DSI Tempest

The Lounge Other Gear
#49

^ all this is true. and don’t get me wrong the Tempest is definitely growing on me and it does sound great. But the fact that front panel real estate has been given to distortion and compression on the Tempest is beyond me. If they were hidden in the Amp section in a menu somewhere I’d have noticed they didn’t sound great, didn’t use them and moved on. But the fact that they are on the front… whose idea was that? I would expect everything on the front panel to be useable. These are not useable.

Enough hacking the Tempest anyways. All in all I really do actually like it.

That is indeed an Iotine in the Karenn pic. Stacked on top of a TL Audio Ivory as far as I can tell. The Tempest does offer very flexible mixing capabilities with it’s voice outs. At the moment I have an Eventide Space and it sounds great with the Tempest. Sending one or two sounds out individually and a bit of Space over the aux sends really brings the Tempest to life

#50

I don’t know as I don’t work for them or own the box, it was just manner of description as I see it… But that’s what it is really, an added bonus… It isn’t like a stand alone distortion box that should be expected to handle and mangle a full mix with aplomb, but has a simple dist/overdrive circuit probably similar to feeding back an out to an input.
I thought anyway.

EDIT - imagine the A4 overdrive on the full kit?? Would probably sound poo.

[/quote]
Not so. I set up a thread because my mind was blown by how good the feedback and overdrive work together with the oscillators and filter on the A4. Have a listen.

It’s a nicely thought out, very useful architecture Elektron have implemented there. There’s the same number of parameters involved here as on the Tempest, chiefly Osc 1 feedback level and the drive level on the filter.
The Tempest distortion is literally tacked on the end of the mix post filter. Can’t be shaped and introduces lots of noise and has some kind of high pass filter that kills the low end. And it audibly clicks on and off when used

#51

Messing with Tempest and my Knas Ekdahl Polygamist.

#52

@cocker
are you running individual sounds out to individual outputs, into individual channels on a mixer, and only sending one or two sounds to the distortion / compression on the master out ?

that seems to be the intended setup. i own some really classy distortion, and I wouldn’t run an entire mix through it and expect loveliness.

perhaps the distortion/compression gets real estate on the front panel because they are meant to be played (rather than set & forget). it seems to me to be a machine that begs to be played as opposed to programmed, at least that’s my expectation.

#53

For instance, i’m in the event or mixer screen. Then i turn one of the envelope knobs. The screen doesnt show me any feedback because it still shows the mixer. And because you need a shift combo to access all adsr params I cant do it blind.
Also it happens alot that i think im in 16 sounds mode, but actually am in 16 mutes, that kind of stuff.

#54

Not so. I set up a thread because my mind was blown by how good the feedback and overdrive work together with the oscillators and filter on the A4. Have a listen.

It’s a nicely thought out, very useful architecture Elektron have implemented there. There’s the same number of parameters involved here as on the Tempest, chiefly Osc 1 feedback level and the drive level on the filter.
The Tempest distortion is literally tacked on the end of the mix post filter. Can’t be shaped and introduces lots of noise and has some kind of high pass filter that kills the low end. And it audibly clicks on and off when used[/quote]
Yeah seen that, nice, A much more versatile setup deffo!! but that’s only 1 sound at a time, probably wouldn’t sound useable on the whole kit at once using that technique. I do like the distortion the A4 can do tho I’m not sure its high end either…

The click from the circuit activating on the tempest is in the FAQs on DSIshomepage http://www.davesmithinstruments.com/support/tempest.php
They say its not too audible when playing? Is it worse than that?
Cheers mate thinking of giving one a go… No trying one first though here.

#55

the 32 mutes is great, i put the same sound on a few pads, then basically make it more complex as it goes,

also one voice controlled by the ot, for arps and all that good stuff

#56

In case anyone’s interested, there’s a beta update to the OS just released which adds arp functionality, plus a few other features.

#57

i didnt know, aweeeesum

#58

Very interested. Signed up to the group but waiting on confirmation. Any more detes pal?
Cheers, Leon.

#59

If you are waiting for the support page, you’ll miss out on alot of features for months. Beta’s are posted here: http://dsiforum.org/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=4727&sid=bfa5ace0a65401fff558091370d47346
In this beta is alot more cool stuff, like 8 bars, easier sample selection, unquantised recording, sequencer midi out, basic midi control over beatFX etc etc

#60

^ still waiting to be confirmed as a group member so can’t get in.

#61

Would you like me to put the beta somewhere in a public dropbox or something? I could do that…

#62

I don’t own one yet but I’m sure the other users not able to get into the forum would love that?!

Have you tried it out yet?

Cheers L

#63

It’s now starting to feel like the machine I thought I was buying originally.

:slight_smile:

#64

Yes played around with it yesterday. It’s really good! The arp fills in notes in the sequencer when you hold the roll button. This is really flexible, you can mute/edit steps afterwards, which is really cool to build melodies for people who can’t play that fast like me :slight_smile:
And because you can set the pads to a certain scale (like a-minor), the arp also is in that scale when you press multiple pads. Really useful.
The copy sequence feature is also implemented very well. When holding the copy button, you can select (by using softknobs) what to copy and what not (the sound, the sequence, the FX etc). It’s not something you are forced to choose everytime, just a setting you can make while holding copy so it’s really unobtrusive, which is good!

#65

^ sound fellas…

Managed to get onto the forum now. Was saying I needed to wait for some confirmation but I pressed send again and got the mail. Playrecords there too. Possibly will have a unit this week.

#66

Finally got registered at the dsi forum. Thanks to tsv for his help there. Much appreciated. Lot’s of cool info and tips on there for sure. Will defo give the new beta OS a try. I’m a bit confused though. Seems there are several different OSes running different parts of the machine. If I load the main OS will it update the others or do they have to be done individually ??

For instance in the system info I can see

Main OS: 1.3.0
Voice OS: 1.2
Panel OS: 1.3
Sam OS: 1.1

Also really bugging me this one and I can’t find a clear cut answer, but can I do an empty reset (like on A4 with function + power on = list of reset options) ?

I’m done with the demo presets. I deleted all the demo projects but there’s still stuff named and set up as if they were there. Is it possible to just wipe absolutely everything and start afresh ?? I realize the samples will stay in there but everything else I would like to get rid of. Any tips on that would be swell.

#67

You have to do each OS separately. But the main OS is the one that changes more often.

From the forum:

Received this from DSI a while back:
“There is a way to format the Tempest’s Flash drives and reload the factory sound banks. To do so, press and hold both “Shift” buttons and press the “System” button. The “Debug” menu will be shown on screen. Navigate to the menu item labelled “Format Flash Drive”. Select it and format the drive. After doing so, you will need to re-load the factory sound files to the Tempest.”

Cheers

1 Like
#68

Nice one. Thanks again tsv. What i’m trying to do really is just have a blank template project i can use as a starting point each time i want something new.
Think i have it sorted the way i like now.
Really growing on me this machine. Got lost for a few hours today in 16 tunings mode and using the different scale settings. Brilliant ! Used to have an old Korg workstation keyboard that did scales too. Getting some real interesting chord/note combos I might not otherwise have come up with. Can’t wait to try out that Arp :+1: