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Markbass Super Synth

#521
Thanks gastric,

I didn't mean I needed a momentary switch.. What I meant by reversed is that the switch engages and latches only after you release the foot from the switch. that opposed to other pedals that engage and latch the moment you press the switch. This makes for a huge difference in operation sense.

Kind of like a buzzer that will not sound right when you push the button but only after you release the button. It introduces a slight delay from the time you wanted it to work until it actually works. Hope you understand what I mean..

A little experiment - press the bypass switch from off state to make the SS work, but leave your foot on it and don't release - Does it turn on or only after you release it?

Do it on other pedals and you'll realize that when you press the bypass switch it will engage and latch the right moment, no matter if you keep pressing it or releasing it. This is the normal operation I know.
 
#522
Thank you, your description is much better and totally accurate. I just received mine and didn't actually notice that. You're absolutely correct - every other pedal activates immediately on the press, the Super Synth requires you to press-then-release to activate. So many things in this pedal are really unusual such as the footswitch, the use of parameter values of 0-63, etc.

After trying way more synth pedals than I should have to (check my sounds page) I'm thus far not initially impressed with the Super Synth. There's far too many limitations imposed for the simplistic amount of features/parameters provided. And for low sounding synth bass there doesn't seem like a lot of sonic options in general.

However, spending a couple more hours with it might flesh out more usable tones.
 
#524
NOTE: On most Windows computers you can access the preset files in the following location: C:\ProgramData\Markbass\Markbass Pedal Controller\Presets\

I've uploaded my current presets to my webpage (see sig).

I've also uploaded a few more sound samples, including one demonstrating a fat, downswept synth bass tone that was excruciatingly difficult to play 8th notes @ 144 BPM. I think that's slightly exceeding the devices ability, and definitely exceeding my playing ability due to needing to pick and palm mute like nobody's business.
 
#526
Gastric you're the man! As always the clips and presets are awesome and much appreciated!

I’ve read just about every single tb post on synth bass and determined for the money the super synth is a strong addition to a synth oriented pedal board- admittedly after purchasing it some of the some wacky design elements have been brought to light. Although I’m not elated with the MBSS I am satisfied with the pedal & for now as none of the drawbacks are deal breakers for what the MBSS offers. Mainly because after owning the tried and true octave>fuzz>filter I’ve got a nice square wave synth - and saw waves are probably the second if not first most important wave form for synth bass- of course this is all imo.

But I came this conclusion only by reading post’s & listening to samples- you’ve actually tried and played a lot of the gear so often discussed so without further ado…in your opinion what stand alone synth pedal would you recommend? What about with the price cap of $300?
 
#527
wolffman said:
...you’ve actually tried and played a lot of the gear so often discussed so without further ado…in your opinion what stand alone synth pedal would you recommend? What about with the price cap of $300?
Click to expand...

I don't profess to be an expert, nor am I an professional player. But I think I have an above average amount of experience with synth effects and the necessary playing technique for triggering these devices at this point.

With that said, honestly there's not a single synth effect that I'm genuinely pleased with. They all have serious limitations of some sort. If price were no object I'd say the Roland GR-55 as it's definitely able to produce the widest range of tones. However, it works best in guitar mode, is expensive, still glitchy like most of the other products, doesn't have LFO reset to sync the LFO period to the absolute boundaries of your measures. But holds the most sonic potential of any product and is what I'm currently using for my synth sounds.

I've been buying up all these other synth boxes in hopes that one, please just ONE!, can do some seriously excellent synth bass tones so I wouldn't HAVE to use the GR-55.

To that end I'd have to choose the Korg G5 if I needed a pedal format under $300. There are a few genuinely good sounding tones, a pretty robust and responsive filter, and it's super easy to use.

Most interestingly, the BOSS VF-1 has the most robust synth effect. It was a total accidental discovery for me as I've owned 4 of them, including the one I currently have. You can do quick up or down sweeps, long slow sweeps, all sorts of genuinely synth tones with a lot of variety. Variety is what most of the synth pedal lack. But unfortunately the VF-1 sounds very thin compared to other effects (filter is very muffled sounding as low cutoffs, not thick and fat) has a very limited playing range as it's a guitar effect, and is decided 80's sounding, partly due to the thinness of the tone. You're absolutely not going to get that super fat saw sound like the Korg G5's voice #5. But all of it's parameters behave well to really let you shape the overall sound. Even crazier the even older BOSS SE-70 had portamento and a blendable sub-octave oscillator. That's 1992!

Which is why I'm at a loss as to how we're nearly 20 years into the future and don't have some wonderfully awesome product with multiple synth tones, multiple filtering options with up/down sweeps, LFO, tempo control, the works.

The Super Synth would be such an awesome product with only a little more work on the filtering. I personally could live without expression support if the Super Synth could produce more of the some deep, dark bass synth tones, and good down swept filters. Of course some more oscillator voices would be nice, not sure why they left squarewave out of the unit. It's a pure digital filter, so it's all programming code which I assume would be the easiest thing to implement considering there's people making free VST galore for filtering and triggered synths, not to mention the massive amount of retail VST out there. Coding should be the easiest part of it all.

MarkBass opted to force all programming via USB so that instantly negates the hardware interface as the bottleneck. So where's the new firmware with the better filtering code? I'm just venting, really. :)
 
#529
I'm not a coder, though I test software for a living. But it's not so easy any Joe Schmoe can write any old code and magically put it on any device. Particularly when you're coding for a specific DSP married to specific hardware.

