For those who have noticed that the Sonic Sideshow walkabout employs 'carryable' rather than 'wearable' technology Project Miniaturisation documents progress towards a new walkabout rig - an improved sampler program running on a small machine that we can wear.

In the run up to the first gig with our new set up I ended up going for the Alesis io2 USB audio/midi interface. On the upside it's small, light, cheapish and has midi included. On the downside it's noisy compared to the mbox, and I'm having midi issues.

Its plug and play on a mac, no drivers to upload, and so seemingly nothing you can do if it doesn't plug and play. Audio works straight off, MIDI is difficult. After a stretch where it sometime didn't work, sometimes did, but I never knew what I'd done right, i found that it only recognises the MIDI if you plug it in with the machine already running, but before you launch the program. What a faff. I can make it work, but i dont really want any 'secret handshakes' to be necessary when other people are using the kit in a stressfull giging situation. Can find nothing on the forums that relates to the mac. There was one person with exactly the same symptoms, but no answers. Seems this is a dead end.

Note: Find the 'Audio Midi setup' application in mac/applications/utilities

18/8/11
Might revert to the mbox one for walkabout rig.

I think it sounds better, I think it has better headroom for loud sounds, or perhaps it's that playback to headphone speakers is better. Also I want to know if the few random crashes I still have are to do with the alesis midi problem, the hackintosh or just the Dell itself.

For those who have noticed that the Sonic Sideshow walkabout employs 'carryable' rather than 'wearable' technology Project Miniaturisation documents progress towards a new walkabout rig - an improved sampler program running on a small machine that we can wear.

Just back from the first gig using the new rig - and it performed alright! I usually want a couple of safety outings before I'll trust a new set up, but it was pretty well debugged so we went for it (with the old rig in the suitcase of course). Still several unexplained crashes though, hoping that it's mostly to do with the lid: the lid-sleep function on the hackintosh is not fully functional it crashes whenever the lid is closed.

Here's the salient bits of information:

The switch on the lid of a dell is magnetic, so no simple hack is possible.

Most of the information online seems to be about making the lid sleep function work normally, but i really want it to just stay awake.

here's a good blog on the hack
http://www.internmentcamp.com/2009/04/12/dell/os-x-on-the-dell-mini-9/
Speaks as many do of  "disabling USB Legacy Support in the BIOS". Dunno what that means but apparently it works if you want a normal sleep function.

An approach to making it sleep properly involving clamshell and lid sleep kexts.
http://www.meklort.com/?p=213

My dell mini seems to be a pretty good discussion forum.
http://www.mydellmini.com/forum/dell-mini-9-os-x-discussion/14762-mini-9-w-10-6-1-stop-sleep-after-lid-close.html
Important bit: The keyboard is designed as part if the cooling system on the dell mini so you can do some damage by disabling sleep function and running it with the lid closed. So I still have to keep the lid slightly open (rather than close it like i planned to save more space).

Heres the solution: InsomniaX
http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/22211/insomniax
This disables the sleep function. Only problem remaining was to get the functionality loaded when the machine boots up. (Seemed unclear if I could do this from the forums, but it does work). InsomniaX has various preferences - Load on AC, load on battery, load on start. With InsomniaX already running these refer to when the 'disable sleep' function will be on, so select 'load on start' and the program will disable sleep as soon as it's launched.
To automatically load insomniaX itself go to : system preferences/system/accounts/loginitems and add insomniaX to the field.
Now InsomniaX will launch automatically when the machine boots up, and immediately disable the lid sleep function.

The same thing works for automatically loading the max file.

For those who have noticed that the Sonic Sideshow walkabout employs 'carryable' rather than 'wearable' technology Project Miniaturisation documents progress towards a new walkabout rig - an improved sampler program running on a small machine that we can wear.

The new program has a file of playdata associated with each sample set (unlike the old one), so playback can be configured in a more flexible way. Trouble is I don't have play data for all the old sample sets. So I wrote a tool to save endvalues to the play data file while listening to the sample - this should speed up the creating of playdata files for the existing sample sets, now just have to trudge through them creating the files.

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Tried to get the record sequence to work well with the imic as interface -failed. Managed to improve it slightly by tweaking the values... but it's not really good enough. Needs to be stable so that the performers don't get confused. 
Think that there is too much noise on the interface for it to tell the difference between 'digital silence' and the open line. Have the feeling there are other problems too: it seems to be more latent than the mbox, making the triggering feel slightly confusing. Also it sounds like there is quite a big increase in the noise floor when I play back the sample (high end hiss), so the noise is going down to the recording.

