GR-MEGA firmware 1.2 & planning

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GR-MEGA Firmware 1.2

GR-MEGA firmware 1.2.2 has just been released, and you can download it here: GR-MEGA firmware downloads. We did an effects-themed firmware update this time. A couple of effects were added and existing ones improved. The large reverb now sounds as lush as we originally intended. There are now more than one hundred modulation destinations. Maybe we’ll do more themed updates in the future.

GR-MEGA Production

The GR-MEGA production carries on steadily. We’ve just finished a bunch more black units.

Projects & planning

We thought it might be a good idea to give you guys some insight into our plans for the next couple of months:

  1. First of all, we’re committed to fulfilling all the GR-MEGA preorders. We’ll be busy until March 2025 at the very least. We’ll regularly do firmware updates to make it even more powerful.
  2. GR-1 firmware 3.0. This is a good time to explain the details of this future firmware:
    • The main goal is to have more intuitive file handling. Meaning storage is typically all internal, the GR-1 starts up where you left it off, and it has separate projects and system settings like in most modern synths and DAW’s (unlike the GR-1’s traditional performances that roll project and system settings into one).
    • Bug fixes are also important.
    • There are no other goals besides this. We now take the approach of “backporting” GR-MEGA firmware to the GR-1, because this will automatically give users access to intuitive file handling. This will have the added advantage of giving access to features like better effects, a full-blown sampler and slice mode, and more.. as long as the GR-1 hardware can properly support it.
    • However, this approach can still be a dead-end. Technically, it’s a long story but we’re dealing with an ancient version of Raspbian, and deprecated closed source drivers as our only options to make a full back port of the MEGA software to the GR-1’s Pi3. So far, we have not succeeded to get a proper back port, although we are close. We may still have to go back to the drawing board and code the new file handling from scratch into the existing GR-1 code base, losing out on some of the GR-MEGA features.
  3. The Integral will also be a focal point in the coming months. While we cannot reveal all details, we’ve already released firmware 3.1 with implementation of long standing feature requests: USB MIDI, impulse reversal. The manual can be found here. We’re also doing another batch of units, which should ship late November.

Ok, that’s all for this newsletter. See you next time!