FCB1010 Users, how do you operate?

I do not own any Rig Kontrols, nor ever have, but I did buy the FCB when I brought the software version of GR3. I must admit it did take quiet a few good hours of constant fiddling over the course of the first few weeks to get it working at the level I wanted.

I might add, after I finally learnt how to operate it, configure it (both by using the pedal, and by using the editor on my PC and transferring the settings over), I upgraded the chip inside it to the UnO chip (a cheap firmware chip that a FCB user made to upgrade the options available on it)

Anyway, upgrading basically put me back to step 1.
For starters, the pc editor was no longer compatible with my new *latest* UnO chip, so i was manually setting up everything on the pedal itself.

This wasnt too hard, but time consuming.

Now, my setup works like so: (btw, i use the FCB in 'stompbox' mode, available only with the UnO chip, but roughly works similar to the original setup)

The FCB buttons 6 to 10 on every bank selects that certain numbers preset, so, in GR3 i have 1 *favourite* bank, and i can select patches in this bank. (I find this works brilliant and after a few uses i've easily memorized about 30 different patches, in order)
(I'll just add that you can use multiple GR3 banks still, but the way i setup, i choose the one a want and it stays their for the course of my jam. I think this makes sense for, say, a gig, and who would need more than 128 presets for one show anyway, especially with snapshots aswell, lol, if so i think you'd be trying to compensate for lack of skill anyway :lol: , lol)

Once your preset is selected, the stompbox buttons (bottom row / btns 1 to 5) operate as either selecting a certain snapshot, or turning on or off a certain part of that patch.

For the expression pedals, the right 1 is ALWAYS set to master volume control, but restricted to -15db to 0db, so that its not a huge change but good for quick volume adjustments.

For the left pedal, that depends on the patch, but generally used for Wah's, etc. Now, i do use the MIDI-OX program, which, through much trial and error, I finally got to work so that, for example, if the pedal is on a Wah Wah, if the pedal is all the way open, the Wah will turn off, then turn on when you shift the pedal, like a real wah. I desperately wanted this option and finally figured it out recently.

One extra thing I'll note is that, my very last bank (bank '08.' with the UnO chip, which is actually bank 19), is configured differently, so that it can control the loop machines Record/Dub, Stop/Delete, Undo, and Redo buttons. This was the greatest idea i think i've had, as a can quickly go to that bank (the banks loop, so I can just go down a bank from bank '00') and quickly record a loop, BRILLIANT!


Jeez, i got a bit carrried away, I didnt think i'd write so much. But anyway, I am very happy with the FCB and its so versatile, with the right software and setup it can do anything. Hell, just for fun i've even used it with Macro-type software to control things in other programs, such as graphic applications, and makes everything easier.

Definitely recommended
And i hope this was informative enough for you

Rhys.

 

...thanks Rhys-very informative post.One question-without the upgrade you mention,would assignments for loop machine use up all the switching options?

 

No. But i'd highly recommend the upgrade, very simple to install and makes a world of difference.

You can still setup the loop machine, and preset selections, and even buttons to change snapshots, etc, but the main disadvantage is the lights for the buttons do not correspond correctly to what you are doing in GR3.

An example, say u hit your FCB button to load preset #4, then, you wish to turn the reverb off on that preset, so you hit the FCB button assigned to do that. This works, but now the FCB un-lights the preset #4 button, and lights up the reverb button. This can get really out of hand and can mess you up in regards to where you are within the bank and presets.

With the UnO chip, you select preset #4, then the bottom row of buttons (the stomp box buttons, 1 to 5) can alter certain settings in the preset, but simply flash for a sec when you hit it, they dont change the light to make you forget what preset your in, etc.

I write way to much....

 

On my FCB with uno chip, I don't toggle the led's that control the stompboxes buttons. Like you say, the led's get out of whack with GR. Instead, I made the led's just flash mometary, not toggle on/off.

For any given preset, I may have stomp box pedals that do wah on/off, octaver on/off and psycho delay on/off.

If I turn the wah on and want to turn it back off, I just step on the preset switch and it returns the preset to the stock, wah not on state.

Of course you can just step on the stomp box pedal to turn the wah off, but I have my presets on the lower row and this is faster than stepping over the bottom row to get to a top row stomp box pedal.

 

Hey EL34xyz,

Yeah i think thats the same my i use the fcb. my preset buttons stay on for the current preset selected, but my stompboxes just flash for the sec when i hit them. This seems the best way for me. And also, i use the bottom row btns for the stomps.

I used to use the wah that way, but using MIDI-OX with some data-mapping, now the exp-pedal works a treat for the wah

Rhys.

 

You guys that are having the LEDs on the FCB switches go out of sync with whether the effect in GR3 is actually on/off: is that because you are using the FCB to send CC messages to GR3?

If so, try reprogramming the FCB to send Note messages instead of CC messages. Using Note messages (Note On/Off) will allow you to keep the LEDs in sync with the behaviour of the effects.

