FCB1010 summary

[toscanini]

Hello,
I am a fresh fcb1010 owner and have read pretty much everything to be found about the item on this forum, and also in some other places.
Everybody complains about the steep learning curve/ unclear operation manual, name it as you like, and I can only agree: after all the reading I have at least 3 questions:
1. it is still not clear if you can assign more than 2 of the 10 available keys to CC messages (and not PC messages)
2. I would really need distinct toggle - gate modes for the keys. Can this be assigned?
3. and with Live running, although I can see the MIDI activity both on my soundcard's and Live's interfaces, I cannot assign MIDI mapping to any UI element.
I other words, I have not come very far

I am not a guitarist, I'd rather use the item as a traditional controller, sending out freely assigned CC messages.

I see there are firmware improvements available, iFCB, UnO firmware, FCB1020 Python script. One is a Mackie emulation, the other is a AP40 emulation, I have never used any of this gear, all I know is I'd love to take a shortcut to a basic, up and going setup this time. Ah yes, I use m4l, and not too afraid to get my hands dirty...

All this stuff has been mentioned in recent threads, so I might get lucky and get fresh impressions about what would be an ideal setup for Ableton users..
cheers and thank you in advance,

[Tone Deft]

all you need to know about the FCB1010

http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php? ... =soft+step

[toscanini]

Tone Deft, the thread you link to talks exclusively about SoftStep. Like I said I just bought my FCB1010. I try to gather info about the best setup for ableton users.
It can be your opinion that I should have bought SoftStep instead, but right now, that is no big help. Please let me stay with creative opinions about the FCB1010 for now

[LoopStationZebra]

Seeing as Tone linked to the thread I started, I'll take a shot at your questions.

1. it is still not clear if you can assign more than 2 of the 10 available keys to CC messages (and not PC messages)

You can. Each of the 10 pedals can handle 2 CC messages, and 1 PC.

2. I would really need distinct toggle - gate modes for the keys. Can this be assigned?

Modes cannot be assigned. You would have to do that on the Live end of things. With the FCB1010, it's on or off, baby. lol.

3. and with Live running, although I can see the MIDI activity both on my soundcard's and Live's interfaces, I cannot assign MIDI mapping to any UI element.

What do you mean by you can 'see' MIDI activity? When you hit a pedal on the FCB does the little yellow MIDI square light up in Live? If so, did you switch on MIDI mapping before trying to map?


Also, are you on a PC or Mac?

[The Leveller]

For no. 3 make sure you have enabled 'remote' in midi prefs for the FCB.

[The Leveller]

Oh, and if you are just using it as a controller for Live then get the APC40 emulation from Hanz Petrov, problems solved.

[toscanini]

Hello, guys, thank you for the help, indeed big noob mistake to not have checked "remote" for my soundcard's midi port. Sorry about this. And good to know that the FCB can be assigned to CCs all over the keys, even if the way it works seems a bit different from what I am used to (can it be that one key will output 1 value for a given CC number, instead of toggling between usual 0 and 127? Anyway, it starts to make a bit more sense.

Also very good to know that Hanz Petrov's FCB1020 script could be what I need. I couldn't exactly follow the setup indications though,

To use, drop the FCB1020 folder into Ableton's MIDI Remote Scripts directory

...the closest I have found was /Library/Preferences/Ableton/Live 8.2.1/User Remote Scripts, and it does not work, at least "FCB1020" does not show up in the MIDI control surface menu in he Live preferences.
Maybe it is just not the right location... or could that be a problem that I use OSX10.4.11 on PPC?

cheers,
toscanini

[The Leveller]

Go: Library, Applications, right click on the Ableton Icon in the current ableton version folder, 'show package contents', the in the contents folder open the 'app resources' folder and you'll find the midi remote scripts folder in there.

[toscanini]

Aaaaargh. These right-clicks and show package contents with OSX. So badass. I'm such a noob:P

I'll tell you tomorrow. No brains tonight.

[hacktheplanet]

I spent the $20 for iFCB: http://www.wabbitwanch.com/iFCB.html
It's an editor for the FCB1010. It was worth it to me because it has saved me hours learning to program the beast.

[LoopStationZebra]

I spent the $20 for iFCB: http://www.wabbitwanch.com/iFCB.html
It's an editor for the FCB1010. It was worth it to me because it has saved me hours learning to program the beast.

+1

One thing that I never knew was that each pedal can send out 2 CCs at the same time, but every manual programming method I've seen (and posted, lol) never mentions how to do that...

When I started using iFCB I was a bit shocked to see a 2nd assignment option.

[madlab]

Which version of ifcb do you use ? Some seem to have a pretty erratic behaviour.

[LoopStationZebra]

2.1.8

I believe the erratic behaviour comes with the fact that it's VERY picky as to what MIDI interface you are using. I get plenty of joy using my M-Audio UNO USB-to-MIDI cable. But my very nice Motu microlite MIDI hub? No luck at all.

[esteban2010]

iFCB....is the best thing. You can do it ALL with it.

[toscanini]

Hey Guys,
thank you for sharing opinions and experiences,
as a matter of fact, I was hoping to have some iFCB- FCB1020 comparison,
I was just not expecting to be so slow myself to have any decent setup,
@The Leveller, thanks, this time FCB1020 installation worked, I hope I have a moment to check it out tomorrow,
question:
doesn't 1020 also need a second MIDI cable, I haven't found anything about it but it would make sense if it works à la APC...
I'll try the iFCB test version aswell,
@Loopstationzebra, yes, I have found one youtube video (maybe it was in spanish) where someone sets up this double CC function with the original firmware, does not seem very straightforward, I need to check it again.
cheers,
toscanini