Groove 3RD WAVE - How to Sound Like a Vintage PPG

108 How to Sound Like a Vintage PPG Groove Synthesis
How to Sound Like a Vintage PPG
Although the 3rd Wave can sound very much like a PPG due to the way
it is designed, there are several things you can do to make it sound even
more like an authentic vintage PPG.
Choose the Right Wavetable
The original PPG 2.2 and 2.3 both used 8-bit wavetables that had 64
symmetric single-cycle waves in them. These 31 wavetables are wavet-
ables P00 to P30 in the 3rd Wave. The wavetables above P30 that have a
“P” in front of the name are also 8-bit tables, but they aren’t tables that
were parts of the original PPG.
If you use one or more of the P00 to P30 wavetables in a preset, is that
enough to make the 3rd Wave sound like a PPG? The short answer is
“no.” The fact is, there are several other things that you need to do to
make a preset sound like a classic PPG. Some of these things are built-
in features. For example, the PPGs ran at a high sample rate that was a
division of the clock rate that the processor ran at. The 3rd Wave runs at
that same rate when you select a “P” wavetable. But you also need the
waveforms to be “calculated” a certain way without smoothing or any
reconstruction lter. To do this, you will need to look at the three items
in the WaveFlow display.
Choose the Right Wave Flow Settings
To operate like a PPG, press the
wave flow button and turn on “Use
Upper Wavetable,” turn off “Waveform Smoothing,” and turn off
“Wavetable Smoothing.” For a complete explanation of what these three
buttons do, refer to “About Wave Flow” on page 18. In short, the
PPG did not have interpolation when changing from one waveform in a
wavetable to another. Also, it did not have interpolation when changing
from one pitch or note to another. Finally, it would not stop at the highest
waveform in a given wavetable if you modulated past the last position in
the wavetable, but rather it kept going into wavetable P30 which is the
“upper wavetable.” Using these three settings, you are most of the way
to making the 3rd Wave sound like a PPG.