I am setting up my Hapax and while making a definition file for the Roland TR-8S I noticed that for drum lanes the maximum number is 8. The TR-8S got 11.
I don’t see the reason for this limitation in the Hapax as has a scroll function in many screens and having more than 8 drum lanes would be just as easy to manage as a simple scroll up or down.
Am I missing something or do I really have to make a work around and waste two tracks in the sequencer?
Correct, there is a limitation of 8 Lanes per Drum Track. I too use a TR-8S with Hapax and have to “sacrafice” an extra Track to accommodate all the voices of the TR-8S. I actually 4 Tracks dedicated to the TR-8S because of some kits/sounds using Alt Sounds. This is often overkill… 2 Tracks is plenty… but still one more than I’d like to be using.
Squarp is aware of this limitation and desire of the community for more Drum Lanes per Drum Track.
Here is there response to my recent request for more drum lanes: “For now adding this would take a lot of internal memory and we don’t want to reduce the scope of other features, but we planned to think about ways to improve parts of the code to earn space and be able to add 16 tracks. In the meantime, you can use two tracks sending notes to the same destination. this is not the same but it works right now.”
So hopefully we see this feature added in the future (without too much expense to other feature requests). As always if you have changes/improvements/requests, please forward them on to Squarp using their request form found here: Contact us | Squarp instruments
I would even be ok if there was a way to “sacrifice” a lane in order to see and program all 16 lanes on one page. Uses the same amount of memory but increases usability,
My main issues with the 8 drum lane limit is having to jump back and forth between multiple drum “instruments” to program steps and also manage multiple drum “instruments” when using mutes/sequencing.
I would be happy with an option that allows you to combine multiple drum “instruments” so that I can scroll through all the lanes on one page and mute them all at once from the mix/mute page.
Something like picking one instrument as the “master” and then being able to choose other instruments to be under the master. You’d have the same number of total lanes available in the Hapax but you’d get to split them up/combine them as you see fit.
I would also very much like to see more drum lanes indeed! Most drum maschines have more than 8 pads Just make it scrollable (both in live as in step view: problem solved?)
Perhaps he meant to sacrifice a “track” for this instead of a “lane”?
I was just about to post this here, if this is a memory limitation, I’d be willing to sacrifice 2 tracks for this, as long as I have all sounds in a single pattern / instrument definition.
Ok, I guess the easiest way in terms of workflow would be to create 2 definition files - the first has the first 8 instruments, and the second has the others. Then, you need to use 2 tracks, but at least you can reach them via MIDI now inside Drum tracks!