MY BEAT BUDDY IS HERE!

[SingularSound]

No, there's only the master volume control on the BeatBuddy unit. From my understanding, adjusting the mix of the various components of a drum set is beyond the scope of the management software as well, but we'll see what it can do when it finally gets released.

You can adjust the relative volume of each drum set component. We're really close to finishing the software -- it gives you really detailed control over drum set behaviour. You'll see.

Meanwhile, you guys can download all of the MIDI files in the content here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/p4lbjzhpllir8ov/MIDI loops - content 1.2.rar?dl=0

Enjoy

 

[Joe Nerve]

Sometimes I think people say things like super easy just to frustrate other people, like me, more. Not so super easy.

I went to the boomerang site. Read the directions. Downloaded midi-ox. Hooked up the boomerang to my computer. Again. Nothing. Trouble shot and switched the midi in/out cables. Still nothing. Boomerang doesn't show up in the device section on midi ox. I plugged, unplugged, replugged, reread, and tried everything a couple of times. Not so super easy for me. Might Windows 8 be interfering? I should probably be on the boomerang forum, or maybe just send the pedal to them :/ .

Does your computer have a dedicated MIDI output that can be selected in "Devices" or "Hardware" or anything? Literally setting the MIDI to output to my interface was the most confusing part for me (because my ancient computer uses Vista, which doesn't have MIDI routing built-in and has to be "fixed" to recognize MIDI devices). I would assume MS 8 would have rectified the clumsiness of Vista though!
Also- I just remembered that I used Windows Media Player to play the MIDI file- the only thing I ever use that program for!

Media player is the default player for the update file, and on windows 8 there is no option to choose another program to open the file. Couldn't figure how to get that doing anything though with the Boomerang either. I'm starting to think there's something wrong with the looper because I can't seem to change any of the settings in the play style. Read the rang user guide a bunch of times and no matter what I do it stays stuck in serial. Gonna fiddle with it again tonight, try things on my old computer, if nothing happens I'm gonna pack this baby up and send it to the Boomerang fellas. It's a little disconcerting to me that they warn if there's a mishap in the file update, they want $50 to fix it. They only ask for $25 to update it though, so... yeah, I think that might wind up being my best bet.

Sorry bout the derail guys, BUT IT'S MY THREAD AND I'LL DO WHAT I WANT!!!!

 

[shwashwa]

Here you go:

thanks for that. in my opinion that groove is terrible. if a drummer started doing that when i counted off a medium swing tune i'd ask him to leave in the middle of the gig. there's nothing swinging about it. picture trying to play a tune like sunny side of the street with that going on in the background.
i feel kind of bad for beating up on this thing, i guess the positive thing about it is that the pedal itself is a great tool and an amazing piece of technology, and the content is something that can be updated at a later time. i realize that i could program my own midi swing groove, but those dont swing either. i think there is great potential in having a real person play a midi drum set and leaving it unquantized. maybe at a later date they could hire a real jazz drummer to lay down a bunch of grooves and release it as a package for sale. it would be nice to have at least one usable groove in the jazz section though when you buy the thing.

 

[LeonD]

It took me hours to upgrade the software on my Boomerang. It took about fifteen seconds to sync it with the BeatBuddy. It couldn't have been easier.

There's definitely a learning curve to using the BB and the looper together but it's not too bad with a little practice. A couple of "nice to haves" I thought of during the learning process:

1. An easy way to defeat the BB's MIDI. If everything's connected and I want to use the looper but not the BB, the loops don't work properly. I've been pulling the MIDI cable but it would be easier if one of the top buttons could be used for MIDI enable/disable.

2. The BB and looper currently sync on the quarter note. It'd be great if you could configure it to sync on the one of the upcoming measure. Currently, I have to start my loop between the four of the current measure and the one of the upcoming measure. It'd be much better if I could "stage" my loop by selecting it anywhere in the existing measure and have it start on the one of the next measure. The Boomerang does this on it's own when playing/recording loops.

 

[Adamixoye]

It took me hours to upgrade the software on my Boomerang. It took about fifteen seconds to sync it with the BeatBuddy. It couldn't have been easier.

There's definitely a learning curve to using the BB and the looper together but it's not too bad with a little practice. A couple of "nice to haves" I thought of during the learning process:

1. An easy way to defeat the BB's MIDI. If everything's connected and I want to use the looper but not the BB, the loops don't work properly. I've been pulling the MIDI cable but it would be easier if one of the top buttons could be used for MIDI enable/disable.

2. The BB and looper currently sync on the quarter note. It'd be great if you could configure it to sync on the one of the upcoming measure. Currently, I have to start my loop between the four of the current measure and the one of the upcoming measure. It'd be much better if I could "stage" my loop by selecting it anywhere in the existing measure and have it start on the one of the next measure. The Boomerang does this on it's own when playing/recording loops.

