OP-Z Oplab Module and Pocket Operators

Question for those of you who have an oplab module on your OP-Z and pocket operators. Is there a way for you to control the Pocket Operator with the OP-Z? Like use the CV channel to send notes to the PO and have the OP-Z be the brains and sequences instead of the PO? Or is it just that the PO and OP-Z’s bpm and transport are synced together?

Thanks in advance!

its just bpm/transport sync

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Only sync, unfortunately. The POs do have a serial port available at the back but TE missed the chance of using it for MIDI in/out.

or is it just undocumented to do so?
midi implementation would have been great.

The electrical connection is there, but I don’t think the firmware supports it, otherwise they would have added a few components more required to convert the MIDI signal levels. Besides, that is not a trivial code. On the other hand, Volcas do support it, so it should not be impossible to do.

did you already feed it with with midi signals through a small circuit?
you basically need one of those small op amp like chips iam often use with Arduinos.

which points of the connection are for rx/tx?

I mean, does anyone have the gear to test it? I’m still waiting in my oplab module, but when it gets here I can give it a try

ha i doubt it but wouldn’t that be crazy if midi was there all along.

@johnnyego the chip is an optoisolator and is only needed for midi input.
this site shows what all the JTAG pads are for
but honestly i bet the RX/TX pads (SWDIO/SWO) are already being used for the sync pulse IN/OUT

this should give u an idea of how to hook up the optoisolator for midi input
as well as how to hook up the midi out

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nice. you’re talking about the pads on the far right of the backside of a PO, right? I do have the optoisolator laying around in a test circuit…I guess the midi out should then go to ground and on one of those pads, either in or out and able to receive start/stop commands or ccs…
I often think about a CV trig sequencer based on the PO leds…basically the sequencer would drive eurorack. hhmm

What about midi through the 3.5 mm jack…would it be possible to implement in a future pocket operator?
if so, that would be truly great!

i hope TE will drop a programmer Module to reprogramm the POs with the other functions, maybe restricted to the series like a sub can be a factory or the 33 can act as speak etc…

now now lets not get ahead of ourselves here
there is no indication that this is implemented in the software
just because the serial in/out pins are available.

the pads i am referring to are top middle on the back between the audio jacks.
i don’t see any test pads on the far right ?

the midi out is 3 connections.
pin 4 is power (47R resistor)
pin 2 is GND
pin 5 is TX (47R resistor)

try it out if u are interested but i’m not holding my breath
i really doubt they would go to all the trouble to implement midi
and then say/do absolutely nothing about it
i’d love to be wrong but like punji said its not trivial

I also don’t have much hope here. If this was available TE would have hinted about it. Anyway, the RX port is the pad marked as SWDIO and the TX port is the pad marked as SWDCLK in the hackingthepo page.

i would have guessed TX was SWO

wouldn’t SWDCLK imply that it is the clock?

The I/O signals of the EFM32 internal modules can be re-mapped to different pins. SWDCLK and SWDIO is from a debug interface used to flash the firmware, but those pins can be re-mapped to the TX and RX of the low energy serial interface and used for MiDI. Note that this is a bit theoretical, I have not actually tried that out. I do hope that TE reads this and get a clue, it is never too late to release a new PO or even retrofit the old ones as MkII.

what about these two pads?

Please see http://hackingthepo.weebly.com/ for more info about the pads at the back.

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sorry. I’ve looked into it a few years ago as I was questioning the same task I guess.

:+1: