emusonacid!

can you give me a brief, concise explanation of a "tracker?"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Audio_trackers

basically a tracker is an old style sample sequencer (circa mid 80s to present) that handles midi too, on a rudimentary level. the interface is based around text commands that fly by like a piano roll. each command resides on its own line (or tick, usually at a resolution of 32nd notes). basically a big step sequencer with capabilities as a sampler that may seem basic, but all available tricks used in combination are all anyone uses for sampled phrases.

take a look on the 1st page of this thread for pics i just put up of the tracker im using:

AST is an EMU endorsed 'DOS tracker' which utilizes the EMU8000 chip found on Creative SoundBlaster AWE32 and 64 soundcards in a direct manner, rather than through the shitty Creative Windoz driver... therefore allowing direct control of the sample data and hardware via pattern writing. every step can contain a note value, a velocity value, a note cut off, and any one of about 60-80 commands related to any aspect of the system including parameter automation, tempo, instrument selection, etc. you can resample the instruments output (internally, perfectly trimmed measure), save to disk, edit in an external editor (with plugins, etc), reload and away you go. youre only limited by the internal 20bit buss resolution and your imagination! oh, and no native plugins although there are a few destructive DSP functions in the sample editor... basically very fun to use, if you ask me. not as hard as it looks. you can step input it all, or use a controller in some capacity although i havent tried it yet. no sync options unfortunately, but theres midi out, so you can couple it with a midi patchbay and theoretically control a number of pieces of gear from it. my idea of fun.



yeah yeah i hear you say there are newer tracker style options available. theres just something charming about this one. ill start here and move on when i feel completely comfortable...

alien_brain wrote:a tracker is an old style sample sequencer (circa mid 80s to present)

Mid 80s? Old?

AST is from 1994 - 2000.

the concept of a tracker has been around since the mid 80s. bands like the sisters of mercy, skinny puppy and kraftwerk used them.

heres a current tracker:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renoise

check this out! a pull out keyboard/monitor for my rack... always wanted one of these. $300 on ebay.

alien_brain wrote:bands like the sisters of mercy.used them.

I don't think so. I think you'll find over the years that they used an array of Roland and Yamaha drum machines and eventually, Akai samplers under the control of various PCs and sequencing packages.

Cheers,
Adam-V

i swear i read somewhere that they used a dos tracker for midi sequencing... but hey, im not like an expert or anything.

i found this later. i should do more research before i buy.

i might go with this rack monitor instead of the one i already bought:





the more i use AST and my AWE64gold, the more i find them to be conducive to writing jungle tracks... maybe not with 'todays sound', but the good thing is you can import your own samples, so that at least gives it an open capability to sound however you wish... if some of you are laughing behind my back, you really should check out what a tracker is capable of.

i havent tried to use the AWE64gold as a standalone sampler yet, like through AST via midi input... would be cool if it worked that way. then it could be even more useful.

i finally bought renoise, and it appears to be the culmination of all things tracker, modernized, streamlined, standardized, improved, asio, vst, you name it, its in there. no self respecting IDMer or junglist should be without it...







yeah, its for mac too.

http://www.renoise.com/

i just bought a powermac G4 1ghz 2gb ram to host my oasys pci instead of the 98se box i had. i also bought some rack attachments so i could rack it. ill prolly run osx and os9 on dual boot. its my first mac!

(if you dont count the b&w mac classic from back in 1990)

are you sure that one is dual boot?



I have a similar setup with the rack kit.

I use it as a sample server

os9 w 3 scsi cards and a midi interface


for networking my vintage samplers.


too much fun.



are you going to rackmount a monitor for it?

I can confirm that the abovementioned mac will quite happily dual boot into OS9 or OS X. I would recommend that you partition the hard drive and run OS9 on one partition and OS X on the other. I found with mine that the two operating systems couldn't quite cohabit on the same drive.

Unless by dual boot you meant Windows/Mac OS in which case the answer is not.

Cheers,
Adam-V

lordtoranaga wrote:are you going to rackmount a monitor for it?

well i think ill put it on a kvm switch with my 1u 98se rack server, load xp on it and run zoeos, and then use my rack keyboard/monitor... ya know? maybe.

hey mr toranaga, got any recommendations for a non-usb midi interface for one of these? do you know of any other way to get midi in?

i guess it has 2 drives, and it already has osx installed. can i just install os9 on the other? i suppose i dont need anything thats on it already, but if it comes with an office program or photoshop or something, why get rid of it?

i am clueless when it comes to macs. thanks for the advice, mr V!

some of the later g4s would not boot into os9.

if yours can, you can just install it on the same drive as your osX


non usb? maybe , for os 9 or 10 you can use what is called a "stealth port"

this replaces your internal modem w/ a rs422 serial port

if in os9 you can use an opcode, or older MOTU

with os 10 you will be limited to a motu.
I think motu still maintains some serial drivers for osx


does your oasys card have midi i/o?



sort answer is yes you can find a solution
long answer is it will take some digging.

I found a stealth port on ebay
http://cgi.ebay.com/GEESG4-404-Stealth- ... dZViewItem


these are getting hard to find.





also there is a company that made a 4 port pci card.

I had one once, and do not recall the manufacturer.

i found one at macmall for cheap


http://www.macmall.com/macmall/shop/det ... eripherals

sweet man! do you think the ebay one will really sell for $125? man thats $75 profit over the other one! it would pay to buy a few and sell them methinks...

i got the cheaper one, thanks for the advice!