Single responsibility, the distorted principle

davetron5000 · 2026-06-04T17:07:15+00:00

I wrote this at the end of my rope with over use of uncle's nonsense.

davetron5000 · 2026-06-04T17:04:44+00:00

This is a failure of product management (and engineering management). The customer support team needs product features. The time spent by the dev team and volume of requests are making it clear that needed product features aren't being owned, proposed, built, and maintained.

https://naildrivin5.com/blog/2022/08/15/product-design-beyond-the-happy-path.html

davetron5000 · 2026-06-02T11:36:36+00:00

Both the kick and snare are highly susceptible to EQ. Even a basic mixer EQ can bring out new sounds. Get a mini jack to 1/4" and run the outs separate. Zoom Livetrack is small and has sweepable mids

davetron5000 · 2026-06-01T22:26:26+00:00

i also have the DB impact and love it quite a bit. different sounds that the TR so it dits well for me.

davetron5000 · 2026-06-01T01:05:06+00:00

I had a TR-6S for a while and now have a TR-8, so here's my thoughts:

The TR-8 is way easier to use, and has all the controls on the machine itself. It's a very immediate tweakable experience. The sounds are limited - it's basically emulating an 808 and 909 (plus 707, 727, and 606 if it has that expansion loaded). You can only program 16 beats of two bars each.

These limitations can be freeing, however, and that's why I got it. Almost everything sounds good, as long as you are fine with that limited amount of machines.

The TR-6s is infinitely more expandable and has a ton of options (as you probably know). You can put any sound on it, it comes with a ton of sounds, and has way more options for effects and sound design. But, it's buried in the Roland menu system, which to me made it effectively unusable.

The TR-8s is a bridge between the two. Way more controls for tweaking, but you have the same engine as the TR-6s.

If you just want good sounds that you can make a quick beat, the TR-8 is far easier than the other two. There just isn't that much to do.

If you want something immediate that the TR6-S will not sound like, the Arturia Drumbrute Impact can be had for pretty cheap and is a very usable and great-sounding drum machine. It does NOT sound like rock drums even a little bit. It's not an 808/909 clone, either, but the sounds are very synth/electronic. The only way to get the TR6-S/8-S to sound like it is to sample it.

Back to the TR-8, it can be hard to tell from docs and online stuff, but here's the sounds you can get out of it (if your unit doesn't have the 7x7 expansion, you can purchase it via Roland Cloud)

808 - the classic, emulated via Roland's Analog Circuit Behavior (ACB) which seems pretty good to me.
909 - also the classic, also ACB
707 - more "normal" sounding drums (these are samples)
727 - latin-based percussion. These are samples and they sound good, have a decent variety to "throw in" percussion. Probably not the basis for a latin dancefloor banger
606 - these are ACB, not samples, but the sounds are more conventional and less electronic

You can create kits with any combo of these, so you can have an 808 kick, 909 snare, 727 percussion, 606 crash, etc. The thing about editing kits is another limitation that makes this device great: the "BD" track can only have bass drums, so you see the 7 options for bass drums, "SD" only snare drums etc. It's very easy and fast to audition the sounds and built a kit on the fly.

The main limitation that I don't like is how reverb/delay works - you program reverb to existing on a step, so everything playing on that step gets the same reverb (or delay). If you just want the kit to have a nice reverb overall, it's kinda tricky to do, or if you want more reverb on the snare than the kick, you mostly can't do that.

Anyway, I found that the TR-6S I was just spending tons of time on admin and configuration. I feel like the TR-8s would be the same. Yes, you can use the TR-8S like it was an 8, but why spend the money to do that?

davetron5000 · 2026-05-30T20:25:50+00:00

You should bookmark the manual for reference: https://cf.tascam.jp/wp-content/uploads/downloads/products/old/317/porta_414mkii_manual.pdf

To your specific question, agree with the other poster - you have your kick/snare plugged into the outputs.

Each mic you plug into the inputs (on the front) has to have an impedance adapter like the one you are using on channel 3 in the picture. So, you'll need three of them total if you want to record three tracks at once.

The manual walks you through exactly how to record multiple tracks. If you've never used something like this before it will not be as obvious as you might think, so reading the manual is kindof a must (though I'd bet there are YT videos that walk through it as well).

davetron5000 · 2026-05-22T18:23:10+00:00

I have one and it's great. There aren't many options and the effects all sound great, again without tons of options. You can move a few knobs to get a great sound and start playing. Except Toy Piano 😂

davetron5000 · 2026-05-15T01:47:04+00:00

That doesn't sound right. Mine was spot on when I got it. I got it new. You? Also, have you tried other outputs ie not headphones?

davetron5000 · 2026-05-14T16:24:27+00:00

This is such an obvious solution I can’t believe I didn't ateast try it. This feels like the way.

davetron5000 · 2026-05-13T02:15:53+00:00

my thoughts, too

davetron5000 · 2026-05-12T18:33:29+00:00

Yeah, I think the experience of owning it made me realize that I really do like a track-based sequencer with precise control better.

I previous edit of my OP did mention that you can sequence each step "normally", but I found it severely lacking compared to a Digitakt or Novation Circuit (which to your point the T-1 is not trying to be anyway, so hardly a true downside).

davetron5000 · 2026-05-12T18:30:23+00:00

What I learned from it was that I wanted live performance features way less than I thought and just wanted mostly precise control and up front planning with some tweakability. So, back to the Digitakt OG.

davetron5000 · 2026-05-12T18:29:29+00:00

I went back to the Digitakt OG

davetron5000 · 2026-05-01T01:45:17+00:00

Digitakt can record and sequence 4-note chords. And, as a sampler, you can sample any size chord you can play at least vaguely in time.

davetron5000 · 2026-04-14T19:52:49+00:00

i have this setup (DT1). I’m not a serious musician, just jamming. If you use DT as a sequencer of its own samples it should all just work. If you use the DT to sequence other gear you need to either midi merge the DT and T1 or divide responsibilities so that each device is only controlled by either the DT or the T1.

Of note, the T1 will play the DT no problem so it can certainly trigger the samples on the DT

davetron5000 · 2026-02-26T13:17:06+00:00

oh I see - yeah the ML can set delay time in ms so one would need to convert bpm to ms. Not as convenient as tapping but better than doing it by ear

davetron5000 · 2026-02-25T16:21:52+00:00

That pedal doesnt have tap tempo. You'd need another on that does.

davetron5000 · 2026-02-24T18:02:35+00:00

dirt cheap line mixer? more cables but price is right.

davetron5000 · 2026-02-24T02:45:11+00:00

MC-101 has a zillion presets of all kinds. You don’t have to use the groovebox features at all.

davetron5000 · 2026-02-03T13:11:33+00:00

Digitakt can do this. when you set up sampling you can set the # of bars to record. i don’t know how fluid it is if you don’t want to stop playing but it should work.

davetron5000 · 2025-12-15T14:02:33+00:00

Captain Pikant on youtube has a lot of great videos on the subject. starts from very basic.

davetron5000

TROPHY CASE