Yoshimi Pi

[Eddy Deegan]

Thank you very much for taking the time and trouble to do this Will. Safely downloaded at this end, and a card on order to deploy it to

[Folderol]

Let me know how you get on... Oh, and from the 7th to the 12th I'll be off-grid at the NFFF

Moving on, some numbers, all deg.C to the nearest 0.5

Ambient
22.5

Processor

Idle (no Apps)
63

Yoshimi idle
67

Yoshimi playing arps from keyboard to Ghost Ensemble
69

Yoshimi + Rosegarden with East to West demo loaded but idle
69.5

After two runs
72.5

Yoshimi + Rosegarden with Well Really demo loaded but idle
71.5

After two runs
73

Some explanations:
The Pi starts to throttle at 80, so this is safe but not ideal.

Tests were done with 008. 003 seemed to give a similar result for the first static test, so I didn't bother beyond that. The first measurement was made after idling for about 2 hours to ensure the temperate was settled, for the same reason the other idle measurements were made 30 minutes after the state had been set.

When yoshimi is idle, it isn't really! Even though there is no sound, (silent) audio is being calculated, generated and sent to the interface, so the difference with running values are pretty much down to the calculations being made at each note on. The more parts there are enabled, the more work is being done, and the tests are done with; just one part , 10 parts and 15 parts.

Rosegarden adds some extra work of course, and this is almost entirely dependent on the running status.

The received wisdom is that the small finned heatsinks make very little difference in an enclosed environment unless air is being moved over them, or unless they have thermal connection to a metal enclosure. The second option would be very difficult to arrange with any reliability, but there is space inside for a 30mm fan blowing across the board, so that's a possibility. This would be easy with 004 onwards, not so much with the earlier ones. I'll see if I can get hold of one and do further tests, for both performance and noise.

In an extreme situation for 004 onwards, it would be possible to cut a hole, in the blank side and fit a larger fan there drawing in outside air, but I'd prefer to avoid that!

[Folderol]

Ho Hum an error in the arpeggiator call, but fixable.

In Apps, while holding down Shift, double-click on the 'QmidiArp' icon. This will open a new window with two files.

Again while holding down Shift, double-click on 'AppRun' which will load it into a text editor.
Add ' -a' to the command so it becomes:

qmidiarp -a

(don't forget the space)
Resave it, and the job's done.

[Folderol]

Having loads of free time - HAR! I've managed to build a pair of apps, the first of which will fetch-build-test the latest version. Once you're satisfied it's tickety-boo you can run the second to actually install it. This way any kind of build failure won't break the existing install.

The first time these are used it will be necessary to use the synaptic package manager to install an extra system file, so I'll wrap all of this up with instructions and post it somewhere.

I'll also include an archiver program (never thought it would be needed) but on this occasion it will have to be unarchived from the terminal window - instructions for that will also be in the text file. Actually I might just put the text file here when it's all ready to go

[Martin Walker]

Ooh, thanks for this Will - being a total beginner at Linux, having an app to streamline the Yoshimi Pi update process could help bypass a world of pain

Looking forward to the official write up.

Martin

[James Perrett]

Our lad is now enjoying experimenting with Yoshimi. On the recommendation of a friend of mine we set up a Patchbox system on his Raspberry Pi 4. Patchbox is a slimmed down version of Raspbian specifically set up for audio with Jack and Alsa already configured. We then downloaded Reaper and, after a little bit of fiddling with Jack, we managed to record and play some Midi.

We then downloaded Yoshimi - it was actually very easy once you get used to using apt-get for every new bit of software.

He's just come in to tell me that he has his USB Midi keyboard talking to Yoshimi and he's set up the audio output to feed into Reaper so that he can record it. I can hear some interesting sounds coming out of his room.

[Folderol]

Well, that's good to know
Which version did you get?

[James Perrett]

I'll have to check tomorrow.

He was very chuffed to find that Yoshimi responds to the filter and resonance controls from his keyboard. However, it didn't seem to respond to the reverb control (controller 91) or chorus control (controller 93) - is there a configuration setting somewhere to set this up?

[Folderol]

Good to know he's getting into it. I'll be interested to know how deep he goes down the rabbit hole

Both Reverb and Chorus are effects that can have their controls MIDI-learned.
to do this, Right-click on the control you want to learn while holding down the Ctrl key, then wiggle the physical control you want to learn. Since V1.7.4 almost all controls can be learned, and most will affect playing notes not just next note.

There is a 'gotcha' with the MOD wheel. It only works on voice patches that have the AddSynth and/or PadSynth frequency LFO depth set above zero! However, the physical wheel can be learn linked to any other control (as can the pitch wheel)

If he gets stuck there is a link to a supplied user guide in the Yoshimi dropdown menu. This is quite heavy going for older versions, in which case, a more friendly one is here:
http://yoshimi.sourceforge.net/docs/user-guide

This is really for Versions 2.0 or later, but apart from the filer the majority of the info also applies to earlier versions.

Finally,
If in doubt hover the mouse over a button or control for info and hints.

[James Perrett]

Thanks Will,

That's all very helpful. He's using the standard SD card in there at the moment but we'll give this a try the next time he gets back to using the Patchbox SD card with all the music software on it.