Sonic Cell USB storage capacity limit??

[smurf]

I have a Sonic Cell PRO and I'm wondering what the USB storage drive capacity limit is if anybody knows. I called roland tech several months back and they weren't sure either but Scott (the tech guy) said it probably would be around 1 GB max. I think I may have been the first person to own a Sonic Cell, having purchased it way back in September before they officially went on sale to the public, and my call to roland tech was the first ever that they had received regarding the Sonic Cell. Scott told me back in September they were still in the process of testing spec limits on the Sonic Cell but here we are in the middle of December and still no word on their web site regarding USB storage capacity limits.

When I bought my Sonic Cell I tried my Lexar Jump Drive PRO 512MB thumb drive and it worked fine with my Sonic Cell. I then just recently bought a Lexar 2GB Jump Lightning Drive and it also works great with the Sonic Cell. If I knew the Storage capacity/compatibility limit of the Sonic Cell and if the capacity were, let's say 4GB, I would gladly take the 2GB I have back for a refund and get a 4GB version. I took a gamble on the Lexar 2GB drive hoping it would work and it did. But maybe you guys (roland tech included) can save me some time and hassle by giving me a definitive answer as to the Sonic Cell's USB storage capacity limit. Has anybody got a 4GB or even larger USB drive to work with the Sonic Cell? And if so which brand?

Mike

PS: I'm happy I got a 2GB drive to work but I would be even happier to know that an even larger capacity drive would work as well. Thanks...

[tomdavisdotcom]

I got the first shipment also. Was on the phone IMMEDIATELY with roland tech who verified my horrific discovery of a 198 song total limit. The SC will recognize ONLY a playlist of 99 songs plus 99 songs you would drag / drop or copy / paste into the root directory of the flash drive. I told them up front that had I know this, I would have kept using minidisc for my backing tracks. The cell even has to be TURNED OFF AND BACK ON if you want to exchange one stick of 198 songs for another stick. And- if you use alot of mp3 on a stick it takes a few MINUTES for the SC to gather in the song property and title info. This big time limitation makes it more of a recording tool that a live performance tool. Most pros have a catalogue of more than 198 songs.

[smurf]

Yeah, that's kind of a bummer I agree. I didn't know about the 99 song limit either until after I purchased the Sonic Cell. Maybe Roland will accommodate owners and provide an OS software update that will increase the root directory song limit? I don't think it's a hardware related issue but rather a software issue right? In other words it's not something with the Sonic Cell hardware itself, but rather, would only take a software fix to increase the limit. At least that's what I'm hoping anyway.

And the reason I'm asking about the USB drive capacity limit is that a larger capacity drive would be more suitable for loading large uncompressed .wav files and therefore be able to take advantage of the Sonic Cell's 24bit/96kHz playback capability with the ability to produce a better quality sound as a result. But since there is the 99 root directory song/file limit it makes it sort of a catch-22 situation even if we could theoretically use a 4GB, 8GB, or even larger USB drive. However, I was pleasantly surprised that my Lexar 2GB drive worked since Roland tech said the limit would probably be 1GB max.

Christmas is right around the corner. Extending the 99 song limitation through an OS update would sure be a nice Christmas gift from Roland and company. Or is that too much to ask? That is of course, if it only requires a software fix and not a hardware fix to correct and extend the limit.

Mike

[tomdavisdotcom]

I use a 4GB drive with no probs. The only drawback using WAV files would be load time. Not sure WHY it takes so long for a load of 150 total MP3s, but it does- 3 minutes or so. 150 MID files takes 10 seconds. It must load beginning of each mp3 into a buffer or something. The 99 song limit in both locations is a little bewildering, especially since software is usually governed by binary, making 128 songs the logical limit.

[Marc Clifford]

Hi Guys,
My name is Marc and I live in Australia.
I also share your woes and grief on this product regarding song limits etc.
I use it live for backing tracks both midi files (smf) and mp3 backings.To hold only 198 songs is a bummer and I also would not have purchased it if I knew this limitation.
I use a Kingston 4G usb drive with no problem but when arranging playlists/songlists it takes far too long to load the next file.Have you guys experienced the same problem and have you any comments or advice to resolve this???
I also noticed a sofware update on the Roland US site and am wondering if that would fix this problem??
I like you had great hopes of using it as the ultimate sound module and backing machine for solo and duo performances ( I play keys and work with a female vocalist) but so far am not impressed with slow loading times and limited storage capacity!!! But I do love the sounds and have been a Roland user for over 30 years!!
Great to discuss ideas and suggestions.
Regards
Marc

[smurf]

Well, I took back my 2GB drive and got the 4GB version of the Lexar Lightning Drive. Thanks for posting that a 4GB flash drive does indeed work. I have no idea why Roland Tech originally stated that max capacity drive limit would be around 1GB. I am glad that they were wrong though.

As far as slow loading times I did a comparison with my Sonic Cell and noticed that loading a Playlist took longer than loading files directly into the root directory of the drive. For instance, I made a playlist of 99 songs that consisted of a total of 578 MB and timed the load time. Using my Lexar 4GB Lightning Drive the total load time for the playlist was 1 Min/30 sec. Putting those same (578MB) .mp3 files on the root directory of the Lexar drive (sans a playlist) the load time into the Sonic Cell was drastically reduced to 16.3 seconds. It's worth mentioning that I enabled Chain Play when creating the playlist. Also, I'm not sure if you were experiencing long load times between songs [if indeed your playlist was set up with chain play activated Marc and that this was one of your questions]. I don't notice any lag time between loading songs (from one song to the other that is) in chain play. When the song that is playing has ended the next song in the playlist starts to play almost immediately. There would be a lag time between songs loading and playing in sequence if there are gaps at the end of the song playing and/or at the beginning of the next song in the chain.