I'm just using the coding illustration as probably the easiest effect development scheme VS someone trying to perfect something like this with pure hardware, or digitally controlled analog hardware like the Octavius Squeezer, both of which have to pose a much larger challenge to implement successfully than DSP code.

Note the Super Synth was released in 2009 to my knowledge. It's now 2011 and as far as I know there's been no firmware updates provided for the device.
 
#531
Gastric a response to your post a few weeks ago- and I know I asked your opinion specifically so I’m not trying to be a troll here but had a realization because I've had synths and synth pedals have been on the brain A LOT recently…

I understand the desire for a single all inclusive synth pedal without so many limitations- everyday I consider buying a new piece of gear to get my board synthier (usually I come to my senses before spending hundreds of dollars on a whim). But I came to the realization (some may call it a rationalization) that actual hardware synths themselves all have serious limitations on the types of sounds they can do. I mean most keyboard/synth players I know have at least 3 synths and some musicians play with as many as 5 or 7 on stage to cover a wide variety of sounds- and that’s just a live performance not to mention how many would be used on a studio album. So I guess my point is- if there isn’t a hardware synthesizer that can recreate tones like the little fatty, voyager, anx1, microkorg, vsynth, & radius- how can we expect an actual pedal to have a huge variety of sounds as well?

I do understand that one difference is that synth pedals always seem to have a major flaw like poor tracking, not enough waveforms, no down sweep, poor buffer, not enough presets, and the list goes on. But I’m just thinking we may have to have to settle on the idea of having a stable of synth pedals to achieve the tones we want much like some artists have a whole army of basses…

Also Markbass if you’re reading this it is NOT an excuse to avoid sending out an update for the Supersynth… It could use some work.
 
#532
I'm back to using my Roland GR-55 exclusively at this time for synth sounds. It's the closest all-in-one available outside of pitch-to-MIDI. Definitely not without it's own set of issues, but the raw functionality trumps everything else. I should have some updated recordings and a cleaner GR-55 page available in the next couple weeks.

You're correct about synth players needing multiple synths, they don't do it all either. But they can do a lot more than what most of the guitar/bass synth effects offer. If you haven't already go listen to my BOSS VF-1 page. The last recording on the page has my clean playing panned hard one side, the synth the other so you can solo it if you want. Keep in mind it's a multieffects box from the 1990's and amaze at all of the interesting synth sounds it can generate. Up sweep, downsweep, slow, fast, high, low, resonant or not. And that's before you stick delay, verb, distortion/overdrive, EQ, compression, etc. all of which are available in the Guitar Multi 1 algorithm the synth effect resides in. All someone needs to do is take that, make the tracking work with bass, and update the oscilators (or whatever it uses) to sound more modern and you'd blow away all of the other basic synth effect boxes on the market.
 
#535
Had the Super Synth out again last week. My opinion hasn't changed. :) It's great for slower playing and if you enjoy up-swept filtering. Terrible if you're trying to play fast as it simply doesn't retrigger the envelope fast enough, or the core synth sound for that matter. Even with palm muting it's too challenging to bang out repetitive/continous, high tempo bass lines (non-stop eighth notes @ 140bpm) with the Super Synth as the notes just all blend together (no definitive re-trigger of the next note) and sound like one continuous note. Also, the company also never responded to my detailed email with my thoughts/comments/requests which was disappointing. I was hoping I could try to convince them to tweak the envelope behaviour and retriggering performance. That'd go a long way towards making it better for me, personally.

Not that the Korg G5 sounds better from a pure VCO aspect, and it lacks the blending and octave control the Super Synth has which can give a more modern sound. But overall it's a much easier product to use, and is much more responsive to fast playing.

I've never used either product outside my office/music room at this time. But I did notice the G5 allows instant access to all patches, the Super Synth you have to cycle linearly through them. No way to jump from Patch 1 to Patch 3 then back to Patch 1 with the Super Synth. Probably not an issue for 95% of the players.
 
#538
I had a seriously skilled player over at my place today to check out the SuperSynth I have for sale. It was his first experience with synth effects and he was really put off by the slow tracking of the unit. Not just the slow envelope tracking I've complained about, but the slow note tracking. He was getting the hang of playing to the effect after a while, but still wasn't sold. Then he grabbed one of my picks and instantly it was tracking much better, though obviously still not as fast as his actual playing.

The conclusion by both of us was that it was tracking picked playing better than fingered playing. I'm guessing it has to do with the fact that you're forced into a more monophonic playing technique with a pick VS your fingers (at least his) which were skillfully playing quickly all over the place, likely too quickly and simultaneously.

He was totally sold on the SOUND, which I'd agree on. He just wasn't sold on giving up the Korg Microsynth he's been doing synth on and using his bass and the Super Synth instead. Though as he left, without buying, he thought he could likely adjust to playing into the effect and limiting the speed of the lines he's playing to be able to do it live.

Just sharing the story.

It's too bad I don't have the gear and know-how to make quality videos (or any videos) to share. Not saying I could've talked him into giving consent, but it would've been a great demo for the capabilities and limitations of the gear as his playing was stunningly excellent. As opposed to my self taught simpleton playing. ;)
 

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