Seems like I’m one of the more lucky people in here.
The SSP does what I bought it for, and it is substantial in my setup. But we’re all different; I already own a lot of gear and modular eurorack devices, so I didn’t expect the SSP to be a “end all, be all” device.
I expected the SSP to be a interface between the DAW Bitwig and my modular rack. I got lost very quickly in the vast possibilities this device offers in combination with a CV control monster that is Bitwig. It’s absolutely next level, no doubt about it, and I can’t see another device on the market even come close to this combo.
But I can understand that if you wanted the SSP to become your sound generator and sound processor “all in one” solution, you might become bored and frustrated. I almost never control the SSP with the SSP functions (step sequencer, LFO etc); I pretty much only use external CV and gate triggers from Bitwig to control my SSP instruments. That way you dont have to handle the menu diving and the encoders. You can just prepare the instrument in Bitwig and on the SSP, and you’re finished. Variations of the device can be saved quickly, and you can also save different CV controls on Bitwig in a heartbeat.
So yeah. I guess there’s loads of room to improve on the SSP; I agree that it would be very sad if the dev’s just leave it be at this point.
Not everybody has got the setup that I’m using. I wouldn’t even think about using the SSP all on its own, like doing everything “inside the box”. That’d be a deal breaker for me aswell.
I just wanna give a quick example as to why.
Imagine this connection; A sampler is routed into rings, and then routed into clouds. This can accumulate in about 20 CV destinations that control the modules. These 20 CV destinations couldn’t even be controlled by just the 16 external inputs. You need CV over USB to control more than 16 destinations.
Then, what if you would use LFO’s, slow pitched WTO or Step sequencers to control the 20 destinations? Possible, but limited; The LFO shapes aren’t that diverse- you could FM the lfos for more variations. Ok. But in the end, you have to menu dive on the SSP, and when you have a new setting that you like, you need to save a new preset. You can also use the macros; but you only have 4 macros to control important CV values of your modules. And the encoders, quite frankly, are not optimal to jam this device live.
Now, I wouldn’t want to work like that. It can yield interesting results, because the SSP’s audio engine has some interesting character; the precision of the step sequencer is pretty good and unique.
But now picture this: You create this connection of sampler into rings into clouds; you select an Input module and control your CV destinations now from Bitwig. You can do everything from that point on.
You could map every CV destination on your midi controller knobs. So instead of menu diving on the SSP, you have a CV grid open in your DAW, and assign those destinations to your MIDI controller.
Its 100x more fun, I promise.
Also, you can simply use Bitwigs’ fantastic CV capabilities to send sequencers, LFO’s and every kind of complex signal you can imagine to your CV destinations. Re-routing your CV destinations can also be done in Bitwig, you dont even need to look at the SSP anymore.
Dont know if I can explain it well. But the SSP in combination with CV Grid from Bitwig enables a much more fun and lighting fast workflow to go crazy with.
Anyway, this is how I use it, but this only works on Mac in my experience.
