Squarp Instruments Hapax Polychronic Performance Sequencer

Got mine. Midi A out to DT. Works perfect. Midi in from Pro 3 and then back out to Pro 3, records perfectly. Undo is heaven sent, already used it multiple times. Great so far!

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I think that is because he said one of the cons of a sequencer is that it was a sequencer lol :-/. It shouldnā€™t be a con that a specialized piece of hardware does exactly what it was designed to do!

I am so glad squarp made a dedicated powerhouse sequencer. I want a sequencer for my hardware, I already have synths and effects and midi/mpe controllers. I am thinking the complaints about no sound engine, no velocity sensitive pads, etc., etc. are coming from people who are not the target audience for a dedicated hardware sequencer like hapax.

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Yes, fully agree. I think the Hapax looks really like the killer sequencer. Will definitely get one once the teething phase is over and I have enough monkeys lying around.

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this thing looks dense & I have to admit to a bit of TL;DR here as a resultā€¦

But a really quick Q for you cats who have dived in fully on what this thing can do : will it do the crazy tempo / timing modulation & manipulation stuff that I can do on my Squid ? as so far thatā€™s the only sequencer outside modular Iā€™ve used where I can achieve LFO style tempo fuckeryā€¦? when you add in the real time controls including ratcheting & per track tempo division / multiplication, plus the arpeggiator running at itā€™s own per track tempo over the top, itā€™s pretty wild

yeah, iā€™m sure, Cirklon are redesigning their offerings as we speak in light of this revelation :wink:

but I go get Zivā€™s point about price, but I do not think it was well articulatedā€¦
itā€™s up to the buyer to know, if they need another source source, or a dedicated sequencer. a groovebox with this sequencers functions was not ā€˜on the menuā€™.

Hapax does not allow tempo to be modulated. (*)
It allows tracks to run at different speeds (track elasticity) but thats more for polyrhythm usage, and that cannot be modulated.

however, you can modulate the rate of the Arp FX , either with an LFO or via automation ā€¦ etc, per track/pattern - since, you can modulate any fx parameterā€¦
(once we get the Delay FX back, then this will similarly allow you to push/pull notes)

Ive seen a few request for this, and of course, we are still at v1 firmware, so who knows what will get prioritised for future firmware revisions.


(*) ok, like any sequencer, you could use an external clock (cv/midi) , and modulate that, and then Hapax will follow thatā€¦ but thats not really what you mean.

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I was sort of watching the Loopop video yesterday and he said it only has 2 global LFOs. I canā€™t believe that to be true. Does this crazy thing only have 2 LFOs?

yes/no
it has 2 global LFOs
there is also an LFO FX ā€¦ and every track can have up to 7 FX.

I really donā€™t use the global lfos muchā€¦ since the LFO Fx can also be syncā€™d (or not)
so really, only use the global lfo, when I wanted the same value to be used across tracksā€¦ which has been as I say rare.

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Cool cool. This looks like the first standalone sequencer Iā€™d consider. Iā€™ve had trouble thinking about how a sequencer with no sound generation would work in my setup with a Digitone, Digitakt, and Octatrack, 0Ctrl, the Medusa has a basic sequencer, and my iPad. This piece may be the one that lessens my hesitation. It looks like it has just enough visual feedback to satisfy my needs, and with the parameter locking, I could mimic the Elektron sequencer stuff to some extent while getting even more cool sequencing features. It would also be a great for the iPad, I bet. Throw in a little knobby controller and itā€™s basically a crazy hardware groovebox. $950 is a bit steep for me, right now, though.

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cheers for the answer :slight_smile:

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Iā€™ve watched all the Squarp related reviews Ziv (loopop) did and Hapax was by far his best review about a Squarp product (The Pyramid review confused me big time - but I guess the Pyramid structure is a bit confusing - and the Hermod review was not really one - mainly comparing it to the Pyramid). I did wish he took a bit more time to talk about the MIDI FXs though because it brings a lot compared to the fixed architecture of the Elektron workflow but well, the video is already 45minā€¦ (The crashing thing is a bit of a concern thoughā€¦ The Hermod has been crashing on me for my last jam but it has been rock solid until now so will see if it happens again with another project).

Talking about FXsā€¦ I wonder if they will add the slide/smooth FX available in the Hermod. Quite useful.

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Ziv is great ā€¦ but as you say, so much to get thruā€¦ and perhaps felt heā€™d talked about midiFX quite a bit in other videos?!
many things are similar here to the Pyramid/Hermodā€¦ I think perhaps the most difficult thing to get across though, is how much quicker/easier it is to do things like automate (per pattern!) fx parametersā€¦ this is possible on pyramid, but its so much easier hereā€¦ and that in turn means I do it much more.

crashing, my experience is its pretty stable in day to day use.
the thing is when you first get it (and like Ziv are making demos/reviews), you are likely to be going across its entire feature setā€¦ so are more likely to find bugs. also, now its released more users are using it in different ways, so thats going to unearth things.

of course, how much a particular bug will affect you, complete depends on your setup, and how you use itā€¦ so some users are hardly ever going to see it crash, others might have a hard time with a particular bug keep hitting them.

