Repository navigation
Releases
BoopBox 1.5.1
What's new in 1.5.1
BoopBox Trainer: the coach's text always fits (the trainer):
- A line of the coach that is wider than the screen now scrolls like a ticker: it waits a moment so you can read its start, moves to the left until its end shows, waits again, then starts over. Lines that fit stay still, as before. On the screens with one line, where the step and the hint take turns, a scrolling line keeps its turn until it has shown all of itself.
- A note on a black key is now hinted as LIT KEY (it was LIT BLACK KEY): the hint fits without scrolling. Before, in songs with sharps or flats (your own songs from the song page, level 4), its end was cut off.
- No hint is cut short any more (they have room for 47 characters).
The song page (webapp/song/) hears dense songs better:
- Half-time over a whole section: in a busy drop the snare on beat 3 can hide in any four bars; a section of 16 bars or more is now also judged over all of its bars.
- Kicks over a whole section: in four bars of a full mix the bass's notes can sound like kicks (a kick on almost every step). A section of 16 bars or more now takes its kick pattern from all of its bars.
BoopBox itself is unchanged in this release (only its version number). Projects, songs, presets, settings and the trainer's progress from 1.5.0 open as they are. Level 4's song lives in the trainer's package: installing 1.5.1 from the installer empties level 4, so to keep your song, install 1.5.1 from the song page with it.
How to install
From the browser (recommended): open the BoopBox installer in Chrome or Edge on a computer and connect the FM-1 by USB, with a data cable, directly (no hub). Choose BoopBox or BoopBox Trainer (three songs taught step by step on the FM-1; the trainer), press INSTALL, allow MIDI access, and wait for Done. The FM-1 restarts on the BoopBox logo. Your projects, user presets, samples and settings are kept. Then unplug the FM-1 and plug it back in once, so the computer finds its USB audio input.
The installer always installs the newest version. To install this one in particular, use Python:
With Python: download boopbox-1.5.1.fwsc from the assets below and fm1_install.py, then run python fm1_install.py boopbox-1.5.1.fwsc (needs pip install mido python-rtmidi).
Offline editor: download boopbox-editor-1.5.1.html from the assets and double-click it. It opens in Chrome or Edge without internet.
If something goes wrong: hold OCT− alone while switching the FM-1 on (BoopBox USB RESCUE), then install again. See Rescue and Going back in the README.
Custom firmware is installed at your own risk. No warranty.
Checksum
SHA-256 of boopbox-1.5.1.fwsc:
728d0e4139ee2a6b5a945d205c66582357b172212cb6b77fbb43337f560c34b1
All files: SHA256SUMS.txt (check with sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS.txt).
BoopBox 1.5.0
What's new in 1.5.0
BoopBox Trainer: your song as level 4 (the trainer):
- A new page, Your song (also linked from the installer). Drop in an audio file (MP3, WAV, OGG, M4A, FLAC). The page listens to 30 seconds of it, in your browser: the file is not uploaded anywhere. It finds the tempo, the key, a bar of drums (kick, snare, hats), a bass line, a chord a bar and a lead; the notes are found by Basic Pitch, Spotify's note model, served from the site.
- Compare the original (or its drums, bass or the rest alone) with your FM-1 version, played by BoopBox's own sound engines in the browser, part by part. Fix a drum hit with a click, pick another key, style, kit or sound, or leave a part out. The steps the trainer will show are listed as you go.
- Install it: the page installs BoopBox Trainer 1.5.0 with your song in it (Chrome or Edge on a computer, as the installer). On the FM-1, hold HOME: the picker has LEVEL 4: YOUR SONG, taught like the others, with the same hints, lights and why pages. Another song replaces it; its progress starts again, the other levels' stays.
- It is an approximation, not a transcription: four parts and a loop of a few bars. Songs with a clear beat work best; in a dense mix a bass can sound like a kick (fix it on the drum grid).
The trainer keeps an 8 KiB song area for level 4 (about 1.5 KB of code more); without a song it has its three levels as before. The editor's sound preview plays the drum track again (its track 4 was not a drum track in the browser).
BoopBox itself is unchanged in this release (only its version number). Projects, songs, presets, settings and the trainer's progress from 1.4.3 open as they are.