I agree #1 would be nice to have, and hopefully there is a simple firmware fix that could be applied down the road.

For #2, my conclusion is that this is actually the product of your Boomerang and not the Beat Buddy. My Infinity syncs to the beginning of measures in the way that you describe. I have only tested this for 4/4 signatures, I may need to alter some settings on the Infinity to handle different signatures, but it definitely works this way for the Infinity. I am not sure if/how you can change this on your Boomerang.

 

[LeonD]

Thanks for the reply.

Just to verify, say you have a loop recorded in your looper but it's paused. BB is playing, doing it's thing and on beat two of the current measure, you hit play on your looper, the looper will wait till beat one of the next measure to start?

If so, good deal. In the above scenario, the Boomerang will start the loop on beat three of the existing measure.

 

[Adamixoye]

Thanks for the reply.

Just to verify, say you have a loop recorded in your looper but it's paused. BB is playing, doing it's thing and on beat two of the current measure, you hit play on your looper, the looper will wait till beat one of the next measure to start?

If so, good deal. In the above scenario, the Boomerang will start the loop on beat three of the existing measure.

Off the top of my head, I can't remember. The opening and closing of new loops is synced to Beat 1. I think that replaying the loop after stopping it is also synced to Beat 1, but in general when just messing around I don't do a whole lot of that so I don't remember if that's how it worked or not.

TL;DR I think so, but only 90% sure.

 

[sunbeast]

Media player is the default player for the update file, and on windows 8 there is no option to choose another program to open the file. Couldn't figure how to get that doing anything though with the Boomerang either. I'm starting to think there's something wrong with the looper because I can't seem to change any of the settings in the play style. Read the rang user guide a bunch of times and no matter what I do it stays stuck in serial. Gonna fiddle with it again tonight, try things on my old computer, if nothing happens I'm gonna pack this baby up and send it to the Boomerang fellas. It's a little disconcerting to me that they warn if there's a mishap in the file update, they want $50 to fix it. They only ask for $25 to update it though, so... yeah, I think that might wind up being my best bet.

Sorry bout the derail guys, BUT IT'S MY THREAD AND I'LL DO WHAT I WANT!!!!

You never mentioned what output device you are using to output MIDI to the 'Rang. Unfortunately newer Windows systems don't inherently allow you to choose a different hardware MIDI device as the default MIDI output device without a sort of "fix"- here is a post that might help you: [Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
If you read the first reply, a poster discovered that the same "Vista MIDI" fix that let me use my Edirol on my Vista computer also works with Windows 8...
Luckily this was an issue/solution that I came across with MS Vista immediately when I Google searched for "how to choose MIDI device Vista" years ago. Might help in your situation as well.

 

[Feral Feline]

...
Meanwhile, you guys can download all of the MIDI files in the content here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/p4lbjzhpllir8ov/MIDI loops - content 1.2.rar?dl=0

Enjoy

Merci beaucoup, Monsieur Packouz.

 

[sunbeast]

Media player is the default player for the update file, and on windows 8 there is no option to choose another program to open the file. Couldn't figure how to get that doing anything though with the Boomerang either. I'm starting to think there's something wrong with the looper because I can't seem to change any of the settings in the play style. Read the rang user guide a bunch of times and no matter what I do it stays stuck in serial. Gonna fiddle with it again tonight, try things on my old computer, if nothing happens I'm gonna pack this baby up and send it to the Boomerang fellas. It's a little disconcerting to me that they warn if there's a mishap in the file update, they want $50 to fix it. They only ask for $25 to update it though, so... yeah, I think that might wind up being my best bet.

Sorry bout the derail guys, BUT IT'S MY THREAD AND I'LL DO WHAT I WANT!!!!

As far as the "stuck in serial" part- if you have one of the earliest firmware versions from when it was first released then that might have been the only available play style (I can't remember exactly, but I know that the Free mode at least wasn't complete yet upon release). And to play in the Sync mode you need to start by recording Loop 3 or else it will automatically default to serial mode (Loop 3 is always the "Master" loop for the Sync mode).

 

[Bradass]

Growing pretty fond of using the percussion set with pop and funk beats, some cool sounds available there. Im liking the percussion set a lot because it gives some of my looping compositions the vibe of a drummer but keeps the emphasis on the bass playing...very useful in some instances.

Does anyone know if its possible to use two drumsets in the same song? I.e. start with standard drum kit on Pop 2 part 1, and have part 2 use the percussion kit? It that something that is programmable in MIDI?

 

[Chippy147]

Growing pretty fond of using the percussion set with pop and funk beats, some cool sounds available there. Im liking the percussion set a lot because it gives some of my looping compositions the vibe of a drummer but keeps the emphasis on the bass playing...very useful in some instances.

