For the pure analogue side of my hybrid setup, I have been experimenting with drum machines. I decided on the TR-626 for a number of reasons. Budget and tuning. Initially, I was put off by some of the reviews in relation to the sounds be finding out about the HKA mod made me chnge my mind. The HKA mod enables you to add an extra ROM of sounds from the TR-707, TR-808, TR-909, LinnDrum and DMX. The sounds then go through the 12 bit processors of the TR-626 and sounds really good.
To get started, I needed to work out the basic setup. I later found that it defaults to Channel 10 on factory reset. On page 78, it explains how to change the midi mode. Hold the shift key and tap key 15 (SYNC/MIDI). Press enter to cycle through options. I placed it on Omni mode. At first, it wasn’t so obvious to me, finding the keys. Shift is towards the bottom left, near the LCD screen and the SYNC/AUDIO button is on 15. Hold down SHIFT then tap MIDI/SYNC. Then, press ENTER (bottom right) to cycle through the options. When you want to change an option, use the yop right VALUE, UP | DOWN keys to change settings.
The MIDI/SYNC menu looks like this.
- Sync Mode – MIDI SYNC, Tape Sync, Sync Off.
- Omni mode On/Off
- Reception Channel (1 to 16)
- Key No (35 onwards)
- Transmission Channel (1-16)
- Exclusive (data transmision/reception through MIDI)
To stop the continue midi clock, I changed Sync mode from off (internal) to nn or Tp to play from a DAW but will play with this later because – it is really powerful.
The Problem
Anyhow – I work hybrid through a DAW so the key question I need to ask myself is – what problem am I trying to solve? The answer, quickly load up tunings for different songs. The main reason why I bought the TR-626 is so that I can tune and volume mix my kit, per project. I do not want to have to go into the Roland each time and meticulously tune and level my kit. I need an editor.
The Solution
The solution: The Raymond Transitior 6. I wanted quickly loadiing, dumping and transmission of the onboard settings to load in kits without fiddling. I also wnted visuals to see exactly what is the globals, with po
tential for quick editing.
So far, I have loading and editing working fine, tuning and volume plus live note on and off with velocity. The next steps involve the transmit. I’ll pause here and then look at building in a librarian.