digitables

M8-style pitch tables for the Digitone (mk1): a table is up to 16 steps of semitone offsets with a length and a loop point, and the project holds 16 of them. A sound with a table on plays every note through it: each note restarts the table and the sequencer's clock steps it, so one trig plays an arpeggio, a trill, a pitch drop or a riff, from a slow walk to a buzz at 1500 steps a second. A step can also ADD a note instead of moving the pitch, so one trig can strum a chord.

It is an elekloader mod for Digitone OS 1.43 and 1.44. elekloader builds a custom OS file on your own machine, from your stock OS file and the mods you pick; nothing from Elektron is distributed.

Status. The TBL page, the editor, playback, the fast speeds (1.1) and the ADD steps (1.3, with core-dn1 2.2's Mod Menu) have run on a Digitone. The Digitone Keys runs the same OS file but has not been tried. On OS 1.44 (1.4, on core-dn1 3.0) it has run in an emulator only.

What it does

The TBL page

Hold a track key (T1-T4) on its own for about half a second: the Mod Menu opens (it is core-dn1's, and lists every mod that put an entry there). Pick TABLES with YES (or trig key 1). The TBL page is also AMP's third page: press AMP until it shows.

Both are sound parameters: saved with the kit, shown and edited like the stock ones, and p-lockable per trig (hold a trig in grid recording and turn the knob), so one trig can play another table, or none, or at another speed. Turning SPD while a note plays changes its speed from the next step.

An LFO on the speed

Both LFOs can move the table's speed. On the LFO page, turn DEST to AMP:Table Speed (the last entry in the list) and confirm with YES. The LFO's own SPD, MULT, WAVE, SPH, MODE and FADE work as for any destination. DEP sets how far it moves SPD, in proportion to its range as on a stock parameter: DEP 8 swings SPD 2 values either way, DEP 32 eight, and the full DEP (64) sixteen, so from SPD 6 an LFO reaches both ends, 22 ticks a step and MAX. Positive DEP slows the table on the top half of the wave and speeds it up on the bottom half; negative DEP does the opposite.

A slow sine at a small depth makes a table drift ahead of the beat and back; a square wave flips between two speeds; a ramp with MODE TRIG makes every note start fast and slow down, or the other way round.

The table editor

On the TBL page, hold a track key: the editor fills the screen with the table, its 16 steps as bars around a zero line.

PLAY, STOP, FUNC and the track keys still work while it is open. The table opens on the one the track's sound plays; a marker under a step follows a note playing that table. Edits sound at once, even on a note already playing.

How a table plays

A note starts at step 1, its own pitch plus step 1's offset, and moves on one step at the SPD speed: 1, 2, ... up to the length, then from the loop point to the length over and over, or the last step held when the loop is OFF. The clock runs at the tempo whether the sequencer plays or not, so a note played live from the trig keys (KEYBOARD) steps the same way. Table 1 starts as an arpeggio (0, +12, +7, +3); the others start empty (all 0, length 16).

An ADD step works differently: when the table reaches it, the note keeps its pitch and a new note starts at the note's pitch plus the step's offset. The new note is a copy of the trig's note, with its sound, p-locks, velocity and length, and it is released together with the note that added it (at the end of the trig's length, or when you let go of the key). So 0, +4 ADD, +7 ADD plays the note, then adds its third, then its fifth: a strummed chord from one trig, low to high. Start high and add downward (+12, +7 ADD, +4 ADD, 0 ADD) to strum down. SPD sets the gap between the notes: 1 is a tick (21 ms at 120 BPM), 1/2 half that. A plain step after ADD steps moves the first note on as usual; the added notes keep theirs. Step 1 always sets the note's own pitch; marked ADD, it adds a note only when a loop comes back to it.

A quick one to try: a C64 chord. In table 2, steps 0, +4, +7, length 3, loop 1; TBL 2 and SPD 1 on a bright sound with a short release, and hold a long note. Minor: 0, +3, +7. At 1/16 to MAX small offsets (0, +1, or 0, +12) turn into vibrato and FM-like buzz.

A strum: in table 3, steps 0, +4, +7, +12, with ADD (YES) on steps 2-4, length 4, loop OFF; TBL 3, SPD 1 or 1/2, on a plucky sound. Every note (a trig, or a key in KEYBOARD) becomes a major chord strummed upward. 0, +3, +7 is minor; on a trig that already holds a chord, every note of the chord strums its own, so keep an eye on the voices (below).

Saving

The tables are part of the project: SAVE PROJECT and SAVE PROJECT AS save them, LOAD PROJECT loads them, and a new project starts with the defaults. They live in 480 bytes of the project's file that the Digitone OS leaves alone, so a project saved with digitables loads on the stock OS (which ignores them) and keeps them through a save there.