Feel kind of like I'm out of time for fucking about with it as well. Might just get the physical side set up using an mbox.  It's not elegant, but it works, and it wont look that bad.

For those who have noticed that the Sonic Sideshow walkabout employs 'carryable' rather than 'wearable' technology Project Miniaturisation documents progress towards a new walkabout rig - an improved sampler program running on a small machine that we can wear.

Got a simple load sequence working: set up a file of sampleset names, and several example files of sample sets. Got the load menu working, and its loading the file names and samples into the buffers.

(Embedded the file containing all the sampleset names in the patch. Searching the samples themselves by filepath, but have to search the sample sets by name and leave them somewhere in Max's search path. Seems a bit of a faff. Would like to search all by filepath so it's easy to configure on new machines, but can't seem to load a file to coll using a filepath. Can just hit the coll with a read message, open a dialog and load the file by hand... not as easy as it should be tho. Might make a little thing for altering Max's search path so Ill remember how easily)

For those who have noticed that the Sonic Sideshow walkabout employs 'carryable' rather than 'wearable' technology Project Miniaturisation documents progress towards a new walkabout rig - an improved sampler program running on a small machine that we can wear.

This is the process of getting a balanced input from an SM58 mic to record into the computer at a decent level via the unbalanced imic input. I've been round the houses checking the XLR wiring protocols, and then found that I need an impedance transformer.

It seems to be phantom powered in mic mode and too quiet in line mode. Huge click when the mic switch is opened and closed in mic mode - going to give me triggering problems in the software.

Theres also a lot of noise. An earth hum off the mic (when not touched), and processor noise, not sure if this is to do with the way that I have wired the balanced> sterio sockets, or if it is just innate to going balanced>unbalanced. (Is this what an earth lift does?) Should I experiment with different wirings? (Also been to Maplin. £14 for their wiring solution: sterio 1/4" to mono rca, rca to (one!) male xlr)

Tempted at this point just to get a very cheap mbox1 and dismember it...

Here is the XLR wiring protocol:
pin2 signal (hot). pin3 inverse (cold), pin1 ground (shield)

How do ballanced inputs actually work?
Good article on balanced inputs: http://community.avid.com/forums/t/58612.aspx

There are three types:
Impedance balanced [cold tied to grnd via resistor matching the output imp of the hot]
grnd pin3 to pin1, or leave pin3 floating, makes no difference.

Transformer balanced [actively drive primary winding of output transformer]
grnd pin3 to pin1

Active balanced [actively drive both hot and cold outputs]
leave pin3 floating (or it draws from the transformer, stressing it)

(...So I think the earth lift on a DI disconnects pin3 from grnd. )

Ive tried it with cold to grnd - so try with a floating pin3 instead... Nope.


Right. Found it. It is an impedance matching problem.
Theres stuff on the Griffin site:
http://www.griffintechnology.com/articles/31
The Sm58 is a balanced low impedance output and the imic is an unbalanced high impedance input configured for using with sterio gear and high impedance electret microphones.
Low impedance seems to be below ~ 300 ohms, high above 1.5 K ohms.
Sm58 is rated at 150 (actual 300(?)) ohms.  Can't find any info on the imic.
I need to buy an impedance matching transformer.

Got a Maplin transformer for ~£9. Says its 500 ohms in and switchable 600 ohms/50 k ohms out.

Yup, thats a result! Got the SM58 triggering the new program well enough through the impedance transformer and imic. I'm using the high impedance setting with the mac system preferences slider on about 5/16ths. The sound floor does seem a bit high, but its definitely usable. Guess the first thing to do is to try and adjust the trigger sensitivity, see how good i can get it. (about £34 so far for this method, with so ~ £40 with another splitter to take the strain of the imic, and ~£49 to be able to do two separate mics. Not so cheap, but very small.)

For those who have noticed that the Sonic Sideshow walkabout employs 'carryable' rather than 'wearable' technology Project Miniaturisation documents progress towards a new walkabout rig - an improved sampler program running on a small machine that we can wear.

Alesis IO2 express. 
£99 denmark st. ~ £80 online.  Pretty layout, but would be covered i guess.  Possibly marginally smaller/ lighter? than m audio... would be good to hold one - cop a feel of size and weight.

Behringer U control Uca202.
Small, good. Cheap, good. ~£25-£30. Has 2x2 in/out and a headphone with level control. Think the input levels are all software controlled. Downsides: not balanced inputs I assume,  think its only 16bit. But really easy to mount on the suits- should probly try it. >>>> Ah, no. This looks like a line level only input. Probly back to the drawing board.

