Edirol PCR 300/500/800 - First Impressions

[gunnar]

bumbsky.

i am interested into frsh opinions from you guys.

what do you like and what do you dont like about it.

are there working templates for ableton live and cubase?

[gunnar]

i posted already in another thread:
i yesterday compared the stability of the axiom to the pcr-300

i prefered the axiom.
more stable impression.
better key feel and bigger keys.

[da-real-cz]

yo everybody im glad theres forums like this cause i gotta serious problem with my brand new pcr-300. for some reason when im using it through reason 4.0, well and reason 3.0 whenever i hit the key the note sustains and never ends. so i hit the key and the note plays for ever. you know what im talkin about right....well any ideas what the hell is going on. this is extremely frustraiting and mad fishy. if no one knows exactly, would anyone like to direct me to a support phone number so ican talk to a real person about this pcr-300 sustaining problem....hope to hear from you guys soon. thanks homies...

[SeerXillion]

Hi All!

I've followed the Manual and set the SYS00 to On, assigned the Value to change the tempo, but I still not feel that the Sonar or Nuendo receive the tempo change message.

In Sonar, I change the sync mode to SMTP/MTC, and after I pressed the record button, the sonar doesn't go even though I played the PCR-800 nor tweak the Value Knob.

I can see the led "DATA OUT" flashing when I tweak the Value knob, and the data range is between 20 and 250.

Same problem is also in Nuendo.
I setup the Sync, but nothing happened. the SYNC status is always "idle" on the tranport panel.

And, without transpose, it is not convienent.

[Adrenaline Dept.]

yo everybody im glad theres forums like this cause i gotta serious problem with my brand new pcr-300. for some reason when im using it through reason 4.0, well and reason 3.0 whenever i hit the key the note sustains and never ends. so i hit the key and the note plays for ever. you know what im talkin about right....well any ideas what the hell is going on. this is extremely frustraiting and mad fishy. if no one knows exactly, would anyone like to direct me to a support phone number so ican talk to a real person about this pcr-300 sustaining problem....hope to hear from you guys soon. thanks homies...

I just got the same problem with my new PCR-500 on Reason3.0 / Win Vista 32-bit - any suggestions on how to fix this issue? Have downloaded and installed the newest drivers from Edirol but no joy

[HunterKiller]

yo everybody im glad theres forums like this cause i gotta serious problem with my brand new pcr-300. for some reason when im using it through reason 4.0, well and reason 3.0 whenever i hit the key the note sustains and never ends. so i hit the key and the note plays for ever. you know what im talkin about right....well any ideas what the hell is going on. this is extremely frustraiting and mad fishy. if no one knows exactly, would anyone like to direct me to a support phone number so ican talk to a real person about this pcr-300 sustaining problem....hope to hear from you guys soon. thanks homies...

I just got the same problem with my new PCR-500 on Reason3.0 / Win Vista 32-bit - any suggestions on how to fix this issue? Have downloaded and installed the newest drivers from Edirol but no joy

Why don't you guys directly email/call the respective devs and get a conversation going to resolve the problem.

[Adrenaline Dept.]

yo everybody im glad theres forums like this cause i gotta serious problem with my brand new pcr-300. for some reason when im using it through reason 4.0, well and reason 3.0 whenever i hit the key the note sustains and never ends. so i hit the key and the note plays for ever. you know what im talkin about right....well any ideas what the hell is going on. this is extremely frustraiting and mad fishy. if no one knows exactly, would anyone like to direct me to a support phone number so ican talk to a real person about this pcr-300 sustaining problem....hope to hear from you guys soon. thanks homies...

I just got the same problem with my new PCR-500 on Reason3.0 / Win Vista 32-bit - any suggestions on how to fix this issue? Have downloaded and installed the newest drivers from Edirol but no joy

Why don't you guys directly email/call the respective devs and get a conversation going to resolve the problem.

I have emailed Roland support, so will see...unless they come up with something easy I'm going to have to speak to the shop to return it and get something else - useless as it is now.

[Jim Y]

It really would be strange if a keyboard is sending a note-on and then failing to send a note-off when the key is released. I suppose this could happen if you had a foot pedal switch attached assigned to "hold" and it was permanently operating - or a pedal polarity setting in the keyboard setup that meant it was seeing a pedal-down when there actually is no pedal attached. I would expect that the firmware in the keyboard would not see a pedal at all unless it changed state (you operate it) - proving that it was there.

