Tape loop click

OP-1
#1

hey all,

ive been using the tape looper a lot and have noticed as the loop is returning back to the start point there is a click.
its loud enough to be annoying and put me off the idea of any kind of venue performance. is there a bug fix out there?
hoping that my op1 is glitchy and its not the same for everyone.
cheers
ciaran
Tape pop/click replication/avoidance
#2

It’s the same for everyone

#3

No I would swear I don’t have such problem.

I usually record my loop and stop playing before hitting “Play” button to stop recording.

So it maybe about a way to record loops…
#4

there are plenty of work arounds. but at base value. when just recording into tape. often enough ill get pops and clicks from dubbing, cutting pasting, etc.

#5

The Drive section in master/mixer page4 increasers level of clicks, if used.
Turn down drive can help (them boost PB level externally with a mixer etc).

#6

I’ll often record 2 bars with a little extra on the end, and then trim off the first bar and part of the extra at the end, leaving only the recorded 2nd bar as my final 1 bar loop.


This way I get FX tails at the beginning of the resulting 1 bar loop, and no clicks.

Instead of overdubbing, I record takes to different tracks, and then resample the master to the drum sampler, fine tune the start and end points, and record that back to tape. Yea, it’s a little more involved but, again… no clicks.
2 Likes
#7

Yup its a known problem. It occurs when there is a signal right up to the end of a clip. Also watch out for lifting tape clips that don’t end in silence, it will occasionally leave a click there.


Tried emailing TE support several times and I got one canned response and then nothing but silence. Either they’re working on it or have given up.

Like @LyingDalai said, if you stop the recording right before the end of the tape is reached, it helps prevent the clicks.

Sometimes though, the clicks don’t appear once you copy the tape tracks to a computer for further processing.

In the month’s I’ve owned it, I have learned to adapt, but I still yearn for the bliss of endlessly recording a drone loop with lots of long transients on the fly.
1 Like
#8

TE’s tape metaphor is incomplete in that people used to splice tape at an angle to smooth their edits. No crossfade whatsoever is lazy. My problem is lifting leaves junk on the “tape” too often

1 Like
#9

Any clicks left after lifting (on blank tape) can be removed by recording silence elsewhere,then lifting and dropping on mark,click area.

#10

Strikes me this is just down to transients and the fact that we tend to be a little less disciplined with managing them in the OP-1 tape use-case as opposed to how careful we are with waveforms on our DAWs.

CB

#11

Perhaps, but I had a Boss loopstation from many years before the op-1 that didn’t have the same problems. I could do all kinds of punching in and wonky loops and it would be fine.

#12
Strikes me this is just down to transients and the fact that we tend to be a little less disciplined with managing them in the OP-1 tape use-case as opposed to how careful we are with waveforms on our DAWs.

CB

what?


strikes me that it’s about there being no envelope associated with the loop points.
#13

+1 no enveloping = clicks. Sometimes you get lucky with the transients of the loop, sometimes you dont. Depends what kind of music you make. Beat based stuff sometimes you actively want the click to emphasise the kick on the loop. ambient stuff it kinda sucks…

#14
No I would swear I don't have such problem.
I usually record my loop and stop playing before hitting "Play" button to stop recording.

So it maybe about a way to record loops...

This is my method also, and it works fine.


It can make lifting and dropping arbitrary segments a pain, and I still haven’t found a great way to record drum loops from an external source.
#15
Strikes me this is just down to transients and the fact that we tend to be a little less disciplined with managing them in the OP-1 tape use-case as opposed to how careful we are with waveforms on our DAWs.

CB

I don’t know. I created a loop in the drum sampler that was seamless. I recorded 4 bars into tape, and began hitting 1 and 2 randomly, rapidly replacing start / end points at different locations… No matter where I dropped that end point, I got the same exact pop. So it’s definitely not the zero crossing on a particular piece of recorded audio.

#16

I can’t recall the exact details, but on previous discussions about this issue someone heard from TE that loop points lacked precision, sometimes jumping to the wrong sample and causing clicks. I collected some evidence of this with an oscilloscope, but that got lost in the click petition thread on the old ohpeewon forum.

#17

I did some research on the tape start and end points a few weeks ago and determined that they represent those points as the number of frames of PCM data from the start of the tape to that specific point. It didn’t seem to me that this representation lacked precision. I might have made a mistake in my analysis though.

#18

This problem occurs when you insert your drum kick righ at the end of the loop, and right at the beginning of the loop. It can also happen when you put a bass sound or any kind of low frequency sound at these points. This is happening because we don’t leave enough space to start and end the drum sound properly. There should always be enough space before you start the kick, and before you end it. Because we always forget that drum sounds have a play time just like any synth sounds. That click sound usually occurs when you start and end your loop sharply. In order to solve this, you can use this method:

Don’t start your recording at the very beginning of your loop. Instead, press rec+play and let the tape roll. Start your recording while the tape is rolling, this way you don’t have to worry about having started your record at the beginning and ending of the loop. I know that this will mess with your memory of where the exact starting of the loop is, but at least you will get rid of the annoying click sound.
But that click sound is NOT actually a bug. It occurs naturally because of the fact that we forget the drum sounds have a solid play time and needs a space between their beginnings and their endings jut like a piano sound. If you put a piano sound right at the end of your loop and not let it end with a space properly, then you will hear this click sound as well as with a drum sound. And it would also happen in any kind of computer software just like when you are looping in FX Studio. Check your loop carefully and you will see that you haven’t left enough space to end the last sound that you put at the end of your loop. Not leaving enough space means that you ended playing that sound because you ended the loop, but the sound was not actually finished playing, so it remained half, and then this half connected to the beginning of another sound at the beginning of your loop, and here is your click sound.
#19

@yoof As far as I recall, the experiment I did was to set the loop points on an empty tape region and then record a continuous sound over the loop end. When playing it back, there was a discontinuity there, causing a click. So, it was like the loop cause a small gap, or jumped back to the wrong place in the tape.

#20
This problem occurs when you insert your drum kick righ at the end of the loop, and right at the beginning of the loop. It can also happen when you put a bass sound or any kind of low frequency sound at these points. This is happening because we don't leave enough space to start and end the drum sound properly. There should always be enough space before you start the kick, and before you end it. Because we always forget that drum sounds have a play time just like any synth sounds. That click sound usually occurs when you start and end your loop sharply. In order to solve this, you can use this method:
Don't start your recording at the very beginning of your loop. Instead, press rec+play and let the tape roll. Start your recording while the tape is rolling, this way you don't have to worry about having started your record at the beginning and ending of the loop. I know that this will mess with your memory of where the exact starting of the loop is, but at least you will get rid of the annoying click sound.
But that click sound is NOT actually a bug. It occurs naturally because of the fact that we forget the drum sounds have a solid play time and needs a space between their beginnings and their endings jut like a piano sound. If you put a piano sound right at the end of your loop and not let it end with a space properly, then you will hear this click sound as well as with a drum sound. And it would also happen in any kind of computer software just like when you are looping in FX Studio. Check your loop carefully and you will see that you haven't left enough space to end the last sound that you put at the end of your loop. Not leaving enough space means that you ended playing that sound because you ended the loop, but the sound was not actually finished playing, so it remained half, and then this half connected to the beginning of another sound at the beginning of your loop, and here is your click sound.

all of this < envelopes associated w/ loop points


everything that everyone is saying is correct and it ain’t rocket science.


millisecond fades implemented with loop points solves EVERYTHING.

(not saying it’s easy to implement)