this is interesting, but is the midi timing of the microQ ever actually noticeable when listening? Yes, a million times yes. =( It's bad enough that I may end up selling it. The 'test' for that is that sometimes I'll leave a sequence running and go off and do something else (I'm too lazy to turn it...

Since I'm now officially obsessive... My Schrittmacher arrived today and I decided to run the same MIDI timing tests I did on my RS7K. I connected my MicroQ to MIDI OUT 1 and my Nord Lead 2 to MIDI OUT 2 and recorded (each independently, not both at once). This was, in hindsight, a bad idea since I ...

Yeah, you can't draw too many conclusions from this -- TR-909 has timing similar to this, so don't worry too much unless you notice it audibly.

With MIDI you're going to see issues no matter what unit you have.

What you need depends on how you plan on using stuff. If you're just going from the MC-50 => everything then it's easy enough, just use MIDI THRU for everything or get a MIDI Solutions T8 (which is sort of expensive but at least available easily enough). If you have to do N x N patching where you wa...

To clarify, there's no evidence that the RS7K is unique in this regard. Without other data points it's hard to draw a conclusion about its relative worth. You can see more tests here: http://www.innerclocksystems.com/New%20ICS%20Litmus%20Midi.html There are also some that test a sampler's internal s...

...and because I'm a completist OCD kind of guy, I decided to compare the internal sound generator of the RS7K vs. a direct MIDI OUT to my TX81Z. These are 16th notes, no swing, running simultaneously on two tracks, one sending to internal sound generator and the other to MIDI OUT connected directly...

Standalone patchbays are tough to find, so be warned on that front. If you want a computer based one you have options, just make sure they support routing and reconfiguration via a control panel of some sort (the ESI unit I just returned had no routing at all, so if I wanted to have Port 3 route out...

If your gear has THRUs you can easily do two separate THRU chains no problem. You'll need a MIDI THRU box if your timing gets janky or if some of your devices lack THRU or "Soft THRU" facilities. I don't think the AMT8 can be used standalone. The standalone patchbays you can use these days are the A...

Something else I forgot to mention -- you may have to distribute the MIDI signals no matter what if the synths and outboard gear you have don't have MIDI THRU ports. This was/is a trend started in the late 90s where synth manufacturers assumed no one had MIDI THRU chains anymore (they assumed everyo...

I'm assuming that the internal sound generator has nearly zero jitter or latency -- it's when you go out of the machine that things start getting bad, especially with an ancient protocol like MIDI. The test on that GS post was done using all tracks muted, no program change, straight 16th or 32nd not...

You can do a MIDI Thru box and that would work. A lot of 8x8 MIDI interfaces exist, but it's a minefield working through which ones work with a computer, work with some computers, and are standalone. The best standalones are going to be the Akai ME80P, AKAI ME30P (I'm selling one if you're intereste...

The RS7K is a great unit (I'm the guy that wrote the timing post on GS btw), but it does have caveats. I had an RM1X and then got the RS7K when I outgrew the RM1X. I don't use the sampling at all. RS7K pros: fun, intuitive, really solid architecture, dual MIDI outs. RS7K cons: SCSI or SM storage, ti...