If you have another midi input available (5pin DIN), try setting the keyboard to transmit over that instead of USB.

Try a different program than Reason. Any freeware VSTi in a freeware VST host would be a worthwhile test.

A program like MidiOX can show you what midi messages are being received from a particular port as they happen.

I've a hunch there is a firmware update for the PCR range.

Jim

[MIDI Life Crisis]

Hey guys (gals?) -

I just bought an Edirol PCR-800 (like it a lot but prefer an 88 note kbd).

ANYWAY... I have a fix for you guys sustain pedal problems. It's a "dumb" solution, and in theory, it shouldn't work, but it does.

In the pedal parameters, set the MINIMUM value to 127; then set the MAXIMUM value to 0. ANY pedal, regardless of polarity, should work fine. Kind of weird, but I suspect that Roland might have programmed their pedals that way to pump sales.

Hope that helps.

[Jim Y]

Ha!
That explains why the PCR has no dedicated pedal polarity setting - you simply swap the min & max CC value.

I've just bought a PCR800 for myself. The main selling point for me is the ability to assign sysex messages to the controls.

I have some hardware that can only be fully tweaked using sysex. In particular, a Roland VK8-m organ module. The PCR sysex supports automatic calculation of the checksum byte that follows the data. Without this, sending variable data in a sysex message would be impossible. There is some zipper noise when adjusting certain settings but that's the modules fault. Still, it beats the VK8's own editing system by miles. There are some settings I want that can only be accessed via sysex as far as I can see.

Roland did assign CC to the VK8 drawbars (only one set on the module), so I have the PCR's 9 faders assigned to the organs lower manual. Drawbar mode (pull towards you increases) is achieved by swapping the controls min & max values - so it's min=127, max=0.

Jim

[MIDI Life Crisis]

There is some zipper noise when adjusting certain settings but that's the modules fault.

Hi Jim.

I get the zipper noise as well, and I blame the PCR for that. It may be that sending the controllers thru USB is the problem. The noise goes away during playback for me (I am sending to a VI). I can deal with that as long as I don't use the PCR in performance. I also get a little crackling sending MIDI notes. Again, I blame the USB connection and the PCR.

I've been doing MIDI since 1987 and never once thought to set a controller to MIN at 127 and MAX to 0. That is probably the oddest setting I ever made to compensate for a hardware device. Very sneaky of the programmers.

[Jim Y]

OK
Well, the PCR USB has a so called "advanced driver". I struggle to find anything anywhere that explains what is advanced about the driver. I see there is a little applet in Windows Control panel that lets you downgrade to a "light load" setting - I can only guess that means it then acts like a normal usb midi interface.
Maybe there is the possibility of bus contention using the "advanced" mode?

I've examined the output of my PCR in Midiox. Controller and sysex messages are being sent smoothly - no erratic jumping of values or any spurious transmissions. I've got my external module hooked up to my pci soundcards midi ports - and it's this out port I was monitoring in Midiox.


Jim

[MIDI Life Crisis]

I'll have to test this later, but my test would be to send MIDI data via standard MIDI interface from another device and listen for zipper noise. Then plug the same device into the PCR and do the same thing. If you hear zipper noise, it's the USB interface in the PCR.

I can live with it as long as it doesn't affect my recordings (or notation ). In a live performance the PCR stays home and moaps. (sp?)

[mtfire]

I too have the sustain problem with Reason with my Edirol PCR-800. It doesn't do it in GarageBand or Logic, so I know it's unique to Reason.

"ANYWAY... I have a fix for you guys sustain pedal problems. It's a "dumb" solution, and in theory, it shouldn't work, but it does.

In the pedal parameters, set the MINIMUM value to 127; then set the MAXIMUM value to 0. ANY pedal, regardless of polarity, should work fine. Kind of weird, but I suspect that Roland might have programmed their pedals that way to pump sales.

Hope that helps."

Where do I find the pedal paramteres? I can not locate it in my Edirol manual. Thanks for the help!

[Peter-500]

I found two different ways to fix the hanging sustain pedal problem:

- Setup the keyboard in reason as a generic keyboard. Disadvantage, none of the other controls seem to work

- Install the Reason 4.01 update. This recognizes the PCR automatically and now all the controls seem to work as well. And no unwanted hanging notes.

Now I just have to figure out how to set things up so the 'drumpads' trigger redrum. Any tips on how to do that would be most welcome.

Regards,
Peter