 

I use notes to changes things in gr3, not cc

It gets out of whack like this:

You are in a preset that has, say an octaver
the normal mode of the preset has the octaver off
you turn on the octaver with a stomp box pedal on the fcb,
The led on the fcb pedal is on.

You change to another preset
The led is still on.

You switch back to the first preset, the octaver is normally off but the led is still on from the last time you hit the stomp box pedal.

See?

There is no way to record states that the stomp box pedals are in and undo these actions when switching presets.

 

It's been several months since I've used the UnO upgrade with my FCB1010, so I've possibly forgotten some things and maybe am not completely understanding what you are saying, but ...

Why is the LED still on? This doesn't have to be the case. Page 3 of the UnO upgrade manual explains how individual stompbox behaviour can be assigned for different presets.

 

If you can figure out how to turn off an led only on a fcb pedal without stepping on it, let me know. The whole FCB community would like to know how to do it also.

Lets say I have two presets, one with the octaver on as the default and one as the octaver off as a default.

The same fcb stomp box pedal is set up in both presets to turn the octaver off and on. How does the fcb know what the octaver on/off state is and sync the led to that preset condition?

I switch to the preset that has the octaver off, I step on the stomp box pedal to turn it on. I switch to the preset that has the octaver off. The led is still on, there is no way to command just turn an LED off when switching presets.

 

Yes, this can be done with the UnO upgrade.
Look at page 3 of the UnO upgrade manual. There are three options for each stompbox when a preset is selected: ON, OFF, NO CHANGE.
When I was using the UnO upgrade, I could (for example) select preset switch 6 to turn on stompbox (LEDs) 1, 3, and 5, and then select preset switch 7 to turn off LEDs 1, 3, and 5 while simultaneously turning on LEDs 2 and 4.

Since I didn't want to reinstall the UnO EEPROM to double-check my memory, I asked for confirmation in the UnO group on Yahoo. This functionality is very well known in the UnO community.

The FCB doesn't know. The way I handled this was to first set up all of my patches in GR3, and then arrange my FCB presets to match. For GR3 patch 1 with octaver turned ON, I would set the initial octaver stompbox setting for FCB preset 1 to ON; for GR3 patch 2 with octaver turned OFF, I would set the initial octaver stompbox setting for FCB preset 2 to OFF. Within FCB preset 1 I could step on the octaver stompbox as many times as I wanted, turning the octaver ON/OFF; but, as soon as I step on FCB preset 2, the octaver stompbox LED would go OFF.


Also, a few things I should note here:
1. I never used more than one GR3 patch for a single song.
2. There were a few times when I would have to create GR3 patches that were identical except for what components were initially turned ON (depending upon the song to be played).
3. I never used the NO CHANGE stompbox setting, only ON or OFF. Using NO CHANGE could definitely cause confusion in LED/component sync. The NO CHANGE setting may actually be the default stompbox setting, but I don't recall.


Another intesting thing to note, page 3 of the UnO upgrade manual says "Switch the stomp box [On/Off] -> when selecting the patch, all messages (PC / CC / NoteOn) of the stomp box are also sent." This indicates that the stombox settings on the FCB should be able to *force* GR3 patches into sync with the FCB LEDs. In other words, have all components in a GR3 patch set to OFF, and then force the octaver ON simply by selecting an FCB preset where the initial setting for the octaver stompbox has been set to ON.

However, it doesn't actually work this way (or, at least it didn't for me), and that is why I arranged my FCB and GR3 patch settings as explained above.

Since moving from the UnO upgrade to the GORDIUS upgrade, and after many conversations with Xavier (the creator/programmer of both upgrades), we finally discovered that there is a signficant "buffer" in GR3 that blocks all messages sent immediately after a PC message is received. So, with the UnO upgrade, I believe "all messages (PC / CC / NoteOn) of the stomp box" are being blocked by GR3. With the GORDIUS upgrade, Xavier programmed in an optional setting for me to incorporate a delay between the PC message and subsequent CC or Note messages. I believe I have that delay set to around 30 or 50ms, which is enough to circumvent the buffer and allow me to force GR3 to sync with the stompbox settings on my FCB.

Unfortunately, the UnO upgrade is not capable of adding a delay between messages.


I apologize for the length of off-topic material, but thought it was important to explain why the UnO upgrade doesn't work exactly as expected with the FCB, and how I worked around that.

 

Hmm, what version uno chip do you have?

At the time I got mine, I asked the guys on the uno forum how to contril just the led state and was told that it could not be done.

I'll look later what version chip I have. (The fcb is is not here)

 

The handwriting on my UnO chip says "Uno 1.0.2e" ... or the last letter might be a "c". The handwriting is a bit difficult to read, and it has been too long since I used it for me to remember what version it is.

Also, the last part of my above message where I say "...the UnO upgrade doesn't work exactly as expected with the FCB..." should actually read "...the UnO upgrade doesn't work exactly as expected with GR3..."
The trouble, in this case, is with GR3, not with UnO.

