Blofeld ADS1DS2R envelope bug?

Hi guys,

I think there's a bug regarding envelopes when on ADS1DS2R mode. I'd like you to confirm that you can reproduce it on your own modules to make sure it's not my unit's software that's faulty (I've the latest firmware version 1.24 by the way).

Start from an INIT patch
Set let's say Env 3 to ADS1DS2R mode with the following setting:
Attack 0
Attack level 0
Decay 90
Sustain 127
Decay2 90
Sustain2 0
Release 0

Now in the Mod Matrix, link Env 3 to Osc global pitch (it's the most obvious way to test out the envelope behaviour from a listening point of view) at +50 amount.

Now hold a note from a moment, and you should hear the pitch going progressively up then after a few seconds, down.
Now set the Decay 1 to 91 instead of 90.
Play the note again: the pitch goes up but never goes down (on my unit anyway)

For any value of Decay 1 of 91 or more, the DS2 stage is never triggered automatically. As a matter of fact, if you change the Sustain 1 parameter while the note is held, it triggers the DS2 stage.

Does the same behavior occurs to you too?

That does seem strange. Your unit having faulty firmware is highly unlikely. I'm sure the blofeld, like any well-designed synth (or any embedded system for that matter), has a checksum included in it's firmware image. The Blofeld would likely complain if it's firmware were corrupt.

Anyhow, I will check this on my unit with 1.22 on it. I'm not flashing to 1.24 at this point. I'll wait for the 1.25 bug fix.

You're right, it's probably a software bug. Weather it's always been here or came with recent firmware updates is the question. I can say for sure it's happening in V1.23 and V1.24. So it'd be great if you could test it on your V1.22 version indeed.

EDIT: is the Blofeld really still supported by Waldorf? Can we hope to have more firmware revisions coming up in the future?

Yes, they are still supporting the Blofeld! They just rolled a new hardware revision in 2017. It may have just been a cost reduction or respin of the board to deal with parts going obsolete but they also noted bugs in 1.24 and are continuing to fix the firmware. They are currently working on firmware 1.25 which is in Beta according to Karsten.

It's still an awesome machine so it's great to see Waldorf supporting it.

ErnstStavro schrieb:

Yes, they are still supporting the Blofeld! They just rolled a new hardware revision in 2017. It may have just been a cost reduction or respin of the board to deal with parts going obsolete but they also noted bugs in 1.24 and are continuing to fix the firmware. They are currently working on firmware 1.25 which is in Beta according to Karsten.

It's still an awesome machine so it's great to see Waldorf supporting it.

Excellent, that's good news! It sure sounds really good, but that's the kind of little bugs that take the joy out of it when you can't achieve what you're trying to. Is there a place where users can file bug reports directly to the dev. team?

I'm pretty sure this forum is the best place to let them know of any issues.

I duplicated that envelope behavior on 1.22 firmware using your description.
You can duplicate the scenario with a One Shot envelope as well.
Attack 0
Attack level 0
Decay 90
Sustain 127
Decay2 90
Sustain2 0
Release 0

Anything over 90 for the Decay setting never comes back down.

It appears to be because any setting over 90 for Decay results in the rising edge of the exponential curve never actually hitting the value that would trigger the Decay phase. I tried different sustain values but it didn't make any difference.

IMO this isn't really a showstopper. The exponential (technically logarithmic) attack already takes quite a while to hit it's target value even with a setting off 90. How long do you want to wait for that decay/attack to complete after all?