Smarttrigger/Surge/JobekyP-P-S Triple Zone Ride

[maru_engineering]

Hello everybody!

Please be so kind and share your MegaDrum settings for a piezo(bell)-piezo(bow)-Switch(edge) triple zone ride like the ones manufactured by Smarttrigger, Alesis Surge or Jobeky...
I recently purchased a 20'' Triple Zone Ride from Jobeky and I hope I will be able to use it together with my MegaDrum32 to get all the zones and the choke working.

Thank you very much in advance!

[maru_engineering]

Hi again!

I just checked with the ohmmeter the internal wiring of my Jobeky Ride and it's like:

Jack1 Bow Piezo - Tip; Bell Piezo - Ring
Jack2 Bow Piezo - Tip; Edge Switch - Ring

...so, not Smarttrigger style which, from what I read on this forum, is outputting the edge switch on both of the rings of the jacks...

Thanks for sharing your knowledge and experience.

[dmitri]

As I have not had such triggers/cymbals I can only make a theoretical suggestion.
1. Plug the the cable with pizeo1/piezo2 signal to one jack and configure it as a dual piezo/piezo pad/cymbal. Disable piezo1 zone setting its Note to 0. Set the piezo 2 zone with a Bell note.
2. Plug the piezo1/switch cable to another jack and configure it as a 3way piezo/switch/switch pads/cymbal. Make sure you configure the piezo1 zone of this jack with a Bow note, the switch zone with an Edge note and the 3rd zone with a Bell note.
3. Place all the zones into the same (and exclusive only to them) XTalk group.

[maru_engineering]

Hi Dimitri,

It looks like the last step from point 2 did some magic The triggering is looking much better now! I have to fine tune the parameters and check the choke functionality before reporting back here...

Thank you!

Best Regards from Romania.

[maru_engineering]

Hello again!

After rebuilding my ride (I wanted to be able to get the edge switch sensitive enough so that I get some velocity range for the edge hits; I wanted to get rid of the hotspot of the bow) and some testing I came to the conclusion that the separation between Bow and Bell is much better (in fact I think it's almost perfect) if the bell and bow piezos are using the same jack.

From my past three months experience of converting acoustic cymbals I think for the diy-er the most easy approach is the Bell-piezo, bow-piezo, edge-switch approach.
If there are other MegaDrum users out there using this configuration let's kindly ask Dmitri to consider a software modification that allows the 3 Way Roland configuration to accept the rim of the first of the two input that have to be used to accept piezo signals - it is configurable like this in MegaDrum Manager, but the module is still expecting a switch...

Dmitri, please let me know if my description was clear or if you like to have more information about this plea...

Thank you everybody!
Best regards,

[dmitri]

If there are other MegaDrum users out there using this configuration let's kindly ask Dmitri to consider a software modification that allows the 3 Way Roland configuration to accept the rim of the first of the two input that have to be used to accept piezo signals - it is configurable like this in MegaDrum Manager, but the module is still expecting a switch...

Dmitri, please let me know if my description was clear or if you like to have more information about this plea...

I don't think there is a need for a firmware change. Did you configure it like this?:

1. Plug the the cable with pizeo1/piezo2 signal to one jack and configure it as a dual piezo/piezo pad/cymbal. Disable piezo1 zone setting its Note to 0. Set the piezo 2 zone with a Bell note.
2. Plug the piezo1/switch cable to another jack and configure it as a 3way piezo/switch/switch pads/cymbal. Make sure you configure the piezo1 zone of this jack with a Bow note, the switch zone with an Edge note and the 3rd zone with a Bell note.
3. Place all the zones into the same (and exclusive only to them) XTalk group.

If yes, then where the module is still expecting a switch?

[maru_engineering]

Hello Dmitri!

Of course I tried the configuration that you had suggested a while ago... It was working but sometimes I get a bell event followed by a bow event around 14 ms (as per MIDI Log Viewer)... Some other times if I hit the bell I get strong bow midi events.

However this never happens when I configure bow and bell on the same input as head / rim...

My feeling is that is I set the bow note to 0 (that's disabled) on the first input, Megadrum would not process that signal anymore in order to decide make the separation between bow and bell and relies for this on the Xtalk algoritm; furthermore maybe the scanning time and/or the Xtalk not being "strong" enough can have something to do with it.

If you think it's useful I can get some midi logs for the two scenarios to see the separation improvement when using the first input as bow/bell... In fact I think I could split the signals and use simultaneously the two configurations, but I'm not sure how the midi data is going to look like ...
Maybe we can identify by the input number what's supposed to be what...

My opinion is that if 3way Roland "algorithm" would read a voltage from the rim of the first input (instead of looking for noise reduction) when set to piezo in MegaDrum Manager (like Dual Or Yamaha option) but still expecting a switch in the second rim input (current 3Way Roland implementation) everything will work like charm...

Please let me know if my explanation was coherent enough

Thank you so much Dmitri!

[maru_engineering]

One cigarette later, let me ask it this way:

How complicated would be to change the code in order to use Dual or three way Yamaha 'algorithm' for the first rim input when selecting 3 Way Roland on the first Head input and Piezo (insead of switch on the) first Rim Input while still looking (as is currently does) for a switch on the second rim input?

(first meaning of course the current input we are configuring and the second the next input in ascending order - as it is basically currently for the 3way Roland configured inputs)...

The point is it's very hard to DiY a nice looking and functional bell switch... Piezo under the bell it's better also for the dynamics; Megadrum can separate the piezos very well in Dual Yamaha three way mode but them we loose the edge switch, maybe the chocking capability...

I think I was more clear this time around

Thank you for your time!

[maru_engineering]

Wait... Maybe It's already in... I'm testing something and will report back....

[maru_engineering]

No, it's not working as I thought...

I was asking if it isn't too much trouble to make the following configuration usable:

Proposal_first_input.jpg

Proposal_second_input.jpg

In the mean time I will try to fine-tune things as per your proposal and check if I can get better results with Dual or three way Yamaha configuration...

Thank You!