1 year since Firmware update

The next big update might be the one related with the optional filter board. As far as I remember only stereo live loops was teased in previous video.

Speculation in either direction could be emotional. Nonetheless it’s good you bring your take on it to the table. Let’s just hope enough of the thoughts that count here filter upwards to the minds that count.

It seems to me that it is likely that ongoing development/updates will continue up to a point and that the factors that play into that are more likely to be money factors than ‘difficult to get back into something’. They need to have bursts of sales to generate money to cover further development and bug fixing.

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I’m with you. I don’t understand the pessimism. There is plenty of evidence that they have been, and still are working on the s2400 update. As far as I can tell there isn’t much evidence to the contrary other than it’s taking longer for them to release it than we’d all prefer.

Solid point from the business perspective and a great post, thank you!

The further the development of a project progresses, the more complex it becomes. Resuming development often requires development overhead which is often very expensive. I am not saying this is what is happening here. What I am saying is that this happens to software projects in general and it is a huge money factor.

My main point is that we need to lower our expectations (and possibly by a significant amount if it’s measurable :smiley: ). Hell, my expectations are rising too. However, if expectations are low and the update ends up exceeding them, then it would make us all very-very happy. Classic “underpromise-overdeliver” strategy!

Although, I personally find lowering expectations difficult due to personal involvement (aka purchasing the product) and it impacting my workflow… so I might as well be saying all that to myself

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My hope is that the developer has used multiple branches of the code base, so that all bug fixes can be released separate of the filter/fx/looper/new/other functionality. But the longer the release takes, the more I start to convince myself that there is only one branch that is being worked on.

Loads of fixes are done over 6 months ago… the wait continues…

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I have no experience of being in a team of developers so can only imagine possible complexity curves. But I know that any engineering project’s success is going to be partly dependant on the initial design spec, the knowledge of the engineers and the fuel to keep them going up and over the curve.

In theory a well planned project should at some point start to decrease in complexity shouldn’t it?

A well-planned and designed project only dampens the rising complexity as the system’s functionality grows over time. More modules start to interact with each other, more RAM is being consumed, more code is written, the build system becomes more complex, different hardware revisions come out because somehow the MCU manufacturer decided to do so which is poorly documented but needs to be accounted for in the code etc. New requirements are being imposed on the system due to new modules. Take RAM limitations for example — We cannot have samples longer than X because it will not be possible for the unit to function otherwise… It’s a continuous effort in which nobody ever wins :smiling_face_with_tear:

However, it’s like in life, if you are healthy and do the right things for your body, you will live longer

Yeah, I’d say it matters more than anything. Projects that did not spend enough time in design stages often collapse quickly because of rapidly increasing complexity… the more complex the project, the more it is worth spending more time designing it properly… Otherwise, at some point, it will become so difficult to maintain that there will not be another choice but to completely re-develop everything from scratch

For me it really just comes down to a few bugs being fixed. Specifically the recording incoming MIDI data on the MIDI tracks in Step Record Mode. Right now any recorded note just defaults to whatever the root note of the pad is and it’s not recognizing notes inputted from an external keyboard, either monophonically or polyphonically. In live Record there’s no issue but for whatever reason step recording has this issue.

My fear is stuff like this gets overlooked. I would also like an arpeggiator function with the Roll button but not at the cost of bugs not getting fixed.

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Welp….that seems to settle things for the time being. New video just dropped from Brad, reiterating that the new update will be coming in the next week or so, consisting of mainly all bug fixes and only one or two feature updates. Heavier updates with added features are being saved for when the filter/DSP cards roll out. That’s fine for me, though, maybe not what some are asking for. Still, it kind of confirms for me what I’ve felt all along. That the team set out to create something with a specific end point in mind, did that and now view this machine/project as near complete, as far as their initial goals + plans went. Them focusing mainly on ‘tidying the house’ by addressing bugs only further underlines that.

I sold my old SP-1200 years ago because its limitations no longer fit into the way that I was making music and, frankly, made working fast difficult. But, I always missed the sound and got exhausted, trying to replicate that ruggedness with plugins and newer gear. A year and a half, on, I’ve gotten really fast with the S2400 and, sonically, it’s exactly what I’ve been missing. I’m happy with the end product and have, deep down, really hoped that the ISLA team wouldn’t take this machine too far away from its ‘roots’. I’m pleased that they seem to feel the same way and aren’t trying to introduce too many radical changes.

Curious to hear how some of you feel about this.

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Can’t wait for this.

Personally I’m glad there are no major new features with this next update as there are too many bugs that need squashing first. Today I switched on my unit and the metronome curiously vanished, hopefully it’s just user error , but this was working fine during my last session. I find there are lots of weird issues that randomly come and go, I’ve since become used to the unpredictable nature of this machine, however it would be nice to work smoothly without all the setbacks. Still love it a lot despite this, drives me a little crazy at times as I’m never sure what mood it will be in. lol

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Hahaha! ‘Never know what mood it will be in’. Exactly! Cute at times, infuriating other times. But, yes. I made a beat last night that I really liked. No choke groups assigned to anything. Woke up, turned the machine on, got that weird message about channels + choke groups possibly not being assigned because it’s an older file (definitely not) and the beat sounded……off. After ten minutes of trying to figure out what was wrong, I realized that everything on channels 1 + 2 had choke group 1 assigned. So weird. So I turned them off, resaved it and reopened it. Everything loaded up as it should have. It’s those odd hiccups that are the bigger issue for me. If those can be ironed out and bugs can be reduced to next to none (or once in a blue moon), I’d be completely satisfied. That’s better than new features. Beyond that, I’m totally in love with this machine and am so happy that this level of enjoyment has been returned to my creative process.

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Gotta hand it to Brad & crew, as they’re certainly delivered an authentic old school sampling experience :grin: As a legacy MPC user, I’m kinda used to walking the high wire, always hitting save after every additional move before the inevitable freefall. I mentioned elsewhere in this forum I think my unit is haunted.

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Absolutely. Hahaha. This machine reminds me of my MPC-3000, with its character and temperament. Especially how it will eeeeevery now and then pick up what I think is a radio frequency. It sounds like a ghost in the machine and would scare the living shit out of me, if it was like 2 or 3 in the morning hahaha. My S2400 will every now and then trigger a sample when I’m not near it and it’s scared in the same way!

Once in a while i’m getting the reported white noise burst that settles with a reboot. I hesitate calling it a ghost in the machine, more like a screeching banshee. That’s one bug I can do without asap lol

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Hopefully, it won’t take another 10 months to fix new bugs discovered by new users.

Now the machine has been here for a while and we see its hardware limitation ( low outputs, limited RAM, strange SD card behavior, weak CPU) it would be nice to put the priority on making the software reliable indeed. :slight_smile:

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Bug fixes r welcome as are the small feature updates. Think stereo looper was noted as incoming a while back.

But the new DSP and filter cards will introduce a ton of new features, so I don’t think this is the end of S2400 OS development. And personally can’t wait to see how it turns out, the new cards in theory add the final missing features in my mind, post big fixes and minor os worklow improvements. This is a beast of a machine, hopefully I will never become stupid or desperate enough to sell it.

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Does anyone know when the next firmware update will be?

brad said on instagram that it will be sometime around these days. so maybe in a few days or so.

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yep yep. he specifically mentioned that they were trying for christmas, but if not, the week or two afterwards. i wish folks would check their videos on social (IG and FB) because they really are being pretty clear about when and what to expect.

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I also came here excited to see whether or not it dropped – patiently waiting like everyone else!

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