#58

OK since my last post I have to admit the Morphagene still has quite a bit of “tape hiss” coming through. If I auto-level with nothing patched as MathewAshmore suggests, the tape hiss goes away but then reappears whenever any sound is passing through the Morphagene. This is also after I added a 4ms Listen module to boost my incoming audio to modular levels.
If I auto-level with a loud modular signal like 0-Coast’s square, the tape hiss is still quite present. Maybe filtering after the MG is the only way to deal with it?

#59

just get the latest firmware and forget about auto-leveling)

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#60

Has anyone been able to get rid of the hiss after the new firmware? I have mine consistently set to low and it’s pretty much unusable as a sampling device. I have it in a shared system plus, with the only two modules added as the XPAN and Crow, so I can’t imagine it’s a power issue.

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#61

New owner here. I also get the noise, a somewhat hollow sucking sound at times. fortunately not super unpleasant. Figured it was due to auto-leveling on a quiet signal - condenser mic on piano, will try leveling on a very loud one I guess. I remember reading the input level is stored on card - perhaps the first numbers?

#62

Was just reading the manual and see in M203 firmware there is no longer auto gain leveling. Hold record and press shift to cycle through settings Blue low, Purple high. See page 38 of manual. Makes sense as auto leveling didn’t really seem to be working! The body of the manual still says auto-level is a thing, but the notes say this new manual switching has REPLACED auto level.

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#63

Morphagene is by far the most noisy module in my Shared System. Setting input gain to blue reduces the noise a bit, but there is still noticeable noise. This is especially annoying when there is nothing connected to the inputs and I’m using the SOS for volume control.

I did a jam yesterday and the recording had a lot of audible noise. I spend a bit time to investigate this issue and I think I found a solution for me.

When I directly monitor the MG output with my headphones on the output of the CV Bus, the noise is not noticeable with volume at 12 o’clock, but it quickly goes to annoying at 13 o’clock.
I did all my recordings at 10:30 and set the input gain of Zoom H1n to 3.5-4. This gave me peaks of around -10 to -6db and I had no noise issues except when I was using the MG.

I now increased the volume to 12 o’clock and reduced the gain on the H1n to 3, which also gave me around -10 to -6db, but the noise from the MG was not noticeable anymore! I need to make a few more recordings, but I think this will work for me.

TLDR: I probably learned a bit about gain staging (which is not that easy without any meter).

#64

Hi All-

I’m getting what sounds to my ear like digital clipping while working with some prerecorded material. I’ll attach an example. Wondering if you all have stumbled upon a recommended amount of headroom with MG, or if this is a different thing altogether. Izotope cleaned it up promptly, but I’d like to remedy the issue at its source if possible.

#65

I should test this more but it really seems to depend on what samples I add to the reel. I often create a reel in a DAW with each sound on it’s own track, try it out, and if I hit any distortion, open it up and lower that track a bit, re-export and load it back.

You’ve probably seen this but if not, this site makes building reels from individual files really easy: https://www.lorenzostanco.com/lab/morphagene/

Indispensable for my current set up.

3 Likes
#66

normalizing to -3db seems to be the ideal level for imported samples from my testing

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#67

The “buttons” page is incredibly helpful! Thanks for sharing!

@madeofoak thanks for the reply. I think I landed somewhere around there yesterday as well. I also ran a pass of Soothe over the sample to pull out some weird resonances that were maybe stacking up with higher Morph values.

#68

@Fedor @photofractal

I too am experiencing clicks while record is engaged. This seems to be a distinct issue from the other kinds of noise discussed in this thread. It seems also to only impact some of the modules and not all (as I previously owned and extensively used a different MG). Are the pops accompanied by a flickering of the varispeed light + do either of you have a camera that can actually capture that flickering? Are the pops present even when fully dry (so long as recording is engaged), and with gene smoothing enabled? Do they disappear and reappear (even without changes to a patch / knobs / sound source)?

MN support is solid, but I think this issue is distinct, hardware-related, and difficult to communicate since “noise,” “clicks,” and “pops” are pretty vague terms. This really feels like an unresolved defect and I’d love to reach out to them for all of us, but don’t have a solid way of recording audio and video in sync // the flickering light doesn’t show up on my phone camera and buying gear to bug test a product that already costs what this does is out of the question.

#69

I gave up on this looong time ago. I still have mg and love it. Whatever clicks are or aren’t there - that doesn’t bother me anymore. I have a lot of processing down the line anyway.

If it still dissapoints you - I advise to sell the module and get something else - life’s too short. And there’s plenty of alternatives to choose from.

#70

The clicking problem happens when you already have something recorded and you have a cable patched into the clock input. It’s a known bug. They said they would try to fix it in future firmware updates.

#71

I get some discontinuities when doing TLA regardless of whatever else is going on with the module. The ole read head/write head collision that isn’t unique to Morphagene. Nothing out of the ordinary for that kind of spaceship, and nothing a gentle pass of Izotope’s click can’t fix.

#72

@photofractal not my issue, unfortunately D:

@mattlowery the clicks do not seem timed to the length of the buffer, the position of slide, or the gene size, which is why I don’t think it’s just the heads butting (also my other MG didn’t have the same sonic aberrations). Does this description fit the behavior you’ve witnessed // is it still plausible that it’s just the heads overlapping in light of this info?

Thanks you all three of you for getting back to me :heart:

#73

Man, who knows. I only assumed that because I run into it when doing TLA work, but not when playing back recorded material (i.e., it only happens when a record head and playback head are fighting for the same buffer space).

I’ll attach a recording. My LED’s don’t flicker at all, FWIW. Morph is full CW here on a steady tone. Lotsa playheads. With morph closer to 7:00 (one playhead), I only get one click.

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#74

I get that clicking thing too. I have the most recent firmware, I believe. It is an intermittent problem, most noticeable to me when doing sound on sound recording. When it happens to interrupt beautiful rolling gorgeous loops it’s pretty upsetting.

#75

For anyone unaware of the latest Morphagene firmware update mg204, the noise & TLA issues have been addressed. I can confirm the noise is significantly reduced on mine compared to firmware mg203, sounds way better. So if anyone was considering selling theirs, you may now not have to.

Here’s what the firmware notes say:

  1. The Auto-level procedure has been replaced with an improved input gain staging, accessed with a 4-step gain selection (blue-green-orange- purple). To use, Hold Record, and Press Shift to step through the gain settings: Blue: low -3db, Green: modular level, Orange: medium +6db, Purple: high +12db.

  2. Playback gain is reverted to pre-mg157 level to improve TLA and Record-Into-New-Splice functions.

  3. Internal processing improved to work with (2) and (3) to significantly improve signal-to-noise ratio on input and playback.

#76

This is the firmware I am running. The TLA issue, as I experience it, has not been addressed.

#77

That’s unfortunate, hopefully it gets sorted out. It alleviated the noise issue for me at least.