I have to mention also that I created this playlist in the Sonic Cell Playlist Editor on my computer and not on the Sonic Cell itself. If you mean that when creating a playlist on the Sonic Cell itself is when you experience the long load times between songs/playlists then this is something I haven't had a chance to try yet and therefore can't substantiate for you.

You also didn't say how much load time you were talking about e.g. was it a whole 99 song playlist?? or just a few songs?? or just loading one song to the next?? Was it all .mp3 files?? or just .mid files?? or a combination of both?? How much time are we talking about?? A few seconds, or several minutes??

Hopefully my stats will give you a gauge and relative comparison guide to the load times you are experiencing Marc.

I also created a playlist (using the Playlist Editor on my PC) with 99 .mid files totaling around 3.5MB and it took 31.5 seconds to load into the Sonic Cell. Again, I had chain play enabled and load time between songs was, likewise, almost instantaneous. I agree that the Sonic Cell is more efficient at loading larger size files into it than with many smaller ones; comparatively speaking that is.

Also, not all flash drives are the same and therefore your mileage may vary depending on the read/write specs on any given USB flash drive.

Since there is the 99 song playlist limit the workaround is buying one or more extra USB flash drives and consequently making other playlists for each drive. The drawback of course is forking over the additional money for the extra drives but is something, in my opinion, that shouldn't be necessary if Roland simply fixed and extended the limit on the Sonic Cell with an OS update. One consolation (sic) is if using more than one flash drive with different playlists etc., is that there is no need to turn off the Sonic Cell and back on again when swapping the drives. Although there would be a need to if the sampling rates of the audio files are different than the sampling rate of what the Sonic Cell is set to.

Flash drives are coming down in price but having the ability to put everything on one drive is, needless to say, optimal and desirable. Hopefully Roland will come through with a fix in an timely fashion.

PS: I had OS version 1.04 installed on my Sonic Cell when loading the playlists I created.

[nc]

I can't get SonicCell to even recognize that there's an mp3 on my jump drive. I've tried 4 different drives that range from 128MB to 4GB (Lexar, SanDisk, and Kingston). Strange thing is that I used one of the drives to update to version 1.04 and that worked! So I must be doing something wrong with the mp3. Any ideas?

[tomdavisdotcom]

Another major software flaw of the CELL is that it doesn't recognize MP3's ripped using most programs. I had tried Nero, Creative, Yahoo Jukebox and Windows Media ripping to MP3- NONE WERE RECOGNIZED. I had forgotten I-tunes was preloaded on my DELL and used that - GOLD !!!!! If you have I-tunes, use that. The Roland guys said its a way the MP3 is encoded using and extra bit or byte or something nutty.

[Marc Clifford]

Hi Smurf,
Thanks so much for your reply,advise and test details on using the Sonic Cell to load playlists.The timeframes to load both midis and mp3s that you quoted were way,way faster than my experience with the unit so far!!!! But I've been using the original OS.
I'm going to update the software and test its performance and will get back to you with how it goes.
Thanks again.
Have a great new year!
Regards
Musomarc

[joetorch]

nc,

The probable reason why you can't get soniccell to recognize your mp3's is that they are not encoded for proper sampling rate or bit rate. Use a freeware converter and rewrite them and they should work fine. I had to do this with many of mine and they work fine now. Also, remember to set the proper sampling rate on the SonicCell to match your MP3's. (the little switch on the front to either 44.1, 48, or 96)

[joetorch]

The 99 song storage limit is a shortcoming. I have also noticed that loading time with midi files just takes seconds as long as you leave them in the root directory. With the price of USB drives (as little as $4.00 for a 64mb if you shop around), I can use them as playlists, putting 99 songs on each, and just swap them as needed.

[nc]

Thanks joetorch. I knew about the sampling rate issue but I'm a novice on some of this mp3 encoding stuff. I'll give your suggestion a try.

[smurf]

Also nc, when you put .mp3's, .midi's, etc. on your flash drive and you plug it into the Sonic Cell there should be a little window that comes up in the Sonic Cell telling you that the files are loading. If you are getting that little loading indicator then the Sonic Cell is indeed recognizing the flash drive and loading the files that are on it. Once all the files have been loaded the little pop up disappears (I know this is trivial) but you have to make sure you then press the SMF/Audio player button and select "USB Memory" from the list to access the files on the drive.

[tomdavisdotcom]

The window will STILL show that it is loading even if the MP3's are not "recognized". As i said, the only ripper that makes my MP3's recognized is I-TUNES.

[howreg]

I am new to SOnic Cell but I have a 4 gig usb with 99 songs in the root directory and 99 sings in a play list. Really important the the 1st file in the root directory and the 1st file in the play list Sonic Cell foilder are compatible with your sample bit rate seletor switch or else it will not recignize any of the other files. I have 198 mp3 backing tracks recognized on the usb once I removed the files that were not compatible. It says so in the manual. Load time for lists songs and USB are completely acceptable with the 1.4 software version. Quick manipulation of the flies and songs. Very cool device!