 

Ok, I have the same UNO chip and after some thought, I don't think we are on the same page.

Tell me exactly how you would solve this problem:
You have two GR presets.
Both presets have the same effect.
One preset is saved with the effect on full time.
The other preset is saved with the effect off full time.
Both presets use the same stomp box pedal on the FCb to turn the effect off and on.
The LED on the FCb for that stomp box pedal is off right now.

Now, switch the FCB1010 to the preset that has the effect on full time. You are not touching a stomp box pedal, just a preset pedal.

How do you get the stomp box LED to light up and match the effect on condition in GR?

 

Do you use one of the free (user-made) editors that are available for programming a UnO-equipped FCB? There are two that I know of (maybe more these days); one is called RipWerx, can't remember the other(s), but you should be able to google them easily.

So, using one of these editors:

1. Assign GR3 patch AA with Octaver OFF to FCB preset switch 6.
2. In FCB preset switch 6, assign stompbox switch 1 to control Octaver ON/OFF.
3. In FCB preset switch 6, set the initial state for stompbox switch 1 to OFF (LED off).

** Now, when you select FCB preset switch 6, stompbox switch 1 (LED) goes off.**

4. Assign GR3 patch BB with Octaver ON to FCB preset switch 7.
5. In FCB preset switch 7, assign stompbox switch 1 to control Octaver ON/OFF.
6. In FCB preset switch 7, set the initial state for stompbox switch 1 to ON (LED on).

** Now, when you select FCB preset switch 7, stompbox switch 1 (LED) comes on.**

I'm doing this all from memory (since I don't use UnO or the UnO editors anymore), but that is the general idea. If you use RipWerx or one of the other editors, it should be very easy to figure out.

If you are programming the FCB directly (without an editor), I'm afraid I can't help you; it's been too long since I've tried doing that. However, the functionality is still the same, so the same objective can be achieved.

Hope this is clear. I've just go home after having a few drinks.

 

Have a look at this website for a better explanation (he was probably sober when he wrote it):

http://www.el34world.com/Misc/Music/FCB_2.htm

Note that in this example, the presets are assigned to the bottom row (switches 1 through 5) and the stompboxes are assigned to the top row (switches 6 through 10).

 

Yes I use an editor and that web site link you sent is my web site.

I'll have a look at your post tommoroow when I have more time to read it properly. Got to scoot outa here.

 

That is your website? Ok, now I'm confused.

Afterall, you explain it quite nicely: "If you wanted stomp box 2 to come on when you changed to this preset #1, you would change Stomp box #2 button at the bottom to ON."

 

I see what you are saying about having the stomp box pedals LED reflect what the preset is supposed to be set at. Honestly, I forgot about that since I abandoned using that method a long time ago.

That works ok for stepping on a preset pedal and setting up the stomp box pedal state but it still gets all fouled up by srolling through presets manually on the screen or scrolling through presets with the fcb.

For example:
I also have a previous and next preset set of stomp pedals on the fcb. If I go to the next preset or back to the previous preset, the FCB has no idea what those presets are set at.

The only way that the fcb would be able to sync up to guitar rig 100% of the time is if guitar rig sent out some sort of preset state info that the fcb could read and then the fcb would have to alter it's pedal LED's acordingly.

 

Ahhhh, now I understand the problem you are having.
Certainly there are limitations to what can be achieved by combining GR3 + FCB1010 (UnO), and using previous and next preset switches falls outside of those limitations, unfortunately.

I suppose I was lucky enough to find a compromise in functionality between the two that was very useful/logical for me, and therefore didn't feel like a compromise.

By the way, is there any MIDI foot controller that is capable of syncing with GR3 in the way you want (using previous and next preset switches)? Is there two-way communication between GR3 and RK3?

 

I personally did not even consider using the previous and next preset, or bank, buttons when i got my FCB.

Excluding the final bank (which i have programmed for loop machine use), the FCB has 95 preset selections if you set up the switches that way. This is way more than I need, let alone the fact you can make multiple banks in GR3 and have different banks for different times/gigs, etc. (even using up one FCB bank to control the previous/next options if need be)

Also i'll add to the other part of the discussion. I have not tried this, but I like the idea you guys discuss about the stompbox settings, say, for example, you select a preset, and because it has delay and reverb defaulted to on, the 2 designated lights on the FCB will be activated.
This is cool, but seeings i almost primarily use snapshots, and occasionally specific rig options, I have set up the UnO to make the stomp boxes simply flash for a second when hit, so i know whats hit, but it doesnt stay visible. This has not been a problem and i've never lost where i am on GR3

Also, can anyone help me with a PC Editor. i have UnO 1.0.2f (i think, or whatever the latest is), but the editors do not pick it up properly, so i cannot edit, send, receive, etc.
I use MIDI-OX, but either sending straight from the FCB or thru MIDI-OX to the editors it never picks it up properly.
When i do a read Sysex command, it works, getting the info from the FCB, but is not how my setup works, and its like its mixed up the message with garbage and the settings are all odd.

Rhys.