I think his summary, that itā€™s v1, and Squarp have a good track record for fixing things is important.
but for now, indeed saving is good advice esp. if experimenting with features.

slide/smooth fxā€¦ I think its going to be interesting to see how much functionality Squarp generally pull from Hermod over to Hapax - given some of Hermodā€™s functionality is tailored to modular.
slide/smooth, I think in particular used to get around that fact that midi is low res compared to CV.
But that is kind of covered in the Hapax by having interpolation on the automation lanes.

sure it could be used for Glide which has been a topic of conversation here and over on Squarp forumā€¦ so Im sure this feature has been requested, so we will see if its later implemented.

but we will see, Im personally hoping to see a few (quick?) firmware revisions focusing on remaining issues, and then as we move forward Squarp taking on features requested (where applicable).

but to balance this, as much as there are a few bugs, and there are many with ideas for improvementsā€¦
I personally use it everyday (for hours some days) , and Im enjoying it and donā€™t have any major issues :crossed_fingers: , but of course, ymmv

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I average about 1 crash (or hard lock) per session/ day of work. Its annoying, but I have my save early, save often hat on. But like @thetechnobear I have been using it everyday for 4-5 hours (sometimes more) since I got it 10 days ago, and I am still smitten.

Even with the issues I have had.

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Same. The crashing is a annoying but saving and restarting are quick enough that itā€™s not terrible. I assume stability will improve but even if it didnā€™t Iā€™d probably still continue to use Hapax. It gets better and better as you start to build out the cc profiles of your tracks (that Iā€™m starting to build into templates). The ease of sequencing ccs is maybe the biggest game changer for me over other hardware sequencers Iā€™ve used. My BAM has never sounded so insane! I was a little sad to not have definition files from the pyramid (Yet!) but it hasnā€™t taken too long to get the relevant ones set up again.

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So, I am using mine with a DT and the drum program works great. If anyone has a Blackbox, I was wondering if one can use 1 track for 8 of the sample slots and another track for the other 8 of the sample slots. So, essentially 2 drum tracks running all 16 pads. That would be sweet but I sold my Blackbox and not sure if that is possible?

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I donā€™t have a black box but I have 2 hapax drum tracks sequencing the 16 tracks of my machine drum and it works fine.

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How are you approaching building templates?

I am currently working through how much my machinedrum is driven by the Megacommand and how much Hapax is driving it. Working with the MCl devs to get more access to changing things via Hapax.

no real support for this at present.
im guessing Squarp might do something similar to hermod, where template were normal projects but prefixed with an underscoreā€¦ then when you came to save, it would default to a new blank name.
(or something like that)

for now Ive just got various projects which have IO setup appropriately,
and also setting up drum tracks and chord tracks and track names.


one neat thing, is as we can have two projects loaded at once
you can create a new project in one,
load your ā€˜templateā€™ in the other
then copy/paste tracks from template to new project.

this is handy, if you have various setupsā€¦ and kind of want to build a hybrid.
all that said, generally I find it quick to setup projects on hapax, so often its not worth it.

(just keep an eye on mute state of tracks, and generally they are muted when pasted)

the one thing im really looking forward to is instrument definitionsā€¦ so we donā€™t have to mess with CC numbers :wink:

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Yes, not true templates. but I do what Technobear does - have a couple of empty projects that have all the tracks IO set and named and the CCs I most use already loaded. It does require having to kind of remember/have notes out about which CC#s are what. Would be fantastic to have the definition files supported in the future.

What do you use megacommand for with Hapax? I donā€™t have one but I have started to use the internal machine drum sequencer less and less. With Pyramid I used to just sync the Electron devices as they were better self-sequenced but with Hapax I find it nicer to just have everything controlled directly.

Sidenote: Iā€™m actually kind of trying to think of other synths like blofeld that have great MIDI CC support and lousy interfaces so I can really dive into them with hapax.

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Sidenote: Iā€™m actually kind of trying to think of other synths like blofeld that have great MIDI CC support and lousy interfaces so I can really dive into them with hapax.

Digitone! (at least thats the one I am driving a lot of modulation through)

What do you use megacommand for with Hapax? I donā€™t have one but I have started to use the internal machine drum sequencer less and less. With Pyramid I used to just sync the Electron devices as they were better self-sequenced but with Hapax I find it nicer to just have everything controlled directly.

Yeah, I go back and forth a lot. Before the Megacommand I would almost never use the MDs internal sequencer, and instead controlled it either via the Octatracks Midi tracks or recently the M8 or OXI. Now that I have a Megacommand I have to rethink this a bunch, since it adds so much cool functionality (Sequencing the output routing! Microtiming, Trig logic, Poly chromatic voices, tuned sequencing without having to have a cheat sheet open, etc)

Some of this stuff I would get via the Hapax, but tuned sequencing, sequencing outputs and other things that are specific to the Megacommand controlling the MD I wont be able to do. So I am working through what is important, and what the MCL devs are willing to add.

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