Griffin imic.
Ok. Bought one of these. ~£19+ P&P, its small,light,cheap, has a mic level, supposed to be reasonable quality sound, capable of 24bit 48KHz. So heres hoping. Theres some useful Utube tutorial stuff, one of someone using an SM 58 with one, one of digitizing music. 
http://www.macworld.co.uk/digitallifestyle/reviews/index.cfm?reviewid=3262951&productid=3262965&pag

For completeness, Jack also mentioned these:
Alesis MultiMix 6 USB mixer.
~£90 on ebay (also used at good price). Really nice looking little usb mixing desk. (No midi course, also supprised to see it seems to be 16bit). 6 ins on the small one.
http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/article/4258-namm-2010-alesis-announces-multimix-6-usb-mixer.html
 

For those who have noticed that the Sonic Sideshow walkabout employs 'carryable' rather than 'wearable' technology Project Miniaturisation documents progress towards a new walkabout rig - an improved sampler program running on a small machine that we can wear.

Was trying to get the mbox to work on the dell so I can program and decide on a sound card/mic pre later. The Digidesign Standalone core audio driver somehow managed to crash the dell on boot, so I was locked out. 

SAFE MODE: I think this comes under the heading of 'too simple to mention how' for programmers, so here it is: boot up while holding the shift key> get a screen with a hard drive image.  Pangeup/pagedown keys give a menu of different boot options, there is also a help page on this menu with the command line codes for different boot options. I typed the safe mode command -x (which then appears in the bottom left corner of the screen) and hit enter. It booted up in safe mode. >  I manually removed the Digidesign folder from the apps folder. There is also supposed to be something you need to chuck: library/audio/plugins/HAL, but it wasn't there.

Seems the dell is running the newish osx10.6 and the Mbox 1 is nearly obsolite. I installed Standalone Digidesign CoreAudio Drivers v7.4.2 for Leopard [356937] successfully the second time (its compatible with mbox1, says for leopard, but also seems to manage snow leopard)

(The crashes seem to have come from me mistakenly loading the non stand-alone version).

This video is about removing a failed driver. Shows him booting in safe mode... but the screen looked different anyway.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3zPlqlxYbA
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Also looked into London Hackspace in Shoreditch. Would be a cool place to learn/do something specific.£5 min £25 average-required monthly.
http://wiki.hackspace.org.uk/wiki/GettingStarted

For those who have noticed that the Sonic Sideshow walkabout employs 'carryable' rather than 'wearable' technology Project Miniaturisation documents progress towards a new walkabout rig - an improved sampler program running on a small machine that we can wear.

So what I want is a cigarette packet sized interface with two balanced inputs (dont need phantom power) and a sterio out (head phone out would do). A small unit that included the MIDI in/out would be perfect, but it's easy enough to do the midi separately. 

Here's the issues:
Separate midi or same unit? Same could save space, but not if it only comes with over spec/sized boxes. I have 3 USBs so can do MIDI, sound, and have one left in case i need triggering from external keyboard mod.

Do I need duel inputs? We only take one mic out with us lately, so mono is recording to both sides of a sterio file (to maintain sterio architecture for preload samples) would be fine. Stopping interaction on both suits to record is a drag. Write a software solution? With sterio mics I could sense the open mic and prefer the hands of that person in the record sequence. (Hmmm. More coding. What happened to 'good-enough' design principles?)

What to spend? I want to keep the cost down so that i can scale to more suits.

How good should it be?  I want to keep record quality high enough not to be a drag musically. Did an experiment with the computers mic in, signel level was low and very noisy, also clippy, (some impedance problem?). Then thought about how much a notebook maker would spend on the sound card and sort of left it at that: It's got to be an external unit.

How am i going to get the outputs? Can I use a mic pre to go in, and the laptop's headphones out? (Probably). If not then I need a fully fledged outboard mixer (eg the maudio fasttrak)

External battery? As far as I know the small mono pres have no battery option, so they would reduce battery life on the laptop, but that might not matter. Upside is, no extra battery to change.

