Nava2021 (post v1.028beta)

Discuss use it and firmware update
  • Hi all!
    Same for me - had to shut down my studio long time, now I'm back at it! :-)
    What's the most recent Nava firmware (considering that I have the Extra9+ kit installed)?
    My version says 20210918

    Thanks and have fun!
    F.
  • So, as far as I can see some vital functionality that will break with the current version of this alternative firmware is:
    1. No Total accent.
    2. Chaining patterns will not work properly. LCD seems to show the correct playback order but the pattern heard is mostly stuck on one single pattern, either from the chain or from some previous chain.

    Unfortunately these are serious bugs. I will revert back to 1.028beta.

    The alternative approach where one can group multiple patterns in advance (prior to playback or editing - pressing down buttons for required patterns and then hitting ENTER) into a group, similar to a chain, is also not working when changing to a new group in playback mode. In groups with two patterns the first one is often repeated twice, in groups with four patterns the second is often skipped. This bug was also present in 1.028beta.

    I don't consider this group bug a serious one since I see no benefit with these groups anyhow. If only the regular chaining would work one doesn't need any preprogrammed groups as far as I can see. So the most easy fix here would be to ditch the group pattern functionality altogether and revert to the original pattern chaining code. But maybe that will end up also removing the the ability to program chains without having to hit ENTER all the time? In that case one quick solution might be to make the system automatically hit ENTER at the last step whenever a pattern in a group is edited. That would only produce EEPROM-writes when editing occurs.

    Total accent still needs to be fixed. Harder to understand why that was lost.
  • The problem here is that nobody is maintaining any firmware at all - neither for Nava, nor for Yocto... :-(
  • FlavioB wrote: Dec 2nd, '23, 21:51 The problem here is that nobody is maintaining any firmware at all - neither for Nava, nor for Yocto... :-(

    (...and from the othe rthread...)
    Oh, it's you in this thread as well :-)
    Do you have any clue about programming? If yes, you could take over the firmware! :-) I would be available for helping in testing...
    I'm able to do some programming and found good instructions on how to build the sysex file from the source code here:https://github.com/sandormatyi/Nava-909-firmware.

    So I've tried compiling with some minor edit (other name on BD) and that works. So then I studied the code and I have some hang of how it works.

    Unfortunately I found no obvious bug and the code is kind of complicated, at least for me. But my biggest issue is that I can only upload new code using sysex which takes a lot of time and is very limited. I would need to invest quite some time to learn and setup how to upload using other methods with bootloader and all that stuff. :| Right now I don't have that time.

    However, I put the Nava on my desk by the computer so every now and then I might give it a go. But it might not finish.

    Anyway. I would like to solve this (from the 1.028beta):
    - Changing pattern chains not always plays the first loop-round correctly.
    - Sort out a timing issue I found (that might actually be the reason pattern chaining is not working properly) which might involve another paradigm for the use ENTER (less often) when editing patterns.

    I will not try to reimplement anything new from the 2021Neuro, that's too complicated for me. That firmware is also much larger which is not good for my other plans and also makes it too complicated to try to fix. I might take inspiration from there though.

    Are there any other really serious bugs in 1.028beta?
    I tried midi and din-sync and that seemed to work.
    What about song mode?
    I have no issues with accent on my machine using 1.028beta, it works perfectly. So issues with that is hardware related I believe?

    In the 1.028beta code there's a lot of comments from ´zabox´. That person really did a great job correcting a lot of things and should deserve a lot of credit for making the firmware work much better.
  • There's a pre beta version of my take on the Nava firmware. It's based on the 2021 Neuromancer version. I started a new thread since there are a lot of differences:
    viewtopic.php?t=3076