Just built my V5 today and playing around with it, had a few questions I couldn’t see the answer to on the wiki.
How do I set any Wifi settings? I tried a Wifi hotspot but Windows wouldn’t connect to it without a password.
How do I access the Pattern menu? There’s a picture of it on the wiki but no details of how to access it.
Can a pattern be longer than a bar?
From Webconf, I could give more details but I can’t tell from your question if you needed that basic bit of info.
Press the Alt + Pad-Step to get to the sequencer. Then follow along in the wiki re sequencer.
I’m going to update your title to change Synthian to Zynthian.
I wanted to give you a brief-quick answer. More details available if needed.
Zynthian’s password is, by default, “raspberry”. You should think of change it.
You can configure your WIFI network and many other things from the webconf tool. Check the wiki instructions about it:
https://wiki.zynthian.org/index.php/Zynthian_Web_Configuration_Tool_User_Guide
Push PAD/STEP button, and then push it again over the pad you want to edit. Once you are there, you can access the contextual menu by pushing OPT and from there you can modify the pattern options, like bars/pattern, etc.
Regards
For the network, I don’t have my V5 plugged into a wired network. I tried Wifi hotspot, but Windows asked for a password which I didn’t know. I did try raspberry but that didn’t work, Windows simply refused to connect to it.
I need to plug it into a wired network to configure Wifi?
Hi @imekon !
The password “raspberry” is right. If windows refuses to connect, try with other device, like your phone.
What is your location? Perhaps zynthian is using a channel that is not allowed in your zone.
If you can’t connect to the zynthian AP, using a wired network is the easier way.
Regards,
Another way of looking at it, is you can connect a PC with an Ethernet Port directly to the Ethernet Jack on the Zynthian. Then start a browser and connect to zynthian.local.
This is the same as having them both on a network, but at least for me, makes things easier-simpler.
The sequencer has it’s own wiki page which is fairly comprehensive and recently updated. You can define the quantity of steps in each pattern, the number of steps per beat and the number of beats in a bar. Time is a complex concept. You can consider a bar to be as many or as few beats as you want so you can emulate multiple bars by adding more beats.
Lunchtime doubly so.
I plugged it into the wired network and accessed the web page configuration. I found the WiFi page showed just one network - probably due to the metal case reducing the signal of all the other WiFi networks around me, including the one I wanted. I put the Zynthian box right next to the router, then I could see the network I wanted.
The selection is a drop down list, not one where I could enter the SSID name by hand. I did go into the Raspberry Pi via SSH and edited a confuguration file by hand to enter it.
WiFi is working but with the weak signal it’s erratic. I note that switching on WiFi can cause the unit to get stuck in “Connecting…” and there seems to be no way to recover other than a reboot.
Having a totally closed metal case has advantages and disadvantages. If the WIFI signal does not reach your V5 strong enough, wired ethernet is your best option. If WIFI is a must for you and your router signal doesn’t reach strong enough, perhaps you could consider plugging an external WIFI dongle or adding a
Anyway, if the router is not far away, you shouldn’t have problems. I work with 2-3 zynthians connected to my WIFI router that is quite close (about 2-3m) and it works like a charm. Of course, there are other environmental factors you should consider. Most important, make sure you change the country code in this file:
/etc/default/crda
and restart WIFI network. This is specially important when enabling the WIFI Access Point or when accessing 5GHz networks. If possible, use 2.4GHz networks.
On next versions, i’ve changed this default to “US”, that is the most restrictive area for 2.4GHz networks, so hopefully it will have a better chance of working when enabling WIFI Access Point for first time.
For the future (there is a feature request in our tracking system), we plan to add a country selection menu in the UI, so you can configure this before enabling the WIFI network.
All the best,
I don’t see anything about the real time clock on the spec. other than mentioning the CR2032 battery and the chip behind it. How do you set it up?
Hi @imekon !
We had no time to integrate the RTC chip at the software level. Although it’s easy to configure, there are some details than must be considered and we are still thinking about it.
Anyway, if you want to check the RV3028, you could configure it by hand by simply following these instructions:
This “uputronics” board use the same RTC chip than the V5 main board, so the instructions works perfectly OK. Of course, don’t forget to put the CR32 battery in its holder 
All the best,