first time setup of MegaDrum

[michel30]

Hi all,

I just finished my A to E conversion of a vintage Premier 303 kit using a crossbar-ish design with foam cones and Drum-tec mesh heads. The piezo's are connected using 47K voltage dividers.
I also have a Synthex 3.2 kit running megadrum_20120911 firmware and MDM 20121013.

When I hook everything up I get responses from all piezo's: both on the MegaDrum and MDM I see signals on the VU meters and midi log.

Now I seem to be missing the obvious: I've read a lot in the forum about settings but I can not figure out how to set my voltage divider/HighLevel combination:

I start with default settings, HighLevelAuto on and HighLevel on 64. No notes set (Disbld).
From what I understood from the forum this should give me the HighLevel but it stays at 64 where I expected it to change to a larger number.
I do see the highest levels in the midi log change when turning the pot though, from 0 to 127.

Can someone help me with a step-by-step plan how I adjust my pots to the HighLevel of ~950?

[dmitri]

If input is Disabled then it should not trigger anything and HighLevel should not be updated no mater how many time and how hard you hit it. Of course you should not see anything from the disabled input in the MIDI log.

[michel30]

So first step is to assign notes using one of the maps on the forum?
They are all set to 0.

Then how do I go about setting the pots: set HighLevelAuto, set pot to 0 and increase voltage till HighLevel is in the ~950's?

[dmitri]

So first step is to assign notes using one of the maps on the forum?

You can set it to any note matching your software synthesizer

They are all set to 0.

Then how do I go about setting the pots: set HighLevelAuto, set pot to 0 and increase voltage till HighLevel is in the ~950's?

Sounds about right.

[michel30]

Great, I'll give that a try.
Thanks for the help

[michel30]

Well I did just that and no luck..

I set:
1. AltFalseTrSupp No
2. MinScan 40
3. Curve to Linear.
4. Threshold to 80
5. Retrigger to 1
6. DynLevel to 15 and DynTime to 60
7. H note 38, R note 40

And HighLevel stays at 64.. it doesn't update automatically which ever value I set the pots to. The midilog responds though.

[dmitri]

It means you configure one input but the pad is connected to another.

[michel30]

You mean it is connected physically to a different port?

Because when I set the snare (input 4) note to 38 and hit it I get responces in the midi log, and setting the same snare (input 4) note to 0 the stops the midi log from showing responces.

That means I have the snare pad connected correctly, or?

[dmitri]

Depending on soldering quality and cabling you may have a crosstalk from the input where the pad is connected to the snare input and hence you get a signal on the snare input but very weak.

[michel30]

I have this issue on all pads I tested: 5 mesh ones.

I doubt it's my overall soldering skills though, but what I'll do is try some piezo's directly on my MD housing connector to rule out any soldering/cabling issues. That way there will be only 10cm ribbon cable attached between circuit board and piezo.

MDM runs on Linux too right? I can try that also to rule out my crappy XP test computer. Building a dedicated computer is next on the list.