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Hi all,

The Roland FP4 works fine on its own, but when I set Cubase 5 to record, and then start playing, the sound that comes out is distorted and sounds strange - which makes it very difficult to play properly.

I am listening via headphones coming out of the Roland (same happens if listen though the inbuilt Roland speakers). The Roland is connecting to the PC via USB.

Has anyone had this problem before?

Thanks!

The distortion is coming from the Roland, not the PC, correct?

I wonder if this is related to the 'local control' setting, either on the FP4 or in Cubase?

It could be that when recording the MIDI information is sent to the PC, then loops back into the instrument, effectively playing the same note twice.

In my experience, I would not really describe this as a distortion sound, however it does result in a rather strange and undesirable effect.

Kind regards,
James
x

Check you don't have 'input monitoring' enabled in Cubase, or you will be feeding the same sound back to your headphones, including, a tiny bit of latency, which could give you the effect you describe.

Rob.

Hi there,

I assume that the USB cable is just sending the signals into the computer to record, and not sending the signals back to the Roland. (But I am just guessing here... - do you know how I can control this??)

The distortion is not a delayed sound, but all the tones sound as if there are extra high frequencies and often the lower frequencies missing, so doesn't sound like what it should...

I have the monitor button off when recording in Cubase, - the orange button visible on the MIDI track on the left section of the track... is this the one you mean Rob?

Thanks!

I figured it out.

The control is at the left part of the midi track: set the output (signified by arrow to the right) to 'not connected'

When you delay sound and add it back to itself, if the delay is only a few milliseconds you don't hear it as an echo. But the sound combines both in and out of phase and so adds constructively or destructively depending on the frequency. They call it a "comb filter".

You get the same effect if there is a reflective surface near a speaker, you hear both the direct sound from the speaker plus the sound delayed by the reflection. This is what gives each room a different sound, the highs and lows are filtered depending on the size and shape of the room.

Sound travels about one foot per millisecond