How to install
From the browser (recommended): open the BoopBox installer in Chrome or Edge on a computer and connect the FM-1 by USB, with a data cable, directly (no hub). Choose BoopBox or BoopBox Trainer (three songs taught step by step on the FM-1; the trainer), press INSTALL, allow MIDI access, and wait for Done. The FM-1 restarts on the BoopBox logo. Your projects, user presets, samples and settings are kept. Then unplug the FM-1 and plug it back in once, so the computer finds its USB audio input.
The installer always installs the newest version. To install this one in particular, use Python:
With Python: download boopbox-1.5.0.fwsc from the assets below and fm1_install.py, then run python fm1_install.py boopbox-1.5.0.fwsc (needs pip install mido python-rtmidi).
Offline editor: download boopbox-editor-1.5.0.html from the assets and double-click it. It opens in Chrome or Edge without internet.
If something goes wrong: hold OCT− alone while switching the FM-1 on (BoopBox USB RESCUE), then install again. See Rescue and Going back in the README.
Custom firmware is installed at your own risk. No warranty.
Checksum
SHA-256 of boopbox-1.5.0.fwsc:
99bb76f62366ddf3b03b91800023b150324a7995760eb300f46e42214685185c
All files: SHA256SUMS.txt (check with sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS.txt).
BoopBox 1.4.3
What's new in 1.4.3
BoopBox Trainer: why you are doing each step (the trainer):
- Hold HOME during a level: before the level picker, the trainer explains the step you are on in music terms: the backbeat, swing, the minor scale, seventh chords, i - iv - VI - v, the pentatonic hook, four on the floor, voice leading, half-time, the side-chain pump, risers, builds, song form and more: 45 topics, two screens each, in plain words. SELECT turns the pages, then on to the levels; OCT- closes.
- Each level ends on a page about what you made.
BoopBox itself is unchanged in this release (only its version number). Projects, songs, presets, settings and the trainer's progress from 1.4.2 open as they are.
How to install
From the browser (recommended): open the BoopBox installer in Chrome or Edge on a computer and connect the FM-1 by USB, with a data cable, directly (no hub). Choose BoopBox or BoopBox Trainer (three songs taught step by step on the FM-1; the trainer), press INSTALL, allow MIDI access, and wait for Done. The FM-1 restarts on the BoopBox logo. Your projects, user presets, samples and settings are kept. Then unplug the FM-1 and plug it back in once, so the computer finds its USB audio input.
The installer always installs the newest version. To install this one in particular, use Python:
With Python: download boopbox-1.4.3.fwsc from the assets below and fm1_install.py, then run python fm1_install.py boopbox-1.4.3.fwsc (needs pip install mido python-rtmidi).
Offline editor: download boopbox-editor-1.4.3.html from the assets and double-click it. It opens in Chrome or Edge without internet.
If something goes wrong: hold OCT− alone while switching the FM-1 on (BoopBox USB RESCUE), then install again. See Rescue and Going back in the README.
Custom firmware is installed at your own risk. No warranty.
Checksum
SHA-256 of boopbox-1.4.3.fwsc:
8a2dd29cb7463dc34200609153c7cebfa40ea277022f82313117cc2d9f56acbd
All files: SHA256SUMS.txt (check with sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS.txt).
BoopBox 1.4.2
What's new in 1.4.2
The sound browser stays open until you close it (BoopBox and BoopBox Trainer):
- SAVE keeps the sound you are on and closes it (SOUND KEPT). HOME closes it and puts back the sound the track had when it opened (SOUND PUT BACK). It no longer goes back by itself after 4 s.
- SAVE tapped elsewhere opens the SAVE pages at USER (USER, SECTION, TOOLS); the browser is the PRESETS knob's.
- PATTERNS, SONG and CHORDS no longer show the bottom of the screen before's labels under their title.
- A drum track reaches PATTERNS: on the DRUMS screen SEQ goes GRID, KIT, SOUND, then PATTERNS, and SEQ there back to the grid (before, only a synth track's SEQ got there).
- ALGORITHM on the DRUMS screen changes the track, as on the other screens (a synth track: its NOTES page; from NOTES, a drum track: its DRUMS grid). The SONG screen keeps it for the loop's start.
- LEVEL and PAN read the same everywhere: HOME's dials, the DRUMS screen and GLO's faders show them as their pages do (a synth's LEVEL in dB, PAN in %, the drum track's LEVEL and REV 0-127), not 0-100 on one screen and dB on another. GLO's DUST and DUCK show their % as GLO > MASTER does.
