Midi Rack Masters Unite, and help my dumb a$$ out!!

[Gresh]

OK, major equipment overhaul in process.

Rack growing here's what it should contain when done:

Furman PL-8
Yamaha AG-Stomp mounted on pull out shelf (for Piezo Signal)
TC Electronic G-Major
Line 6 POD Pro
Mesa 20/20

Question comes when using a midi contoller to control these devices. I know that running the controller to the TC MIDI input and connecting the POD's midi in to the Midi Thru of the TC will allow me to control both devices...but how do I get the AG Stomp incorporated into this path...the simple solution is to leave it on the floor and not in the rack...but I would like to have only one controller and maybe a few expression pedals down there to mess with rather than two bulky pieces. Any thoughts?

[ryan]

If I were you, I would use the Floorboard with the Pod Pro.

Run the MIDI OUT of the Pod Pro to the MIDI IN on your G-Major and you'll be set...

The POD generates a logical set of Program Change messages:

Bank 1, Preset A = MIDI Program 01
Bank 1, Preset B = MIDI Program 02
Bank 1, Preset C = MIDI Program 03
Bank 1, Preset D = MIDI Program 04
Bank 2, Preset A = MIDI Program 05
Bank 2, Preset B = MIDI Program 06
Bank 2, Preset C = MIDI Program 07
Bank 2, Preset D = MIDI Program 08

And so on...

That way, you have very little on the floor, you have a built-in tuner, volume & wah pedals, and much sturdier buttons than just about any other MIDI floor unit.

Since 99% of all MIDI floor pedals use the generic "ALL DEVICES ON ONE MIDI CHANNEL" design, the floorboard is gonna work exactly the same as most others for channel/effect switching.

The only thing better would be a DMC Ground Control pedal, and if you used it in conjunction with the DMC GCX, you could stick yer stompbox in the rack and switch it via MIDI. This setup is gonna run you around $400 (IF YOU'RE LUCKY AND FIND IT USED...) then you'll need a wah and volume pedal and extra cables running out from your rig.

With this setup, you can set the POD Pro to MIDI Channel 1 and the G-Major to MIDI channel 2. Then you can set up your basic sounds on four or five presets in the Pod Pro and set up a handful of effects in the G-Major. When you want basic rhythm, you always call up Bank 1, Preset A on the Pod if you wanna add a separate chorus or flange preset, you still use the same bank/preset in the Pod, but assign it to a different number on your floor unit. This, to me, is the beauty of the DMC stuff, cuz I don't have to have fifty copies of my Rhythm settings in my Intellifex -- no matter what bank I'm in, the Intellifex is always on preset 1 when I'm playing basic rhythm.

Also, the new Ground Control pedal has the bullet-proof buttons like the Floorboard, but it's brand-new, so don't expect to find one used.

[bammbamm]

The other thing you could use to insert an effect into your chain is the Rockman MIDI Octopus and remote fx loop, you should be able to find one for 75-150 depending on desparation. They really come in handy !

Bamm

[jonrayl]

that is almost the exact setup I have, though I have a fishman proeq instead of the agstomp, and an ADA MP1 instead of the pod.

I run my rig with a lexicon MPXR1 foot controller. It works great because I can send data out on different midi channels simultaneously (I can send the g major to patch 53 and the mp1 to patch 2)

to midi out to the ag stomp, there *should be a midi through on the pod pro as well. its probably 1 jack for out/thru, but you would just go from that to the ag stomp.

[Gresh]

There is no midi thru on the POD Pro. I will check the manual to see if the out can serve that funtion, but I don't recall reading that anywhere. If it does, that would be cool as I could assign one channel for each device. The other option as you mentioned was to use the POD as the midi change controller for the G-Major...but in that scenario, I can't control individual effects on the G-Major without creating duplicate patches on the POD...

Yet another option is for me to use two floorboards, one POD and one dedicated for effects control on both the G-Major and the AG Stomp but that's alot of dancing and it takes up a ton of space. Soon as I get this all put together I'll post some more direct questions, too much unknown at this point and I don't really know how much control I really need.