Here are the products:

ART USB Dual Pre Portable Pre Amp
I like this, small USB duel pre. Battery/power/usb. About £75. Good if I go for duel inputs with separate midi.

http://www.google.co.uk/products/catalog?hl=en&safe=off&client=firefox-a&hs=fJI&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&q=ART+USB+Dual+Pre.+Portable+Pre+Amp&um=1&ie=UTF-8&cid=13119046618475861477&sa=X&ei=NAajTbeLKYy4hAfbz_D-BA&ved=0CDIQ8wIwAg#

M-Audio FAst Track Pro 4X4 Mobile USB Audio/ MIDI Interface with preamp
Over spec. Has all kinds of other features. Also kinda over sized. Over priced? ~£150. But, has the ins and the outs, plus the midi. Good standard of preamp.
Blue Icicle : mono XLR>USB pre. ~ £50. 
Mono inline mic pre. (dont like its looks. But wont see em.)
http://www.gear4music.com/Recording-and-Computers/Blue-Icicle-XLR-to-USB-Coverter-and-Mic-Preamp/AJX

Micport pro : mono XLR>USB pre.
~ £150. What justifies the price? Headphones? bundled software?
http://www.dv247.com/computer-hardware/centrance-micport-pro-usb-mic-pre-amp--50912

Is this some chinese copy of the micport pro?
On ebay without a make name, ~£35. (16 rather than 24 bit, but hey)
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-USB-Microphone-PC-Adapter-XLR-Mic-Pre-48V-Phantom-_W0QQitemZ370499487389QQcmdZViewItem?rvr_id=224381095833&rvr_id=224381095833&cguid=9a4f928d1250a0aad4959e05fbe2b20b#vi-desc



 

You don’t visit Carnyville - it happens to you. At the edge of Bristol's dullest shopping precinct an occupied police station/ fire station/ court house and jail complex form the sides of a triangular courtyard. Stood in the centre watching the final preparations for the three night long escapade you can feel yourself being sucked into an alternate reality - for, with the Carnyville event, The Invisible Circus have made the thing that artists and performers get up for in the morning: they have created a coherent 'other-world', a circus of dreams. For the chance to be transported to a twisted, eerie and delightful place that feels like home a breathtaking array of talent and weirdness beats a path to the police station door. Aerialists, sideshow performers, magicians, musicians, pyrotechnic operatives, expert riggers, clowns, high wire walkers, fire spinners, freaks of nature - all turn out for the pleasure of seeing it happen. And pleasure creates a different kind of show - several million quid would not buy you something with the atmosphere of these artists volunteering their skills for an event they enjoy.  It is the triumph of something that present cynicism would have us disbelieve the existence of, and to perform there is to have your perceptions of what is possible gently rewritten through a haze of gin, paraffin smoke and silliness.

Sonic sideshow took out the old-faithful walkabout act - we strolled through the courtyard between the clowns and sideshows, recording the voices of whoever we met onto our bodies and playing silly tunes with them, sometimes letting the punters beat us with electric spoons, or wear our loud-speaker hats if the space got very noisy. 

 We also had international juggling pro David Bernbaum staying with us at the time, and had the pleasure of introducing him to Carnyville.  During a late night jam session Bernbaum resurrected his old juggling-as-percussion act, inspired by which Slade popped out the next morning, got some metal scouring pads and bits of wire, and did a quick modification of the suits so that juggling balls could trigger the samples.  You can see the results below. They're not bad for a hangover!

In September the Sonic Sideshow joined the House of Fairytales’ Travelling Art Circus once again for The Mayor’s Thames Festival - we used junk, water and electricity to make a moist and marvellous racket! Our venue was a beautiful little red and yellow small-top tent stood in the park by Gabriel's Wharf, on the south bank. There we set up our interactive junk sculpture - the Musical Mayhem Machine - and a Waterwheel Powered Beat Sequencer newly built for the event. The Beat Sequencer operates on a similar principle to Daphne Oram's 'Oramics Machine' and looks like a Heath Robinson contraption for making a really good cup of tea! It was built to interactively demonstrate the principle of renewable energy harnessed from the water cycle, and the concept of cyclical beat patterns in music. To create beats the audience draws onto a disk of card which is then read by light sensors as it spins on the waterwheel powered turntable. I addition to our machines, the boys from Noisy Toys built an excellent contraption of see-saws and water-shoots that amplified the dripping and sloshing sounds using under-water microphones. All together we produced quite a din!

Over two days a seemingly endless stream of punters filed through our tent including school-children, teachers, parents, grandparents, intrigued passers-by and an inquisitive dog. Visitors contributed so many drawings to be processed by our machine that we had to continually send out for new pens. Divine intervention struck midway through the weekend with a visitation from an entire Hari Krishna Orchestra - now that’s what I call fusion!

Find more information about the Waterwheel Powered Beat Sequencer here.