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MINIMO inputs and external gear (help needed)

Hello,

I received my MINIMO kit today (thanks for the fast delivery) and quickly soldered everything together. After tinkering around with it for a bit, I found myself at a loss. Obviously driven by false expectations, I tried to hook it up to some existing gear, just to find out that the inputs seem not to be compatible to anything I own out of the box.

My goal is to be able to hook up a MINIMO DCO to at least a Keystep, which has CV outputs for pitch and gate. My understanding from MINIMOs DCO page was that the inputs are able to control the pitch (3: Input - frequency modulation) and gate (4: Input - amplitude modulation). I set the Keystep output to a max range of 5V, but failed to get them working together properly. Do the inputs on the MINIMO work in reverse, I mean lower CV voltage = higher pitch and open gate (+5V) = no amplitude? I'm a bit puzzled since the "manual page" is a bit cryptic/sparse on information. Can someone point me in the right direction?

Cheers
LaKriz

Comments

  • edited December 2019

    Hello!

    driven by false expectations

    sorry if it's my fault :( miniMOs can interact with other gear up to a point, but it depends a lot on the other gear's specs -they get along nicely with an MS20, because they operate in similar ranges; they're not eurorack modules, but sometimes you can use them within a limited range or as triggers; they work fine sequencing MIDI gear with the MIDI cable, etc.

    miniMO takes inputs from 0 to the voltage it's powered up with. If you have it on battery, that's about 3V, and if you have it on external power, you can go up to 5.

    I think that at least the gate control should work (+5-> you hear sound), and CV should also work to the extent that you hear something but not a scale (because it doesn't follow a particular pitch convention at the moment). I don't know what experiments you've tried, but I would do the following:
    -Connect just pitch and see if you can get any modulation at all when playing notes on the keystep.
    -Connect just the gate and see if you can get notes on and off.
    Couple questions:
    What other stuff have you connected it to?
    Could you send a picture showing the setup with the keystep? I'd like to see what it looks like.
    How can I improve on the manuals? (this might be asking too much of you, but any pointers help!)
    Again, sorry if you felt misled. If you want a refund, please send me a pm.

  • edited December 2019

    Thanks for your reply Jose!

    @jose said: Again, sorry if you felt misled. If you want a refund, please send me a pm.

    A refund? God, no! You can't have it back! ;)

    At least I got the gate working correctly now, but the pitch modulation still is not working as intended. The wave output seems to be distorted and the pitch is all over the place.

    What I did to test pitch modulation:
    I build some kind of midi mediator using an Arduino Leonardo which voltage is in the same range as MiniMo's. Then I checked out your sketches on Github and looked into the Tuned Controller sketch, to see how you handled the frequencies to voltage conversion. I implemented that in my own sketch which just takes usb midi input and does the gate and frequency handling.

    Using an oscilloscope I first took a look at the basic output of the MiniMo (externally powered with 5V), without any external input - works fine. Ouput is a sharp waveform as it should be. As soon as I try to modulate the pitch with an external input the waveform gets all distorted.

    I will do some more tinkering if I find the time. When you said in your reply, that the MiniMo works fine with your MS20, did you mean just the gate or the pitch modulation as well (which is as far as I remember Hertz/Volt instead of the more common Volt/Octave)?

  • When you said in your reply, that the MiniMo works fine with your MS20, did you mean just the gate or the pitch modulation as well

    Both, both ways. See below two examples I recorded quickly earlier today:

    MS20 modulating a miniMO :) pic.twitter.com/0AVB1WRdpC

    miniMO modulating an MS20 :) pic.twitter.com/5yjBTLzP14

    I can also modulate miniMO's amplitude from the MS20, and I have used miniMO's CV sequencer with the MS20, too.

    I build some kind of midi mediator using an Arduino Leonardo which voltage is in the same range as MiniMo's.

    I don't see why you would have issues if the voltage is in the same range :/ Maybe you can try uploading a program to generate a sine wave in the leonardo and see if that works; also, (and I'm writing this only because I don't want to discard anything), have you tried reversing the polarity of the leonardo OUT-miniMO IN connection? when I connect them wrong things don't work as they should (though I don't get harsh distortion).

    I will do some more tinkering if I find the time

    Thanks for not giving up :)

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