianland! And congrats but your successful build. I hope you enjoy your v5!

Regarding your question:

I think I’m not understanding your issue. Please, could you elaborate a little bit more so i can reproduce? It would be nice if you could explain in terms of:

  • EXACT steps to reproduce the issue from scratch (after “Remove All”)
  • Observed behaviour
  • Expected behaviour

Don’t mix issues. One issue = One report

Also, could you test with the vangelis branch? I’ve fixed some MIDI learning issues recently and this fixed are available in the testing branch only (vangelis).

All the best,

Hi @jofemodo , thank you for the nice welcome. Yes all in all I’m having good fun with my zynthian!
This is a rather minor issue anyway.

I’m listing steps to reproduce. Unfortunately the two apparent issues here are related, so it appears difficult to separate them. I can open a second one if the “unlearn not saved” issue turns out to be more general. Here is a more systematic report:

Introduction:

The native behavior of setBFree (standalone and LV2) is:

  • Modwheel <=33%: Rotary slow, Modhweel > 33% rotary off, Modwheel > 66%: rotary fast
    AND
  • sustain Foot Switch (CC64) toggles rotary speed from slow to fast (and back to slow on a subsequent press).

Issue:

In Zynthian the modwheel works as expected, but not the foot switch toggle

Steps to reproduce:

  • Remove ALL

  • Add instrument chain

  • select cat 4 setBFree Organ

  • Answer yes to following “manual” config option and select one preset

  • Play the organ via MIDI: outputs sound.

  • Turn modwheel above 50% to switch rotary speed to fast: works as expected

  • Push sustain foot switch: no effect, push it several times: no effect

------>

  • In the setBFree parameter menu go to rotary

  • Push the footswitch again: the first parameter “rotary toggle” jumps to on upon press, but returns to of upon foot switch release
    At the same time the third parameter (“rotary speed”) sometimes does a quick state change but that seems a bit arbitrary.

  • do a long push on zynthian encoder 1 (rotary toggle)

  • select “unlearn all controllers” and confirm with Yes

  • play organ and try foot switch: behavior as expected (foot switch toggles rotary speed)

Second issue:

After unlearning all controllers from setBFree rotary toggle

  • return to mixer

  • long press Z3|Shot

  • Save as new snapshot

  • From admin menu select remove ALL

  • From Z3|Shot longpress menu, select the saved snapshot

  • select Load

  • play organ and footswitch: no effect

  • goto step -------->

All the best to you and the whole team!

1 Like