Cakewalk & TR8S

[Joël JAGODZINSKI]

Hi,

I search how change variation on my TR8S with midi command.

It seems that it's possible with this (see below), in sysex ...

Please help me

[Wookiee]

@Joël JAGODZINSKI they look like Sysex commands. Do you know what each line does, each line is a single Sysex command. To use them you put them in the Sysex tab, normally only one line for any one song.

[User 905133]

I have experience using sysex commands (even mining for undocumented commands for some of my gear), but I have no idea what a TR8S is.  If someone else here does (and maybe even has experience with it with sysex commands), great!  If not and if you post a link to the manual (whichever one has the full MIDI implementation full manual, separate MIDI manual, etc.). I'd be happy to take a look.

All I know is the the manufacturer's ID is within this range:  40H to 5FH[Assigned by AMEI for Japanese Manufacturers]

OK.  So I looked up and found the "Reference Guide" and the MIDI Implementation Guide.  Neither of those spell out the details for the TR8S's system exclusive command implementation.  Older Roland manuals used to have that.  In fact I used to do all sorts of stuff with my CA-30 and RA-30 Intelligent Arrangers in addition to other Roland sound modules (starting with the MT-32).

Where did you get the sysex?

From 2018, I found some posts:

Quote

I wouldn’t hold your breath on sysex specs - I’ve done some work in for them in the past and outside of what is published in their manuals and midi specs, they don’t provide anything. This might actually be because there are no sysex specs to publish due to nothing being supported - for machines that do have sysex (e.g. JDXA, TB3) these are fully documented - so we can only assume that those without specs don’t have anything.

Quote

From Roland support again, I’ve had confirmation that there’s no sysex implementation.

Edited May 1 by User 905133
to remove empty lines at the bottom

[User 905133]

25 minutes ago, Wookiee said:

. . .they look like Sysex commands. Do you know what each line does, each line is a single Sysex command. To use them you put them in the Sysex tab, normally only one line for any one song.

They ARE Sysex commands.  If the OP got them from mining the hardware along with some software tools (eg MIDI-OX), that's one thing.  But if they are just copy and pasted from a list of sysex from unrelated gear, that's totally different.

ADDENDUM (just a historical footnote, which I suspect you might already know): In older gear when Roland documented the sysex accessible addresses, it was indeed very possible to put multiple addresses and values to go into those addresses in a single command [F0 . . . F7].  Of course, for each command, you had to calculate the 7-bit checksum for the last value before the End of Transmission marker. So, for that reason many times it was less painful to have a whole bunch of individual sysex commands rather than cut and paste sysex strings [address, value] into a single command.

My most recent Roland gear is from the last century, so I have no idea what if any sysex accessibility that had starting in the 21st century.  

Edited May 1 by User 905133
added a footnote about Roland's sysex

[Wookiee]

@User 905133 I was totally aware of what they are, I didn't want scare the OP, as it was apparent she/it/he didn't.

[User 905133]

50 minutes ago, Wookiee said:

@User 905133 I was totally aware of what they are, I didn't want scare the OP, as it was apparent she/it/he didn't.

4 hours ago, User 905133 said:

5 hours ago, Wookiee said:

. . . they look like Sysex commands.

ADDENDUM (just a historical footnote, which I suspect you might already know)

Thanks for confirming that you already knew (as I suspected).  

To be honest, at first I wasn't going to try to help because I had no idea what a TR8S was, but decided to look it up because I knew the 41 [manufacturer's ID] looked very familiar. So, I decided to look for the MIDI documentation.  I had no idea Roland no longer made the details of their MIDI commands available. 

Hexadecimal can be quite scary. And playing around with it too much can make someone go blind.  🤪

[Wookiee]

58 minutes ago, User 905133 said:

Thanks for confirming that you already knew (as I suspected).  

To be honest, at first I wasn't going to try to help because I had no idea what a TR8S was, but decided to look it up because I knew the 41 [manufacturer's ID] looked very familiar. So, I decided to look for the MIDI documentation.  I had no idea Roland no longer made the details of their MIDI commands available. 

Hexadecimal can be quite scary. And playing around with it too much can make someone go blind.  🤪

Oh try writing code, in machine code.

[Amberwolf]

3 hours ago, User 905133 said:

Hexadecimal can be quite scary. And playing around with it too much can make someone go blind.  🤪

I prefer to play with my deweydecimals.    

 

Way less math, lots more words.....

[Joël JAGODZINSKI]

Thanks to tour answers.

The TR8S is a rythm composer from Roland. You can create some rythm patterns like other historic TR, but they added 8 variations by pattern.

The pattern can be called with midi CC but not the variations.

These sysex lines came from Roland, found in the Roland forum.

But I received another answer from Roland, see below:

"I'm sorry to say that there're no documentation (MIDI SYS EX chart) regarding using SYS EX with the TR-8S.
But I found this information online, maybe it can be helpful for you if you want to use SYS EX with the unit?
https://github.com/compuphonic/TR-8S-SysEx
https://mididesigner.com/qa/10040/roland-tr-8s-sysex-whats-what
I hope you find this information useful. Please reply to this email if you need any further assistance."

There is a lot of informations on sysex possibility for the TR8S

I controled the sysex message which seem to be correct:

Roland: 41

device id: 10

model id: 00 00 00 45

I just have to put the 8 lines in the sysextab, and in events list add when I want a sysex command which point on the good line of the sysextab?