I need to get one of those Retrokits to connect my M8 and Keystep. It sounded really nice when you were just noodling on the keys. It hadn't occurred to me that the M8 could moonlight as a really nice little portable synth module!
Wow, the sound design looks really good. I might have to get one of these ordered. Well, after clearing it with my wife since I got a Roland Verselab MV-1 a few weeks ago and have now ordered a Novation Circuit Rhythm! 😂
I don't have the Polyend, so I can't really compare, but the main advantage of the M8 for me is that it has several synth engines (chiptune style wave synth as shown in this stream, 4-op FM synth, and a port of Mutable Instruments Braids), where the Polyend is entirely sample based. Some other things off the top of my head: - Extended USB connectivity featuring audio and the ability to "cast" the screen to an app like Touch Designer (I used that to display the screen in this stream) - Decoupled patterns (chains on M8) per track, so you don't have one pattern holding all the note data for all tracks-I think the Polyend has some form of this though - Battery built in - Ability to use the device "headless"-pick up a Teensy 4.1 and a compatible micro SD card and you can run a version of M8 using USB audio and Touch Designer - No restriction on sample length-the M8 streams samples from the SD card - Resampling capability-for example, if you're controlling an external synth via MIDI, you can run its audio output through the M8 and capture a phrase to the SD card, or capture an internal synth engine for further mangling in the sample playback engine. Again, I'm not sure if the Polyend has had any updates that provide the above, but it would absolutely have its own advantages :) I'd love to see someone else chime in with what the Polyend can do that the M8 can't!
@@0Fdigital m8 has stereo sample playback, polyend mono. The m8 has more FX modifiers (3 lanes) and seperate volume lane. Polyend only has 2 FX mod lanes and to change the volume you need to use an fx lane. So basically I often only have one FX mod lane free which is a big downer on the polyend tracker Also polyend tracker doesn't have tables..
@@0Fdigital for the videos I’ve seen (I don’t own one either) the Polyend has wavetable and granular synthesis plus an FM radio. It does have two “step effects” per step but also delay, reverb, and limiter in the mixer section. It also can send 6 CCs per MIDI channel... which makes me wonder, how good would the M8 be for sequencing external gear? Have you tried it?
OK, just saw the M8 can send 10 CCs per instrument. Pretty impressive. I’d only be missing the big screen... oh, and the granular synth. Love granular stuff... or is that some of the things Braids can do?
@@0Fdigital I have more questions if possible. So can you record the chords in the M8 or just play them when the sequencer isn't running? Also can you live record on this? Sorry for all the questions lol but I'm really interested in buying this so I appreciate any answers you can give me.
@@yepuh8828 At the moment it's set up so there's only one channel that will record, so it's monophonic recording only / more for note entry. That may change at some point, especially considering how much the M8 has grown feature-wise in the past year, but currently it's definitely more focused towards monophonic composition. Using 3-4 channels for a chord seems a bit wasteful, so I usually just use either sampled chords or one of the synth engines that allows for chord shapes to be made from oscillator note offsets (e.g. the FM engine in additive mode).
I need to get one of those Retrokits to connect my M8 and Keystep. It sounded really nice when you were just noodling on the keys. It hadn't occurred to me that the M8 could moonlight as a really nice little portable synth module!
This is great! Please do another session- can’t wait for my m8 to arrive and I need content 😂
Wow, the sound design looks really good. I might have to get one of these ordered. Well, after clearing it with my wife since I got a Roland Verselab MV-1 a few weeks ago and have now ordered a Novation Circuit Rhythm! 😂
Would you be able to compare M8 with Polyend Tracker? ie workflow/feature differences?
I don't have the Polyend, so I can't really compare, but the main advantage of the M8 for me is that it has several synth engines (chiptune style wave synth as shown in this stream, 4-op FM synth, and a port of Mutable Instruments Braids), where the Polyend is entirely sample based.
Some other things off the top of my head:
- Extended USB connectivity featuring audio and the ability to "cast" the screen to an app like Touch Designer (I used that to display the screen in this stream)
- Decoupled patterns (chains on M8) per track, so you don't have one pattern holding all the note data for all tracks-I think the Polyend has some form of this though
- Battery built in
- Ability to use the device "headless"-pick up a Teensy 4.1 and a compatible micro SD card and you can run a version of M8 using USB audio and Touch Designer
- No restriction on sample length-the M8 streams samples from the SD card
- Resampling capability-for example, if you're controlling an external synth via MIDI, you can run its audio output through the M8 and capture a phrase to the SD card, or capture an internal synth engine for further mangling in the sample playback engine.
Again, I'm not sure if the Polyend has had any updates that provide the above, but it would absolutely have its own advantages :) I'd love to see someone else chime in with what the Polyend can do that the M8 can't!
@@0Fdigital m8 has stereo sample playback, polyend mono. The m8 has more FX modifiers (3 lanes) and seperate volume lane. Polyend only has 2 FX mod lanes and to change the volume you need to use an fx lane. So basically I often only have one FX mod lane free which is a big downer on the polyend tracker
Also polyend tracker doesn't have tables..
@@slakk5093 I knew I was missing some things!
@@0Fdigital for the videos I’ve seen (I don’t own one either) the Polyend has wavetable and granular synthesis plus an FM radio. It does have two “step effects” per step but also delay, reverb, and limiter in the mixer section. It also can send 6 CCs per MIDI channel... which makes me wonder, how good would the M8 be for sequencing external gear? Have you tried it?
OK, just saw the M8 can send 10 CCs per instrument. Pretty impressive. I’d only be missing the big screen... oh, and the granular synth. Love granular stuff... or is that some of the things Braids can do?
Sounds great. How much is it?!
Final price hasn't been announced yet, but you can follow him on Patreon to get updates:
www.patreon.com/trash80/
$450
So u can play polyphonic chords on this??
Not natively. I'm using the Retrokits RK006 to split incoming polyphonic MIDI data into the 8 channels of the M8.
@@0Fdigital Oh ok ok. Sounds good
@@0Fdigital I have more questions if possible. So can you record the chords in the M8 or just play them when the sequencer isn't running? Also can you live record on this? Sorry for all the questions lol but I'm really interested in buying this so I appreciate any answers you can give me.
@@yepuh8828 At the moment it's set up so there's only one channel that will record, so it's monophonic recording only / more for note entry. That may change at some point, especially considering how much the M8 has grown feature-wise in the past year, but currently it's definitely more focused towards monophonic composition. Using 3-4 channels for a chord seems a bit wasteful, so I usually just use either sampled chords or one of the synth engines that allows for chord shapes to be made from oscillator note offsets (e.g. the FM engine in additive mode).
@@0Fdigital oh ok...thanks again 4 taking the time to answer.