Re: EVENTIDE.

[Dpcoffin@aol.com]

>Is
>there a password or secret handshake or something?

I've got a GTR4000 with no sampler installed so I can only comment on the 
basic unit as a looper. I've also got the Alchemy card, tho, whose manual 
describes some intriguing looping presets for use with the sampler 
card...which BTW is capable of storing multiple samples. I'll copy out a 
few 
of 'em here, from the manual pages in question...but first, my $0.02 on 
the 
secret Eventide handshake (all I have left after joining the club):

(rant begins)
Initiation fees are of course the first hurdle, but with the advent of 
their 
new super processor (Orville), prices have dropped significantly...by 
around 
$1000 for each 4000 series piece.
Once you get your rocketship home, and after a few religious experiences 
with 
the presets, you'll want to open the control panels and make some of your 
own....ha!
Programmed a few multiFX in yer day and think you know yer stuff, do ya?
Next initiation fee: correspondence classes in audio engineering and 
higher 
math, with a minor in computer programming would be a good start. 
Eventide's 
audio tech guy Scott Gilfix is a total champ, but a solid foundation in 
the 
liberal and fine arts, plus YEARS spent happily and profitably hunched 
over 
the front panels of FX from Ensoniq, Roland, tc, Korg, Lexicon, etc., has 
NOT 
rendered more than about 15%  of what he's told  me understandable--let 
alone 
what I can find in the manuals. I admit this with dismay, fully aware (or 
at 
least suspecting) that many if not most on this list will be much better 
able 
than I am to deal with the almost unlimited possibilities in any Eventide, 
but I gotta throw out a well-considered "Bullshit" to all the reviews I've 
read that talk about ease of programming--Tweaking, sure, yes/programming, 
NO. Even if you know the code, you gotta build everything from parts, 
creating your own specs for every detail, down to the number of digits of 
parameter resolution after the decimal point (it's simple, really: %Y.Xf). 
Want a plain-vanilla delay that's not quite there in the presets? FIRST, 
you 
gotta built your own feedback path with one of many available mixer 
modules, 
then create a knob to control it...but sorry, you still can't control that 
from an external foot pedal--haven't figured out yet how to set that up 
with 
a user-created parameter (tho it is easy on factory-preset params). Want 
to 
add an LFO to mod something? First, you gotta add a module to convert its 
output from audio to control, then pick and configure a math module to 
tell 
it how to act or even to limit its range, THEN set up a knob if you want 
to 
adjust it..... Powerful stuff, of course, but NOT user-friendly or 
efficient. 
Do I want to sell mine? 
Absolutely not, unless I lose my struggle with  Orville lust.

There IS a 4000-series mailing list...I'm on it and have seen less than a 
dozen messages in the last year, mostly about Orville...does this mean 
that 
nobody else knows the secret handshake either? I don't know. They're not 
talking.
(rant over)

Non-sampler looping:
Presets exist for up to 5 sec of plain old stereo looping, or 10 sec mono. 
With several MIDI pedals or a volume pedal and an expression pedal, you 
can 
easily control feedback and input. These are built up using 
series-arranged 
basic delay blocks that each max out at 660ms, but whose parameters have 
been 
thoughtfully ganged on simple menu pages, so you can use a single control 
for 
all of them. A 10-sec. delay uses less than half the available dsp 
resources, 
so you can still process your loop in-house.

The unexpanded GTR is a very rich delay machine, with many flavors of 
plain, 
multitap, filtered and mod delays. It's not too tricky to add and connect 
up 
delay units within existing presets, so you don't have to build from 
scratch 
if you just want longer delay times in an otherwise cool preset, and don't 
mind clumsy, automatically-created menus. But woe if you want to create a 
feedback parameter when there is none (surprisingly frequent), and then 
want 
a pedal to control it.

Once you add the Alchemy card and chip ($400), it gets much better, since 
you 
can now tap tempos and you'll find, for instance, a very powerful delay 
structure for rhythmic looping called Combtaps, which is four 660ms blocks 
in 
a feedback loop (you can choose which block is the feedback tap), each 
with 
adjustable resonance, which allows you to set up many different patterns 
of 
these delay taps (using delay times), each with a distinct timbre, level 
and 
pan position that will loop without losing the pattern...much less elegant 
and friendly than the Korg DL8000's slightly less flexible but much longer 
cross-delay/multi-tap version of the same idea, which has rhythm-pattern 
presets...but if you've got the time and the training, you could use this 
algorithm to build something even cooler on the 4000, with BPM displays 
and 
look-up tables for certain patterns. You could probably also build your 
own 
CombTaps or something similar without Alchemy......beyond me, I'm sorry to 
say.

With Alchemy and a sampling card:
Here are a few Preset descriptions: My comments in ():
1.TAPTEMPOLOOP xfade (means that it could be audio-faded in or out at a 
preset rate with any other patch that also uses less that half the 
available 
dsp/memory)
Simple TapTempo loop. You may start and stop the counter at will. MOD1 is 
a 
volume pedal to the loop input. All these loops have a <Door> param - this 
is 
the level of source input to the loop. They also have integral volume 
pedals 
before this door. In general, with all the looping presets, any changes 
made 
to the delay time will be less prone to artifacts if entered via the 
keypad.
Stereo in, Stereo out.
3. MEMNOSENE 1 xfade
TapTempo Loop with multiply and skew. This flavor of loop manipulation 
lets 
you multiply the loop length. For best results, after you TT the length, 
let 
the loop repeat two or three times, prior to doing a multiply. Note that 
if 
<Multi> is set to one, each <count> will add to the loop a duration equal 
to 
the original length. Also beware of large <Skew> values to start with, as 
this is subtracted from the loop length and may clip off your source. 
Again 
the skew param should not be "spun' but keyed in.
Stereo in and out.
6. MEMNOSENE crystals--#3 with "Crystal echos" ( a cool pitch-shift preset)
8. BPM LOOP psycholev
This version of "BPM LOOP..." adds stereo mod delays, set here with 
aggessive 
feedback.
Stereo in and out.
12. BPM DNA LOOP xfade
This BPM loop has two mono loops, each with independant input levels.
Stereo in and out.
15. TT BPM LOOP xfade
Tap the tempo in 1/4 notes which gives BPM. This is multiplied by 4 to 
give 
BARS. You may then set the number of bars to get loop length.
Stereo in, out.
16. TT BPM LOOP verb...adds a reverb.


Tempting, what?
dpc