Dirtywave M8 - Audio Output and Volume Control; The Microsd Card

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Dirtywave M8 Operation Manual
Audio Output and Volume Control
The audio output connector is suitable for both general output and headphone use.
When an output is connected the built-in speakers will stop functioning. You can adjust
the output and speaker volume by navigating to the Project view [SHIFT]+[UP], high-
light the “OUTPUT VOL” setting, and adjust with [EDIT]+[DIRECTION]. Please note
that levels above “F0” will be quite loud when using small headphones/earbuds/IEMs
and as such for your hearing protection “F0” is the maximum volume recalled when the
M8 powers up- regardless of what it was previously set to.
The microSD Card
The M8 uses a microSD card to store data including songs, samples, instruments and
themes. When samples are played, they are streamed directly from the SD card. They
are not read from memory. Therefore the random access read speed of the SD card is
critical to the proper operation of the M8. Most cards are optimized for working with
a single le sequentially and can have performance issues with playback of multiple
samples at the same time. A complete list of tested cards with the M8 is available here:
https://dirtywave.com/sd.
Please be careful inserting the card. The slot in your unit might be slightly bigger than
the card reader. Misaligned insertion may result in the card being stuck in the enclosure.
See the troubleshooting section for more information.
Cards used with the M8 must be formatted using the SD Association SD Memory Card
Formatter tool: https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter. This will ensure the card’s
format is optimized for reading data quickly.
The SD card that ships with the M8 has been tested to have a high enough read speed
to handle most workloads. However, even the included card does have limits. If song
playback is halted with a “CPU TOO BUSY” message, this is most likely the cause. To
limit this issue there are multiple steps you can take:
• Convert stereo samples to mono where stereo is not necessary - e.g. Kick drums
• Convert 24-bit samples to 16-bit or 8-bit where volume detail is not critical
• Avoid playing samples an octave or higher above their recorded frequency (each
octave doubles the amount of data that needs to be read each second)
Converting to mono or dropping the bit rate or sample rate can be done in the sample
editor view. More information can be found in the Sample Editor section of this manual.