Install

You need:

• elekloader:
  • Windows: download elekloader-<version>-windows.zip from elekloader's releases, unzip it and run elekloader.exe.
  • Other systems: run elekloader from source with Python 3.9 or newer (see its README).
• This mod and its core, from this repository's releases: digitables-1.4.elemod and core-dn1-3.0.elemod for OS 1.43, or digitables-1.4-os1.44.elemod and core-dn1-3.0-os1.44.elemod for 1.44. digitables needs core-dn1 3.0: its parameter slots, mod pages, project data and Mod Menu (2.1-2.3), and from 3.0 the firmware locations it uses, which let one source build for both OS versions. elekloader's releases do not have core-dn1 3.0 yet: install it from here until they do.
• The stock OS file: Digitone_and_Digitone_Keys_OS1.44.syx or ..._OS1.43.syx, from Elektron's Digitone downloads. elekloader recognises the file by its hash.

Then build your OS in elekloader's window:

1. Change stock firmware... (top right): choose your stock OS file.
2. + Install from file...: choose the core and digitables files for that OS version.
3. Tick digitables. Make sure the core ticked with it is core 3.0 (untick core 2.0a if it is ticked). The check below the list should say "No conflicts ... Ready to build". It links with digihealth 1.1 too (checked by elekloader's lint; not yet run together).
4. OS version shown: the 4 characters the unit will show, for example TB12.
5. BUILD FIRMWARE, and save the .syx. elekloader verifies it before writing it.

Flash it with Elektron Transfer, as for any OS update: connect the unit over USB, select it in Transfer and Connect, drag the .syx onto Drop files here, and press YES on the unit. Don't turn it off until the upgrade is done.

Or on the command line (elekloader from source):

python -m elekloader.patch --stock Digitone_and_Digitone_Keys_OS1.44.syx \
    --mod core-dn1-3.0-os1.44.elemod --mod digitables-1.4-os1.44.elemod \
    --out Digitone_OS1.44-digitables.syx --version TB14

Recovery: elekloader never changes the bootloader, so the stock OS file always restores the unit. Hold FUNC while powering on for the startup menu, and press TRIG 4 for OS UPGRADE. Then send the stock .syx with Transfer.

Build it from source

With elekloader's SDK and the m68k cross compiler (elekloader's README says how to get them):

python -m elekloader.sdk.build path/to/digitables --stock Digitone_and_Digitone_Keys_OS1.43.syx   # digitables-1.4.elemod
python -m elekloader.sdk.build path/to/digitables --stock Digitone_and_Digitone_Keys_OS1.44.syx   # digitables-1.4-os1.44.elemod
python -m elekloader.lint path/to/digitables/out/digitables-1.4.elemod \
    --stock Digitone_and_Digitone_Keys_OS1.43.syx --with core-dn1-3.0.elemod

core-dn1 3.0 is elekloader's mods/core-dn1. The source names no firmware address: it includes digitone-mk1/core3.h from elekloader's SDK, and the core in the build gives each address for its OS, so the 1.44 port in mod.json is empty.

What it uses

• core-dn1 3.0's firmware locations (fw_*): the voices' pitch words, parameters and lengths, the timeline, the transposition, the LFOs, the note queue, the kit, the sound slot table and the drawing routines;
• core-dn1's events: ev_voice_on (a note starts: the table restarts, or an added note is recognised), ev_render_out (every audio block: the steps, written to the voices' pitch words), ev_key, ev_enc, ev_tick and ev_draw (the editor), and ev_hold (a hold on the TBL page opens the editor);
• two parameter slots, ids 182 and 183, on sound slots 26 and 65, which no stock parameter uses;
• mod page 27, after AMP's second page;
• project data TBL1 (320 bytes);
• a Mod Menu entry, TABLES;
• for ADD steps, the firmware's note queue: an added note is queued as a copy of the trig's note event, the way the arpeggiator queues its notes, and released through the voice's length counter. digitables keeps its own copy of the event and its p-locks (never a pointer into the firmware's pools), and skips the note when a pool is short;
• for the LFOs: SPD's record carries the filter's modulation-destination mask, and digitables maps sound slot 65 to SPD in the firmware's sound slot table (the DEST lists are made from it; the firmware builds it once, at boot, from its own parameters only). The firmware's LFO engine then keeps each voice's LFO destination and modulation every block, and digitables adds the modulation to SPD itself.

Known limits

• Power-up: the Digitone keeps a working copy of the project for power-up, which the tables go into like the rest; the emulator cannot show that step, so it is unchecked until a unit runs it.
• The arpeggiator and portamento have not been tried with tables. On a note the arpeggiator plays, ADD steps add nothing (the note keeps its pitch).
• ADD steps use voices: the Digitone has 8, shared by the four tracks, and an added note takes one like any note (the oldest is stolen when none is free). A loop over ADD steps adds notes over and over, stealing voices as it goes.
• Only the LFOs move SPD. The velocity and MIDI controller modulation lists offer Table Speed too (the firmware has one mask for them and LFO1), but choosing it there does nothing yet.
• On OS 1.44 it has run in an emulator only, not yet on a unit.

Licence

GPL-2.0-or-later, as elekloader. See LICENSE.