I tried to sync external devices to the Prime system via midi without success. The bpm value is sent over midi, but there is a small drift that accumulates in time and prevents the systems to be in sync. If the pitch slider is slightly moved, the devices get completely out of sync.
For now I sacrifice one deck of my prime setup for time code. From this time code I generate a midi clock with my sync lock, which can be used to run Ableton live. This works very well and runs stable for hours. But Ableton Link would be so much simpler to use and require no additional hardware.
Can you explain this in more detail? I am interested in syncing an external device but I didn’t manage to do it properly. Can you explain to me your preocedure @beatom ?
It takes a time and a control signal from two audio channels and converts them into a midi clock. So I setup a short track with a 96th notes click channel and a second channel containing the start/stop/continue signal. This track runs on one of my decks and I use it as bpm master. Then I setup loops and hotcues accordingly to have control of the time signal. It’s important to turn off pitch shifting, so the click signal doesn’t get altered.
When the signal is running, I can change bpm drastically and still the midi clock remains absolutely stable and in sync to the SC5000 tracks (using the sync option). It runs for hours without shifting a single 96th note. You can beat match by using the jog wheels in non-vinyl mode.
Nice!! Thank you for letting me know this device.
However I don’t understand how do you setup this track with 96th notes click on one channel (left channel?), and the signals for start/stop/continue (right channel?).
Yes, that’s exactly how it works. I use a click sample and build the track manually in Ableton Live. So it’s just about fiddling around in the DAW to get the desired result.
It has been mentioned before by a few people, so yes I would definitely Plus one this ableton link, need something to spice up my sets, as I am getting a bit board.
The only option to do anything special is looping on the deck layers, but that is quite awkward to do with any consistency and without being able to mark the tracks you want to use on the seconds deck layer so they are visible as this! when you put them in a playlist, it gets messy and often confusing especially if say you wanted to use a couple of looped tracks over your playing track, its just awkward and takes too much setting up. But with Ableton you can set a large or extensive loop collection or looped track sections as I like etc, so although it would mean using a laptop at present I really need this enjoyment factor, I like to spice things up a lot, so again I say ableton link would be exiting
And I doubt I could afford any decent sampler / or if Denon release a sampler, so ableton link is my best option +1 or plus 100
Is there any chance you could make this time code track available to folks? I’m considering doing similar so I can keep onboard mixer fx and a 303 in sync but I don’t understand MTC enough to understand what needs to be in a track like this.