I picked up the Rack version of Pam’s - happy enough, as I’d probably use it as the sole clock source in a patch, and it allows for a lot of experimentation without repatching.
I did have a question I hope someone could answer - is the “long-press” submenu only available via right-click and the A/B buttons on the Axon expander? Or am I doing something wrong? Long-press on the encoder just acts like a click.
Other modules with long-press (e.g. Stages) operate as expected, so I don’t think my mouse has gone completely janky yet
So, after a week of fiddling with it, I think I found the root of the issue: this plugin does not handle high audio buffer / block size amounts properly. Anything above 128 will start showing issues with the internal clock of the module keeping steady.
I fixed issues I had with drift on the hardware Pams NW when trying to slave to a clock trigger I was sending from by DAW via Mutant Brain by lowering the trigger duration to 1ms and using PPQ 4 instead of 24. Rather annoyingly the Mutant Brain surgery page doesn’t seem to work with Chrome so I had to use Edge, but at least it all still works.
Just a useful note for anyone who might be searching the forum for a way to sync Rack with a DAW and who might not have Pro. This plugin works great when using Reaper as the DAW and Rearoute as the soundcard in Rack. It also works great for syncing Ableton with Reaper using Rearoute and external sync.
I have a hardware Pam’s Pro and I was finding it tricky to get stable clock into it from VCV rack.
I saw in another post that Pam’s is very fussy about receiving a 5v source, so I attenuated the output of CLKD before it went out through the ES-9 into Pam’s. This was working pretty well, but I did have an occasional glitch. I assumed that the software Pam’s would solve this issue so I’ve been trying it out.
Thanks to main.tenant and Spunoza above I was able to get it working after much trial and failure, including numerous crashes on my Macbook Pro M1.
The crashes were solved by un-ticking ‘BPM out is CV when external sync’ in CLKD.
I’m still using CLKD as my main clock source, Pam’s is synced to it and used only for clocking the hardware unit. I then use a second CLKD which is delayed by 17ms to clock internally.
This is working well but I still have three minor issues and one major concern…
Using Binary Gate seems to introduce a one clock tick delay. I haven’t been able to figure this out, nor have I found an alternative to starting software Pam’s.
CLKD is running at 24ppqn with one of it’s clocks at x48 which is clocking software Pam’s, which is set at 48 ppqn. However, hardware Pam’s will only sync when set to 1 ppqn. I find this rather odd. Sometimes the display shows the wrong BPM, however I can see on the scope that the internal and external clocks are perfectly aligned, and everything sounds in sync.
When CLKD is stopped and idle, occasionally it will send out a short burst of clock ticks, triggering the external Pam’s momentarily. Not a showstopper but I’m curious what might be happening here.
Any ideas?
Again thanks to all above, I have a almost perfectly synced-up hybrid system and it is a joy to work with, save these minor issues.
The major concern is that, like echnoiswatchingyou, myMacbook is noticeably hotter after a few minutes of use with the software Pam’s, even if the CPU usage seems normal. However I will address this question directly to ALM and revert here if I get a response.
Coming back as promised: ALM support responded quickly - they are really great.
The heating ‘issue’ has gone away since the last update.
Still haven’t figured out the other niggles, but otherwise the hybrid system running relatively smoothly. Pam’s is sending out consistent clock directly to the hardware unit, without need for attenuation.
VCV is very clear that 0 to 10V is a normal output voltage for a gate or trigger, so presumably a clock also. I guess it’s a philosophical question - should PNW follow the VCV standards or accurately clone this VCV incompatibility from the hardware module?
Sure, once you spend a huge amount of effort to find this deviation from the VCV standards, it’s easy to compensate for it. (although we are talking about the clock input, so you would need an attenuator).
But @steve is not an idiot by any means, and if you look at his post that I was responding to you will see that it took him a long time to figure out this unexpected and strange behavior.
I guess I’m used to the 0-5v from the physical module as many eurorack users have commented it’s a bit of a drag not being able to use its (really good) various modulation outputs to produce the full range you’d expect from LFOs. So I guess it’s annoyingly consistent.
Hi Just purchased pams last week and came here for the same question. Did you solve that long press issue? it’s driving me nuts as you said it works on the other modules but the only way I can access the sub in Pams is through the right click sub, keyboard shortcut or axon. I know it’s nit picky as there 3 ways of getting there but would really prefer the long press option. Anyway if you have a solution please let me know thank you!
Quoting your post below for reference for anyone looking for the solution to the timing issue so they don’t have to scroll through all the shit above.
–Set the Input Clock to Clock –Set the Input Run to Reset –Set Clock rate to x1 not x24
Then
–Connect Clock out from Clocked to PPW Clock Input –Don’t connect anything to PPW Run Inputs
When I did this, start/stop from Clocked to PPW is working fine as is running Clocked outputs at different rates.
*PS Thank you ALM, I for one am very happy you ported this and some of your other modules over,
**Still looking to see if anyone figured out the long press issue mentioned in my previous post in case anyone knows the answer.