BoopBox Trainer, from levels 1 and 2 played on the FM-1 (the trainer):
- A sound step is done when you tap SAVE on the sound.
- With a note in hand on the SEQ layer, every step that wants it stays lit until all are in.
- Where ALGORITHM does not change the track (the DRUMS grid, the SONG screen, a button held) the step says TAP HOME first.
- Values read as their screen shows them (LEVEL -7.0dB, PAN -31%, LEN 4 with SEQ held).
- The PATTERNS steps say the next press from any track: which track, KNOB 1 TO PATTERN 2, KNOB 4 RIGHT TWICE: COPY, PRESS OCT+ TO PLAY IT, from a drum track too (TAP SEQ UNTIL PATTERNS).
- Drum steps off the drum grid say how to get there (TAP SEQ: THE DRUM GRID).
Projects, songs, presets, settings and the trainer's progress from 1.4.1 open as they are.
How to install
From the browser (recommended): open the BoopBox installer in Chrome or Edge on a computer and connect the FM-1 by USB, with a data cable, directly (no hub). Choose BoopBox or BoopBox Trainer (three songs taught step by step on the FM-1; the trainer), press INSTALL, allow MIDI access, and wait for Done. The FM-1 restarts on the BoopBox logo. Your projects, user presets, samples and settings are kept. Then unplug the FM-1 and plug it back in once, so the computer finds its USB audio input.
The installer always installs the newest version. To install this one in particular, use Python:
With Python: download boopbox-1.4.2.fwsc from the assets below and fm1_install.py, then run python fm1_install.py boopbox-1.4.2.fwsc (needs pip install mido python-rtmidi).
Offline editor: download boopbox-editor-1.4.2.html from the assets and double-click it. It opens in Chrome or Edge without internet.
If something goes wrong: hold OCT− alone while switching the FM-1 on (BoopBox USB RESCUE), then install again. See Rescue and Going back in the README.
Custom firmware is installed at your own risk. No warranty.
Checksum
SHA-256 of boopbox-1.4.2.fwsc:
c4d01b4e3cfe3cfb61b260001279b49e4d2580374f093a7d5e9525f77e553026
All files: SHA256SUMS.txt (check with sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS.txt).
BoopBox 1.4.1
What's new in 1.4.1
BoopBox Trainer after its first player went through level 1 (the trainer):
- A level picker. Hold HOME: one level a page (the song, its style, what it teaches, your progress). SELECT turns the pages and OCT+ starts or continues; KNOB 1 picks SKIP, GO BACK, START OVER or QUIT. The last page opens BoopBox's menu.
- Progress is never lost. It was kept only while stopped, so switching off while playing lost it. It now goes to its own flash sector after every step, playing or not.
- Only the keys to press are lit. BoopBox's beat markers and the steps already placed no longer light up on a step about keys, and every step still to fix on the page is lit, not one.
- Hints say what is wrong and what to do: STEP 5: NO KICK HERE (KEY 5), STEP 9: PLAY F4 (KEY 7), STEP 3: PRESS OCT+, KNOB 1 TO SNARE, OPEN THE TIMING PAGE.
- Values as the screen shows them. TURN KNOB 4 TO 30 while the screen said 30% for another value: the steps now show the value as the page does (24%, 1/8, 86 BPM) and the hint shows both (NOW 30% (WANT 24%)).
- The way there, spelled out: steps say which button opens the page (TAP SEQ UNTIL YOU SEE TIMING) and which knob does what, with no words such as "SEQ PAGES".
- The sound browser's dot stays on the group and the sound to pick, highlighted or not, until you tap HOME on it.
BoopBox itself is unchanged in this release (only its version number). Projects, songs, presets and settings from 1.4.0 open as they are; the trainer's progress from 1.4.0 starts again.
How to install
From the browser (recommended): open the BoopBox installer in Chrome or Edge on a computer and connect the FM-1 by USB, with a data cable, directly (no hub). Choose BoopBox or BoopBox Trainer (three songs taught step by step on the FM-1; the trainer), press INSTALL, allow MIDI access, and wait for Done. The FM-1 restarts on the BoopBox logo. Your projects, user presets, samples and settings are kept. Then unplug the FM-1 and plug it back in once, so the computer finds its USB audio input.
