ACT generic device - Surface Function for foot controller

[Victor Payne]

Hi, I have some old Kit for my guitar setup , A digitech RPX400 and control foot pedal device with three selections to allow hands free 1)Stop/rewind, 2)Record, 3)Play/Pause 

I have tried using the ACT learn function and assigning predefined options to each but the surface does not seem to save the presets to the action of the pedal 

i.e I select the surface then the button 3 which I have given the play/pause function through the options setup, I then switch on the ACT learn , select the button 3 , the screen says Learn Midi, I press button 3 on the Physical foot pedal and the surface stops the learn.  I switch off ACT learn, save the surface .

When I try button 3 on the  physical foot pedal it starts play on the DAW  and then when I press it again it does a STOP/Rewind to beginning of the track 

Nothing I do will actually assign the Play/Pause function !!

This is a simple 3 button footswitch and the DAW does respond but I cannot get the ACT learn function to assign the right function to the button 

surely if there is a simple device its a 3 button foot control pedal but I'm noy able to make it assign the correct function , should I give up now or does someone 

have some advice that could help me make this function. ?

Thank you in advance if you have some advice to offer.

 

[John Vere]

There is a toggle for now position behaviour. CTRL W 

this toggles between stop in place and rewind for the spacebar. I use a cheap Chinese 3 pedal foot switch and you cannot program that toggling unless you waste a switch that would macro ctrl W 

it’s no big deal to set it by hand and then the foot switch behaves correctly while recording.  

[azslow3]

11 hours ago, Victor Payne said:

Hi, I have some old Kit for my guitar setup , A digitech RPX400 and control foot pedal device with three selections to allow hands free 1)Stop/rewind, 2)Record, 3)Play/Pause 

I have tried using the ACT learn function and assigning predefined options to each but the surface does not seem to save the presets to the action of the pedal 

i.e I select the surface then the button 3 which I have given the play/pause function through the options setup, I then switch on the ACT learn , select the button 3 , the screen says Learn Midi, I press button 3 on the Physical foot pedal and the surface stops the learn.  I switch off ACT learn, save the surface .

When I try button 3 on the  physical foot pedal it starts play on the DAW  and then when I press it again it does a STOP/Rewind to beginning of the track 

Nothing I do will actually assign the Play/Pause function !!

This is a simple 3 button footswitch and the DAW does respond but I cannot get the ACT learn function to assign the right function to the button 

surely if there is a simple device its a 3 button foot control pedal but I'm noy able to make it assign the correct function , should I give up now or does someone 

have some advice that could help me make this function. ?

Thank you in advance if you have some advice to offer.

 

If some device can send MIDI messages, you can configure it to stop/record/play (or to do many other things).

• you are mixing many terms, so please write exactly
  1. which device you try to use as MIDI controller, RPX400 or "control foot pedal device". If the later, which one (name/model)?
  2. which Cakewalk Surface plug-in you try to configure: "ACT MIDI Controller" or "Cakewalk generic surface"?
• "ACT learn"  cell/button you can see in plug-ins (including mentioned Surface plug-in and VST) have nothing to do with what you try to achieve. You need to do "MIDI Learn" (only) inside Surface plug-in (sometimes called "ACT plug-in"). Yes,  the word "ACT" is used for many different things.
• some devices/controls don't send simple MIDI messages, in that case you can't "learn" them, you need to enter the message manually. Other can send more then one message from the same control. So my question (1) is important, we can have a look in concrete documentation to find the right way for you

[John Vere]

The foot switch I use cost about $30. It’s dead simple to program.   
it’s cheap plastic but so far held up for a few years. 
For my live gigs I have a Stealth Switch 3. It’s just a box with USB and five 1/4” jacks that you can use any sustain type pedal with   Anyhow look up USB foot switch you’ll see dozens of options.  
the software lets you record and store any keystrokes. The software for the cheap ones is crummy but works. The stealth has really good software. 
The thing is you don’t need to use midi or act or nothing. If you program for a space bar that will work in all software. I’m forever typing a R or W into my lyrics cause I stepped on the pedal 

Edited January 3, 2021 by John Vere

[Victor Payne]

Hi ,  Thankyou for your hep in this matter.

1) The Midi device I have is the RPx400 by DigiTech it has and additional plug in footswitch RPXFC with 3 buttons on it.

Button 1) STOP/UNDO    2) RECORD   3) PLAY

I believe all the midi is held in the RPx400 guitar pedal and that the additional RPxFC (foot controller) which is plugged into the RPx400 guitar effects pedal

is simply an extra foot controller.

Under devices the cakewalk see the driver which gives me inputs and outputs of RPx400 MIDI.

2) The Control Surface I am trying to use is the ACT Midi Controller with the input and output ports set as RPx400 Midi.

3) Looking in the Plugins area I can see the surface plugins including the ACT and Cakewalk Generic.

When I pull up the generic surface I created and select a cell i.e B3  I have this set as Play/Pause, I then press the surface Button,

then I press the RPXFC 3rd physical butoon and this stops the surface learn midi function but it does not adopt the Play/Pause function.

 

I thought I would use the ACT Midi Controller as this would allow learn of a generic device but it does not seem to learn even though it does send a signal to the surface to stop the learn nothing gets registered or assigned to the specific button from the foot pedal.   I was hoping that this would work as the RPXfc pedal is a neat small pedal with just the 3 pedal function of 1) Stop / Rewind  2) Record  3) Play / Pause.

I wonder if it's worth trying the Cakewalk Generic surface , would this allow me to assign function to the Pedal Button like 1) Stop / Rewind  2) Record  3) Play / Pause. !!

Thankyou to John also, Yes I see a lot of independant foot switches on the market but I wanted to see if my old kit would work

as it is simply a nice robust unit with a Guitar Multi Effects Pedal RPX400 and the added RPFXC foot controller with some simple functions 

for hands free whilst working with the tracks.  I was hoping the Generic surface could easily learn the few basic functions of the Foot Controller 

I would have hoped by now that there would be a Guitar Multi FX pedal with hands free foot pedal that would work with the DAW's available but I have looked at Zoom, Line 6, Boss &Mooer, they all seem to focus on the guitar effects and avoid the DAW control. 

With so many multi FX pedals available it's hard to choose and then they don't seem to have DAW control so I would like to stick with existing kit until I find the MultiFX pedal that will give me the sounds I need.

Afterall I want to spend more time playing than being a sound device engineer .

Many Thanks 

Victor

 

 

 

Edited January 3, 2021 by Victor Payne
thankyou to John

[azslow3]

16 hours ago, Victor Payne said:

1) The Midi device I have is the RPx400 by DigiTech it has and additional plug in footswitch RPXFC with 3 buttons on it.

Unfortunately Digitech documentation say nothing about MIDI these devices send (they just describe how they work with in-house software).

Please check the following:

• remove ACT MIDI and start recording "RPx400 MIDI" device into MIDI track. Press each button for 2-3 seconds. Then stop recording.
• Open "Views/Event List" in Cakewalk. It should list what buttons  send to Cakewalk. Write us what you see in the "Kind" and "Data" column,

Alternatively you can use any MIDI monitoring tools you now.