Noob questions for using midibox with edirol pcr 300 keyboard

[Rawdata]

Hello Midiboxers,

Im completly new tho this forum as i found this page a few days ago, but i was overwelmed by te idea from building my own personally customed midisequenzer...

Just love this project, as I'm an convinced DIY'er.

So I'm still in reading all te info out there, but already got a few questions, as I'm not too deep into programming and IC's...

I already got a roland sx404 Sampler i would like to control in step sequenzer style, so i would need just a midi out to do this, i guess a single gm5 usb module would do this job perfectly.

Also I'm owner of a edirol pcr300 midi keyboard controller, which comes already with Knobs, sliders and buttons, so i thought i could inicially use this to send the messages to the sequenzer... this would reduce the inicial pricing and layouting pretty much (although i would like to upgrade in future...)

So I guess i could start very fine with just some small enclosure and a few buttons and a display just to change internal values like banks, patterns and so on.

I think one AIN module and one DIN module would do this job...

Now I Come to the questions those answers i couldn't make out yet, firstly and most important one, should i use pic 16 or stm 32? Ive seen these 808 project what is the way i want to go, could it also be done on a 32 bit board? Or is 16bit enough?

I also own some motorola A920 cellphone with touchscreen I dont use since years but still working fine, my question is , is there any way to implant this touchscreen in a midibox?¿? This would allow me to make changes in the sytem without the need of knobs and buttons and would be pretty awsome!!!!

Hope to find some answers so i could start as i cant wait to get on work with this heavenly project...

BR

Chris

[stuartm]

Hi Chris, welcome to the forums.

A few comments regarding your post:

... building my own personally customed midisequenzer... I'm not too deep into programming and IC's...

That's a bit conflicting, if you want to have it customised (in terms of functionality), you'll need to do some programming.

What is not obvious to me:

Do you want to build a MBSeq or do your very own Midibox design (not just the look of it, the machine itself..)

I already got a roland sx404 Sampler i would like to control in step sequenzer style, so i would need just a midi out to do this, i guess a single gm5 usb module would do this job perfectly.

I've got an older SP-404, yes you can trigger it via MIDI.

I'm not sure why you want to go for the gm5, though.

Also I'm owner of a edirol pcr300 midi keyboard controller, which comes already with Knobs, sliders and buttons, so i thought i could inicially use this to send the messages to the sequenzer... this would reduce the inicial pricing and layouting pretty much (although i would like to upgrade in future...)

That is generally possible, see TK's video of controlling/triggering the MBSeqV4 with a Midikeyboard.

However, this is more an extenstion than a dedicatec sequencer control surface. I mean, you'll need a certain amount of control on the sequencer anyway if you want to use it properly.

So I guess i could start very fine with just some small enclosure and a few buttons and a display just to change internal values like banks, patterns and so on.

I think one AIN module and one DIN module would do this job...

The MBSeq requires two 2x20 character LCDs, otherwise, the MBSeq software is pretty useless.

How would you programm sequences into the box with limited controls?

You would have to come up with a software yourself that fits the small interfaces.

This is not impossible, but needs some serious thinking.

Now I Come to the questions those answers i couldn't make out yet, firstly and most important one, should i use pic 16 or stm 32? Ive seen these 808 project what is the way i want to go, could it also be done on a 32 bit board? Or is 16bit enough?

The MB808 is a modified MBSeqV3, so you would need only a PIC-based core.

For the STM32, currently only the MBSeqV4 software is available.

I also own some motorola A920 cellphone with touchscreen I dont use since years but still working fine, my question is , is there any way to implant this touchscreen in a midibox?¿? This would allow me to make changes in the sytem without the need of knobs and buttons and would be pretty awsome!!!!

Again, not impossible, but you have to develop a solution yourself

Hope to find some answers so i could start as i cant wait to get on work with this heavenly project...

Actually, it's quite earthly :ahappy:

Ok, my recommendations to you:

- keep reading

- keep thinking about your concept and what you really want to do with the MIDIbox

- keep in mind that this is not cheap stuff, if you want to get it serious and usable

Finally, just to tease you, here is a prototype of nILS called "KaffeSeq" that might fit your ideas more than the fullblown MBSeq: