Tuesday, May 4, 2010

Prophet '08 Beta Encoder update

Edit: Updated to Main OS version 2.2.5 and Voice OS 1.5

Now that the code is working I've run through this beta a few times over just to make sure it's functioning as is expected; so far so good! It has been improved across the board; slow, medium and fast response, acceleration and error correction. If you start using the beta I'd really appreciate any feedback on the responsiveness and how it feels in each of those modes. I won't be able to get it perfect for everybody and I'm pretty happy with how it feels here but I'd like a consensus that it's at least a pretty substantial improvement. If it's a bit off somewhere I'll definitely poke around a bit to see if I can tighten it up further.

I cannot guarantee that this will solve problems with encoders that have a mechanical problem. Please contact support@davesmithinstruments.com if you have encoders that continue to jump around or are unresponsive.

DO NOT USE THIS CODE IF YOU ABSOLUTELY NEED YOUR P08 WORKING!!! It's a Beta. If for some reason this causes your P08 to hang, it will be at least a few days before I can swap a board so you can get going again. So for now, don't update unless you can handle a few days without it.

I can't make an exhausted list of Sysex problems because, quite frankly, there are just too darned many issues I've seen. I'll probably put together a more full post on this and exactly how sysex is used (sort of like the NRPN posts below) with some examples and tips on editing and automating sysex changes for the Evolver line. For now, here's a few little Sysex and update related things to be aware of when doing your Prophet '08 OS update:

1. Make sure you can update the OS successfully with a Sysex file first. I don't have the time to troubleshoot all the possibilities and there are a lot of them. The biggest problem I've run into is running a class compliant USB MIDI device with Windows XP (it has OS related sysex issues with larger sysex files which I won't detail here) so don't even bother if you have one. You'll need drivers from the manufacturer that have the sysex bug worked out.
2. I have successfully loaded this OS using MIDI OX with Windows XP and Sysex Librarian on OSX. Those are the two Sysex utilities I'd recommend.
3. I do NOT recommend the Soundtower editors to do the sysex updates at this time. We've had some small errors with them in the past and I'm not confident the code has been worked out yet.
4. If on Mac OSX and it doesn't work the first time around with Sysex Librarian, try setting the transmit speed to 80%. That fixed most of the problems I was having with it
5. Certain interfaces have issues that are hard to pinpoint; here are a few we are aware of:
MOTU Ultralite Mk. 3 needs a driver update, the older ones have a very annoying intermittent bug with sysex transmissions
For some reason we can't get any Digidesign interfaces to correctly transmit the sysex files in Windows XP 



I created a google group for DSI Beta information which I may start using for comments and such, for now it's just an easy way to upload files and link them here. You can join there if you'd like to post direct comments about the OS but please keep other topics out for now.

Here's the Main OS 2.2.3 Beta: P8Key_Main_2.2.5.syx
And the Voice OS 1.5 Beta: P8Key_Voice_1.5.syx
And the thread in the Prophet 5/08 forum for discussion: Prophet '08 Beta Discussion

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