Does anyone know if its possible to use two drumsets in the same song? I.e. start with standard drum kit on Pop 2 part 1, and have part 2 use the percussion kit? It that something that is programmable in MIDI?

Changing kits is certainly possible using MIDI by use of bank, programme and/or control change messages. I played synth in an earlier life (!) using a 'keytar' linked via MIDI to a Roland synth and could use the above messages to change voices on the fly for solos etc, which is what you would need to do. However, I'm not sure what the BB's MIDI implementation is like and whether it even responds to these particular messages. From what I've read so far it seems to use MIDI just for time-synch purposes (i.e. start/pause/stop) with external MIDI kit.
Sorry to only half answer your question, but I haven't got a BB in my sticky mitts to try it out. Yes MIDI can definitely control this for sure but I don't know if the BB would react to it.

 

[Chippy147]

Just downloaded the BB manual to check out the MIDI implementation and it only supports MIDI synch functions using the MIDI interface. That means it will only send/receive a MIDIclock message (to keep the devices in synch) and a start and stop message. On the plus side though, I think you may be able to change drum kits mid-song as you wish, once the management software is released. In a previous post (#221) David alluded to giving users lots of control over the drum parameters and this may well extend to using programme change messages within your song files. This would have to be pre-programmed and wouldn't allow for 'on-the-fly' kit changes but that might not be an issue for you.
Hope that helps a little. Only two things are needed me thinks. One...get the software. Two...get your head around MIDI programming. Oh, and three...enjoy the ride!

 

[Adamixoye]

Actually, now that I think about it, the software is supposed to be able to let you create your own kits. So in the worst case, you could create your own kit which is essentially two kits, and then program your verse/chorus different to utilize the appropriate half of your new combined kit.

 

[Chippy147]

A couple of "nice to haves" I thought of during the learning process:

1. An easy way to defeat the BB's MIDI. If everything's connected and I want to use the looper but not the BB, the loops don't work properly. I've been pulling the MIDI cable but it would be easier if one of the top buttons could be used for MIDI enable/disable.

Just a suggestion which may help if I've understood correctly. In the user manual on pages 20/21 it describes two 'pause' modes that the BB can operate in, namely normal pause and mute pause.
Normal pause is the default, but mute pause may solve your problem. This would keep the MIDI clock running (keeping the looper and BB in sync in the background) but mute the drum sound output from the BB, in effect allowing you to loop away to your heart's content, with the BB sync'd up, ready and waiting to kick in at a moment's stomp!
Hope that helps and I've not misunderstood.

 

[Adamixoye]

Thanks for the reply.

Just to verify, say you have a loop recorded in your looper but it's paused. BB is playing, doing it's thing and on beat two of the current measure, you hit play on your looper, the looper will wait till beat one of the next measure to start?

If so, good deal. In the above scenario, the Boomerang will start the loop on beat three of the existing measure.

I forgot to tell you that I tested this. The Infinity starts playing on Beat 1.

 

[LeonD]

Just a suggestion which may help if I've understood correctly. In the user manual on pages 20/21 it describes two 'pause' modes that the BB can operate in, namely normal pause and mute pause.
Normal pause is the default, but mute pause may solve your problem. This would keep the MIDI clock running (keeping the looper and BB in sync in the background) but mute the drum sound output from the BB, in effect allowing you to loop away to your heart's content, with the BB sync'd up, ready and waiting to kick in at a moment's stomp!
Hope that helps and I've not misunderstood.

Thanks for the suggestion but that's not what I'm looking for. My problem is that no matter what mode the BB is in, it's sending sync info. Whether it's stopped, paused or playing, sync info is being transmitted.

So I record a loop with the BB stopped. When I go to play it back, the timing follows the sync the stopped BB is sending. If I pull the MIDI cable, everything's fine.

 

[LeonD]

I forgot to tell you that I tested this. The Infinity starts playing on Beat 1.

That's awesome; the way it should be. I wouldn't even know where to start in getting the Boomerang to do that. Or how the Infinity does it.

 

[HeavyDuty]

My guitarist had a Beat Buddy on order; it came last week, but tonight was our first time using it for practice with just the two of us. We're writing songs right now and the Beat Buddy is ideal for the task. It sounds great and has a lot of really usable patches out of the box. I'm impressed!

 

[sunbeast]

That's awesome; the way it should be. I wouldn't even know where to start in getting the Boomerang to do that. Or how the Infinity does it.

You should try calling or emailing Mike @ Boomerang- I've had good luck contacting him about functional queries with my Boomerang, and he updates the firmware regularly so may be down to implement something like this if people show enough interest (or possibly it is already easier than it seems!).