The installer always installs the newest version. To install this one in particular, use Python:
With Python: download boopbox-1.4.1.fwsc from the assets below and fm1_install.py, then run python fm1_install.py boopbox-1.4.1.fwsc (needs pip install mido python-rtmidi).
Offline editor: download boopbox-editor-1.4.1.html from the assets and double-click it. It opens in Chrome or Edge without internet.
If something goes wrong: hold OCT− alone while switching the FM-1 on (BoopBox USB RESCUE), then install again. See Rescue and Going back in the README.
Custom firmware is installed at your own risk. No warranty.
Checksum
SHA-256 of boopbox-1.4.1.fwsc:
c20659d309ad0717f325b5660d3276d050a27231b589793144a81eac63f29ae4
All files: SHA256SUMS.txt (check with sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS.txt).
BoopBox 1.4.0
What's new in 1.4.0
BoopBox Trainer, a second firmware that teaches you to make three songs on the FM-1 itself, step by step, with no manual (the trainer):
- Pick it in the installer. The installer now offers BoopBox or BoopBox Trainer. Installing the other one switches back at any time.
- Three levels, three songs: First Light (lo-fi hip-hop: tracks, kits, drum steps, notes on steps, key and scale, chords), Neon Avenue (synthwave: the NOTES page, drum levels and ratchets, the sound browser, the delay, patterns for a verse and a chorus) and Lanterns (melodic dubstep: eight tracks, envelopes, the pump, a lock that slides, a roll with ratchets, sections and the song). Take them in any order, and again whenever you like.
- A coach on the screen: the title line says what the step is about and what to do, and what is still off (STEP 8: KICK MISSING). The button to press blinks, and the keys to play or the steps to press are lit. In the sound browser, a fading dot marks the sound to pick. It checks what the FM-1 does, not which buttons you pressed, so any way of getting there counts. Every button, knob and key works as in BoopBox.
- Hold HOME for the menu's TRAIN section: the levels with your progress, and in a level SKIP, BACK, RESTART and QUIT. Progress is kept when the FM-1 is switched off. A level starts from a new project.
- To make room, the trainer has no web editor and three sample sets fewer (HORNS, STRGS, SCRCH: HORN STAB, STRING STB, SCRATCH, STR CLOUD and HORN CLOUD; GRAIN's DRONE plays on the piano).
BoopBox itself is unchanged in this release (only its version number). Projects, songs, presets and settings from 1.3.1 open as they are.
How to install
From the browser (recommended): open the BoopBox installer in Chrome or Edge on a computer and connect the FM-1 by USB, with a data cable, directly (no hub). Choose BoopBox or BoopBox Trainer (three songs taught step by step on the FM-1; the trainer), press INSTALL, allow MIDI access, and wait for Done. The FM-1 restarts on the BoopBox logo. Your projects, user presets, samples and settings are kept. Then unplug the FM-1 and plug it back in once, so the computer finds its USB audio input.
The installer always installs the newest version. To install this one in particular, use Python:
With Python: download boopbox-1.4.0.fwsc from the assets below and fm1_install.py, then run python fm1_install.py boopbox-1.4.0.fwsc (needs pip install mido python-rtmidi).
Offline editor: download boopbox-editor-1.4.0.html from the assets and double-click it. It opens in Chrome or Edge without internet.
If something goes wrong: hold OCT− alone while switching the FM-1 on (BoopBox USB RESCUE), then install again. See Rescue and Going back in the README.
Custom firmware is installed at your own risk. No warranty.
Checksum
SHA-256 of boopbox-1.4.0.fwsc:
f50c82d075b9f96356afae5b454d485f0df0617eb3aab67a5a0bf2578abf9d61
All files: SHA256SUMS.txt (check with sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS.txt).
BoopBox 1.3.1
What's new in 1.3.1
A tuning fix for TANPURA, and room in the firmware:
- TANPURA stays in tune on the top notes. The PHYS sympathetic strings (the ones that ring along with the string you play) are tuned an octave below and an octave or two above it. On the top octaves those partners landed above 5 kHz, where their loop is only two or three samples long and its gain is at the limit. They rang several times louder than the string you played, into the soft clip, and the level changed with every pluck: the top notes came out up to 60 cents off, about one pluck in twenty. Partners above 4.4 kHz are left out now. At E7 the worst of 60 plucks is 11 cents off (it was 59), and at C7 it is 10 (it was 41). Only the highest notes of a SYMP sound change; SITAR and PHYS HARP were not affected on the notes measured, and no other engine changed.
