I’m aware that half of the fun of a Machinedrum is the P-locking but bear with me
I recently discovered the Ableton / M4L ‘8 CC’ device which allows you to control external midi CC’s and thought it would be useful to augment existing patterns with automated 8 bar long filter sweeps or long drawn out modulations.
I created an Ableton drumrack with 3 of these '8 CC’s on each of 16 pads, mapped to each of the Machinedrum’s slots (BD / SD … M4 etc). I can program drum patterns in Ableton and everything works smoothly, and every CC can control the equivalent knob on each page of each machine - so far so good!
The problem is that if I automate one parameter everything works fine, but as soon as I attempt to modulate a second one then the Machinedrum goes crazy. The timing goes completely out and externally triggered notes lag wildly.
Has anyone else experienced this? I can’t tell is this is a Machinedrum limitation, an Ableton/M4L problem or something else. I’m using a MD Mk1 and the latest OS.
The MD can handle quite a lot of Midi data before it starts to behave strangely, definitely more than a filter tweak. I used to simultaneously automate a lot of different parameters on different tracks via Lemur (MD Morphor).
One reason for what you observe might be a transmission of redundant data in your filter sweep. For instance: 5,5,5,5,5,5,6,6,6,6,6,6,7,7,7,7,7,7 instead of 5,6,7.
Cheers MK7, I thought the problem might be due to the quantity of CC data so I’ve tried just adding a few one-click cc changes throughout a test pattern with no values inbetween. Unfortunately the problem still occurs as soon as a second parameter is automated - the timing goes off quite drastically and then catches up at the end of the bar with a loud mess of notes.
So far I have tested with ableton MIDI coming from my:
NI Audio 8 - Lag and timing problems once 2nd cc is modulated
NI Audio 8 into MOTU MIDI Timepiece AV - Lag and timing problems once 2nd cc is modulated
Turbomidi TM1 - Lag and timing problems once 2nd cc is modulated
I thought this could be due to the data coming from Ableton and/or the M4L plugin so I tried connecting the MD to my Octatrack and mapping an OT midi channel and its controllers to the MD’s BD1 page 1 controls. I set up a test pattern and modulated a few parameters on the midi CCs aaaaand…
The same error occurs - so can anyone confirm whether this is expected behaviour or is my Machinedrum being a dick?
I had another go at automating my MD externally and still have the same problem. Is anyone able to give it a quick try to see if its a problem with my particular device?
All you need to do is create CC envelopes for any 2 or 3 parameters in Ableton, send the midi into the relevant Machinedrum midi channel, press play and let me know if the MD timing almost completely grinds to a halt then rushes to catch up.
