From: an236@anon.penet.fi
Newsgroups: rec.music.makers.synth
Subject: Can a Mac function as a sampler?!?  (and question re: "SampleCell")
Date: 25 Dec 92 11:28:25 GMT
Organization: Anonymous contact service
X-Anonymously-To: rec.music.makers.synth

Pardon my Mac/sampler naivete, but please help (post followups) me with the
following scenario (and I apologize in advance for the overbloated verbosity):

My wife does music and has several keyboards and effects units, etc.
She controls the whole universe with a Roland MV-30 Music Production System,
which I guess is a fancy sequencer and MIDI mixer et al.  (I'm not much up on
the music side terminology-wise, so I don't completely understand all of the
capabilities of this thing.)

I thought it might be nice to buy her a Mac for Christmas.  I figured that one
of the Mac sequencer programs out there must have all/most of the same types
of features that the MV-30 has, and it would be more user-friendly to use than
the MV-30's LCD window with arrow keys and spinwheel dials etc.  I also thought
that it could serve double-duty as a Computer Graphics platform, as she's also
an artist and we're trying to figure out how to get her into something that
lets her be artistic yet still pays a weekly paycheck (-:  I am also somewhat
suspicious of most music equipment in terms of future expandability, and I
liked the idea that tho' her present system can only store on 3.5" floppies,
of course if the Mac proves too limited, we can toss in some standard SIMMs
and get a bigger hard disk and keep up with the times better (Yes, I noticed
that Ensoniq just introduced a new ASR-10 sampling keyboard that uses SIMMs
and an optional SCSI interface.  Hooray!).

Well, I was all ready to decide on the Mac and either get an LC II 4/80 from a
store, or maybe buy an SE/30 5/134 (and hang an external color monitor off of
a color card for the Graphics stuff).  Then the wife pronounced that she had
decided that she didn't really *want* a computer, she wanted a *sampler* more!
Either a sampling keyboard (like some version of an Ensoniq EPS, I'd imagine)
or a traditional rackmount like a used S950 (going for around $900 here in LA).

I am uncomfortable with this, because I feel she is only thinking about how it
takes care of her needs *today*, but not tomorrow - i.e., I think the S950 is
limited to 2.5 Mbytes of RAM, yes?  What if she finds this limiting later on?
Too bad, as far as I can tell.  Ditch it and spend some more money ...

Whereas I really like the Mac as a VegaMatic ("It slices, it dices ... it's a
dessert topping, it's a floor wax") approach, with the "Just add more SIMMs and
a bigger disk" to avoid built-in limitations.

My question: if I get a Mac, it seems like I get the sequencer bit taken care
of.  But I don't solve the "I wanna sampler!" problem.  What do you musicians
do about this?  Is this like the audio "separate component" question, i.e.
"Buy a separate sampler because it does that well, and the Mac does something
else well, and hook them (MIDI?) together somehow"?  Or, can I get my cake and
eat it too - does there exist some kind of sampler that can go INTO a Mac?

So far, I have only this hint: there seems to be something called "SampleCell".

In the December 1992 "Keyboard", Geoffrey Ryle's Computers On-Line article
("OMS and MIDI Manager") says

	For a while, though, MIDI Manager was the only way to connect your
	MIDI sequencer with a NuBus device (such as SampleCell) or ...

In the same "Keyboard" there's always these ads (from East-West SoundWareHouse)
for lotsa different CD's of samples - "The X-Static Goldmine", et al.
My wife wants to be able to buy a couple of these CD's, so therefore "I need a
sampler with a CD-ROM drive" is her new rallying cry.

These ads imply that you can get these things either as Audio CD's, or as
"CD-ROMs" specifically intended for "Akai CD-ROM" or "Roland 770/750 CD-ROM"
or "EIII/EIIIXP CD-ROM" or - most importantly - a "SampleCell CD-ROM".

This gives me the hope that there is some thing called "SampleCell" which
comes as a NuBus card (that leaves buying an SE/30 right out, yes?  An SE/30
doesn't have any NuBus slots, correct?), and which may have some kind of
CD-ROM drive interface which can accept these sampler CD-ROMs (mighty expensive
though - $399!?!).

Am I on the right track, or am I all wet?!?  If this is true, and there is a
NuBus sampler card, what software drives it?  Is there any all-in-one
sequencer et al. software that can also drive/control/use such a card?  Help!

Any and all advice appreciated!  Help me salvage her Christmas ... (-:

(P.S. Sorry that I have to post this anonymously; this is not related to this
 newsgroup and will stop as soon as I get my big disk and my own Usenet feed!)

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