- 4.7 KB more room in the firmware (the app is 575,316 B; 6,248 B of the 581,564 B slot are free, up from 1,540 B). The sequencer, voice and set-up code is compiled for size, four tables that only held an initial value no longer take flash, and a few repeated routines are shared. Nothing was taken out and no sound or screen changed.
- Projects, songs, presets and settings from 1.3.0 open as they are, and a saved project sounds as it did.
How to install
From the browser (recommended): open the BoopBox installer in Chrome or Edge on a computer and connect the FM-1 by USB, with a data cable, directly (no hub). Press INSTALL, allow MIDI access, and wait for Done. The FM-1 restarts on the BoopBox logo. Your projects, user presets, samples and settings are kept. Then unplug the FM-1 and plug it back in once, so the computer finds its USB audio input.
The installer always installs the newest version. To install this one in particular, use Python:
With Python: download boopbox-1.3.1.fwsc from the assets below and fm1_install.py, then run python fm1_install.py boopbox-1.3.1.fwsc (needs pip install mido python-rtmidi).
Offline editor: download boopbox-editor-1.3.1.html from the assets and double-click it. It opens in Chrome or Edge without internet.
If something goes wrong: hold OCT− alone while switching the FM-1 on (BoopBox USB RESCUE), then install again. See Rescue and Going back in the README.
Custom firmware is installed at your own risk. No warranty.
Checksum
SHA-256 of boopbox-1.3.1.fwsc:
40dc399a371e5b08c12e7e49093a692f840cef3beac16f0a4de52eb7d1a625c2
All files: SHA256SUMS.txt (check with sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS.txt).
BoopBox 1.3.0
What's new in 1.3.0
Even loudness between the factory sounds, and a drum LEVEL that turns:
- The drum track's LEVEL works on TRACKS. KNOB 2 on a drum track changed nothing you could hear or see (the level stayed at 100). It now sets the drum track's level, as GLO → DRUMS and the mix layer already did.
- The factory sounds are as loud as each other at a normal MASTER. Each preset's level trim was measured with MASTER all the way up, where the master limiter held almost every sound at the same peak. Punchy sounds read quiet there, took a big trim, and came out the loudest at the MASTER you play at: 32 presets were more than 3 dB off, PHYS HARP 7.5 dB too loud. They are measured below the limiter now: 98 presets moved (90 quieter, 8 louder), and at the power-on MASTER 5 are more than 3 dB off and none is more than 0.3 dB too loud. Many sounds you know, such as RHODES, ACID 303 and the stabs, are quieter than in 1.2.0.
- LEVEL turns every sound up. On 39 presets, turning LEVEL above its default did nothing: their trim had used up the top of the range. A trim may now go past it, so LEVEL keeps its whole range on every sound.
- Still quiet, because their peaks reach the master limiter first: CHIP NOISE, REGGAE ORG, NZ SNARE, BANJO and MUTED GTR.
- The editor's sound preview plays the new levels.
- Projects, songs, presets and settings from 1.2.0 open as they are. A saved project keeps the trims it was saved with, so it sounds as it did; a factory preset chosen again takes its new trim.
How to install
From the browser (recommended): open the BoopBox installer in Chrome or Edge on a computer and connect the FM-1 by USB, with a data cable, directly (no hub). Press INSTALL, allow MIDI access, and wait for Done. The FM-1 restarts on the BoopBox logo. Your projects, user presets, samples and settings are kept. Then unplug the FM-1 and plug it back in once, so the computer finds its USB audio input.
The installer always installs the newest version. To install this one in particular, use Python:
With Python: download boopbox-1.3.0.fwsc from the assets below and fm1_install.py, then run python fm1_install.py boopbox-1.3.0.fwsc (needs pip install mido python-rtmidi).
Offline editor: download boopbox-editor-1.3.0.html from the assets and double-click it. It opens in Chrome or Edge without internet.
If something goes wrong: hold OCT− alone while switching the FM-1 on (BoopBox USB RESCUE), then install again. See Rescue and Going back in the README.
Custom firmware is installed at your own risk. No warranty.
Checksum
SHA-256 of boopbox-1.3.0.fwsc:
293ad87f479b8282c0f6248205ab84fa908a55e31600163b1e6ccd19d7b9fc63
All files: SHA256SUMS.txt (check with sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS.txt).