#602

I would suggest starting fresh in a new project and see if you can’t isolate the issue there.

#603

Hi! (And happy holidays!)

I am considering a bargain for a used mk 1 Octatrack just to see if it is for me. The seller says one button cap (Bank/Edit) has fallen off, so it is quite cheap. Has anyone here replaced these buttons?

1 Like
#604

i don’t know how easy they are to find, but i imagine writing elektron will get you one for the cost of shipping from gotenburg. i’ve done it a couple times. should be like a computer keyboard, just plop(snap) it on

2 Likes
#605

Thanks! He still has the cap, but apparently it won’t reattach. But perhaps a completely new one will.

1 Like
#606

In case someone else are in the same situation: I bought the Octatrack Mk 1 with a loose button and opened it up. The button/switch is a spring loaded ball bearing type (don’t know the correct type). My faulty one, and this seems to have happened to quite a few on the Elektronauts forum, had actually physically opened up and the spring and ball fell out when I removed the panel.

Be very careful with panel removal as these switches seem to easily crack open if pushed sideways.

Anyways, I managed to access the switch and superglue the spring back in the top part. Then I carefully glued the button casing together with the ball inside. I have replacement switches on the way, but this works for now! I bought switches from ebay for 8.99 USD each, yikes… Apparently they should be Marquardt 1840 series but couldn’t track them down at a reasonable rate. Haven’t heard from Elektron yet (holiday season…).

Happy to support if anyone else needs to do this repair. And of course this voids warranty, but I guess most/all if these are too old in any case.

So far it seems great, just learning the basics but already bubbling over with thoughts of what to try :).

3 Likes
#607

Does anyone have experience with the Blackstar Live Logic controller? From what is stated on their website, it seems like it could be a perfect foot controller for Octatrack looping- It can hold fully customizable patches with the option of sending program changes, cc, note, and clock messages. I’m really close to purchasing one, but I’m slightly weary since there aren’t many opinions of it.

#608

I haven’t used it but I just kickstarted this with the same thought

4 Likes
#609

This looks perfect. I wish it was already out, but I guess it’s only four months away. Hmm, I might wait.

1 Like
#610

The flexiports sound interesting

I think it would be a good friend for Norns too

#611

Yeah, I’ve never heard of flexiports before reading about the bridge6. The possibility of being able to control functions on non-midi/cv devices sounds pretty cool (and using it with Norns) If everything pans out as its been described then I don’t think I would ever need another midi foot controller.

#612

Thanks for sharing this btw, I ended up backing them :slight_smile:

1 Like
#613

I’m trying to figure out how I can get my octatrack to control an app on a raspberry pi that only responds to specific cc’s.

I’m hoping I can edit the trig’s to send specific cc’s.

For example trig 1 sends cc#46 trig 2 sends cc#28

Is that possible?

#614

Yes (if I’m understanding right) with CC (effect) p-locks on MIDI tracks. But you have to set up the locks (and CC numbers) manually. You can set up to 10 CCs of your choice for each MIDI track but each track can only control one channel.

1 Like
#615

It’s more so I’m looking to use the trig buttons. To get the trigs to send a specific cc.

#616

As far as I know you will need a note-to-CC translator. If you are controlling an RPi, though, you should be able to implement this translation layer between the hardware MIDI inputs and the software input ports of the app using ALSA/JACK sequencer patching with some intermediate translator in e.g. PD, SuperCollider, Node, C, Python, etc.

There may be a way to use “plays free” MIDI tracks to achieve this without a translator, but it’s going to be even more of a hassle because you’ll need to set the p-locks on the first step of different tracks. Additionally, I don’t think the “direct” option (to play the track without delay) has been fixed in the firmware yet.

#617

It is thru a raspberry pi. I’ve heard somewhere else a translator.

I don’t think I’m familiar enough with coding to do something like that but might be worth learning.

Another idea I had was attach a midi controller with assignable cc’s to the pi, and then sequence the controller from the ot.

#618

Primarily putting this here for anyone worried about the learning curve. I got an OT last week and I have found it to be waaaaaay easier and more intuitive than its reputation would suggest. I am only working with samples I pre-load and I’m sure that I am still barely scratching the surface, but it is really straightforward to start sequencing and mangling and making music. If you have any level of familiarity with assigning modulation in general, it is pretty easy to get up and going pretty quickly. Now excited to read this thread and pick up some tricks!

8 Likes
#619

I can echo this - if you want to learn everything it can do, it will probably take a (long) while, but it has definetely been easier than I feared to get going with it.

3 Likes
#620

The thing that gives the OT such a reputation is people trying to eat the elephant in one go. It’s a really deep machine, so it pays to learn in small chunks at a time. The other plus to its depth is that you won’t get bored with it in 3 weeks. It really rewards those who put in the time.

4 Likes
#621

Also the fact that some people mistake their confusion for complexity. Octatrack can be many things but DAW it is not :slight_smile:
Nothing good comes out of trying to work with it like with a daw.

4 Likes