Loopop has made a new video about the Deluge: https://youtu.be/aBeeDwukpTs
A very good primer for getting started and also about what the machine can do. Version 3.0 is ridiculously good. What a machine.
My profession is technical editor and I can confirm what you write, @darenager. The Elektron manuals are excellent, also from from a professional point of view - I only miss some use cases and examples. I know, thatās not the primary task of technical documentation, but it gives the user a significant added value.
The Deluge manual is not completely useless, but far away from āgoodā. However, the new Synthstrom newsletter announced a āProducers Guideā (it seems to be from @iceritchie, the same guy which published the Digitakt Notebook).
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I will have enough money next month for either a deluge or MC 707 as a standalone groovebox. Hmmm which one to go for?
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To screen or not to screen is the question
Both amazing machines. Iāve had the deluge but sold it. Itās a special machine and does so much but the workflow was not for me and way too much memorization of what does what. But still, awesome machine!
I have the 707 now, much more intuitive and just as powerful. Love it! Either way youāll be in good hands.
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Deluge is more innovative and has a better sequencer but 707 has a better sound engine.
Ok, so I had a quick play with the Deluge audio clip function last night, it seems really cool and quite effortless* I only had about 10 minutes with it but grabbed 4 loops in quick succession, it quantises loop length to the nearest next beat (or maybe bar, need to check) so that it pretty handy, but there is probably a way to turn that off if needed.
*once you know how, no thanks at all to the manual.
Iād echo what @ddiamond84 said, the Deluge is really very good, it does have possibly too much crammed within its UI though, there are LOTS of button combinations to remember, the synth shortcuts are easy enough thanks to the printed shortcuts on the panel, although the font is tiny, some of the other functions really should have dedicated buttons though. IMHO
I said it before, for a first machine from a young company it is quite outstanding in many ways, and if it is your main machine in a setup then with plenty of usage the shortcuts will undoubtedly become second nature.
I think the 707 will almost certainly have a better synth engine, and probably a more streamlined workflow, but I think the Deluge wins out on features and flexibility with its at times openended-ness, and things like the CV outs, brilliant arranger and fairly unlimited audio tracks and so on.
Also Synthstrom support is excellent (facebook, and the manual aside) and their commitment to the Deluge seems endless, typically with Roland in 18 months a new version of the hardware might arrive and the 707 wonāt get any more updates, I doubt it will have the openended-ness of the Deluge and will follow a more typical fixed architecture, for instance track count will always be 8, etc.
Personally I think Iād choose the Deluge.
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Loops quantise to zoom level now I believe, the behaviour was amended a bit during the beta testing period. Overdubs used to quantise to iterations of the loop that you were overdubbing fromā¦ canāt remember if thatās still the case.
You can stop recording a loop immediately by holding shift as you close the loop, but this doesnāt quantise so you have to be super-precise. Iām hoping that there will be an option for definable quantisation here in future.
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This is the reality.
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Iād choose the Deluge too. Itās already a fantastic machine, and it will surely improve in the future, with their constant updates. They have told they will be adding wavetable synthesis in the future, and MIDI templates too.
Didnāt know about this app but they added multi-sample export for the deluge in their latest update. It looks pretty neat.
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Would you guys say that the Deluge provide enough tools to push a track to a finished state? Since there is only a stereo out and no option to bounce the individual tracks as stems, the ability to finesse to the max directly in the Deluge is quite crucial to me.
That Sample Robot software has been around for years, it supports a large number of formats for export, but I think it seems pretty over-priced unless you are exporting to lots of formats.
Iād definitely have purchased it years ago were it not for the fact that you can only buy a limited basic version or a limited full version or a full featured pro version, that kind of pricing model doesnāt work for me, just sell me the full uncrippled software then allow me to buy the export conduits that I want, cutting actual features in all except the pro version seems like a bad 90ās business model to me.
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Well, it depends. It definitely isnāt going to nor should be comparable to a DAW, you have basic 2 band eq, basic digital fx, etc. But with determination and realistic expectations there is no reason why you could not finish a track suitable for release using just the Deluge, plenty of people can and do.
My feelings on this kind of thing might be very different from yours though, I donāt use any DAW, mainly because I donāt like the unlimited nature of working in such an environment, faced with so many options I find that endless tweaking and refinements prevents me from finishing stuff, even with just a hardware setup I often find it a challenge to get stuff āfinishedā.
Also I can quite happily release music made using modest means, for example just using one machine, I have no need to make my stuff commercially competitive as I donāt tend to listen to that kind of music anyway.
So I guess it comes down to which side of the line you fall into, if you are happy with certain limitations then you will probably enjoy it, if not then youāll probably find it a bit frustrating.
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Depends. The Deluge struggles somewhat in the sculpting areas. EQ, reverb, sidechaining - the stuff that could take your mix from good to great, just isnāt all that great in the Deluge.
In terms of tools to write a fantastic song, for sure. To make it sound fantastically done, probably not.
But there are plenty of contexts where this just wonāt matter.
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Thanks guys! I will need to drastically downsize my setup very soon (and time dedicated to music as well) and Iām looking for that one piece of hardware which will provide good balance between features and fun.
Regarding finessing, Iām dawless as well, and letās be real: Iām doing music for my own fun. I donāt need a Strymon tier reverb, nor a 8 band EQ. Just enough tools to not fall into the ādamn, I need another box to do thisā again.
Another question: compared to an Elektron sequencer, is it easy to nudge a step off grid? Iām quite anal when it comes to groove.
you can zoom in to 64th notes and make the steps as you like.
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I donāt believe you can nudge them around in the same way you can with the Elektron sequence, though. But Iām not sure.
Generally, I found the Deluge not as immediate to work with as a sequencer than with the Elektrons. Putting down the first notes on the grid is fast and extremely satisfying, but when it came to the next step for me, when tracks grew outside the grid and you wanted to get down into the details, it was slower. Ironically, the Delugeās interface allows for instant and quick creations with a great way to visualise whatās going on, but many of the features would do better in another kind of interface.
Itās kind of like it couldnāt decide what it wanted to be.
But that is my very personal opinion. As sequencers go, I just prefer Elektronās before any other, so Iām biased.
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Ah, thatās a shame, I really like the way it is handled on the Circuit. Elektron is even better for micro nudging.
Iāve used my Deluge quite a bit and I really enjoy the workflow and in particular the options available for live recording of the arranger, which I prefer more than methods on my Elektrons (although Iāve started to use song mode on OT more frequently).
That being said, I rarely Plock and fine tune parameters on the Deluge in the way I do on my OT etc as It lacks some of the hands on immediacy and controlled skulpting I love on Elektron devices.
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