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Using the WAV Recorder as a Pre-amp 

Since the 

WAV Recorder 

can provide a wide range of gain or attenuation to stereo signals, it can also 

be used as pre-amp to interface external equipment with Eurorack modules. 

Patch any line-level, headphone-level, or modular-level signal into the 

IN

 jacks and turn the 

Gain

 knob 

until you see some signal but no clipping. The signal on the 

OUT

 jacks will now be at standard 

Eurorack audio signal levels and can be patched to any other Eurorack module.

For example, if you wanted to use your Eurorack modular system to process an online live stream from 
your smart phone, you could patch the phone directly into the 

Left IN

 jack using a mono or stereo 

cable. (If you want to get a stereo signal from the smart phone, use a stereo-to-mono adaptor and 
patch into the 

Right IN

 jack as well.) Turn the volume up on the smart phone, and turn the 

Gain

 knob 

so that you see some blue lights. You can now patch the 

OUT 

jacks to any other module that works 

with normal Eurorack audio signals.

Note: The WAV Recorder does not work with microphones that require voltage from the pre-amp. 

Busy Light 

The microSD card is safe to remove if you stop recording and wait until the 

Busy

 light turns off. If 

you’re in 

Playback

 mode and not currently playing anything, it’s also safe to remove the card. It’s 

not

 

safe to remove it while 

Paused

 (you’ll lose the file you recorded).

You can corrupt the files on your microSD card if you pull it out while the 

Busy

 light is on. This is similar 

to unplugging a USB thumb drive or external hard drive from your computer while copying files. You 

might get lucky and keep your files; but, if the card starts to act weird, do a disk repair or “first aid” 

using Disk Utility on MacOS or fsck (or something similar) on Linux. After repairing the disk, copy all 

your files off, format it in ExFAT, and copy your files back on. Always keep backups of important files! 

Checking for Free Space

You can check the amount of free space on the card by holding the button down 

for 2 seconds while in 

Record

 mode. An animation of the lights will display while 

the card is being scanned. Once the lights stop animating, the number of lights 
that are off will show how many hours of free space you have available.

 

If there 

are 8 or more hours of recording time available, all the lights will turn off when the 

animation stops.

For example, let’s say you hold down the button and the animation stops with five lights on and three 

off (see diagram below):

The fact that there are three lights off means that there are three to four hours of 

recording time available on the card.

Changing recording settings will change the amount of time available. If you went 

into System Mode and changed to mono recording, the next time you check for 

free space it will show six lights off (six hours mono = three hours stereo).

Checking for free space serves a dual purpose: if you insert a microSD card into the module while it’s 

powered on, the card will need to be mounted before it can be used for recording or playback. 
Checking for free space will mount the card safely and report the free space available. See 

Hot 

Swapping

 (next section).

If the card is ever detected as being full (or having less than 50MB in available storage), all 8 lights will 

flash brightly twice when you press record. The lights will keep flashing every 5-10 seconds until you 
flip to 

Playback

 mode or insert a new card and refresh it.

Note: 

The 

WAV Recorder

 will always leave about 50MB available for swap space.

Page   of 

9

15

Clip

Hold 2 sec

Playback

Record

Summary of Contents for WAV Recorder

Page 1: ...ystem can be used to browse the folders on the card for playing back wav files A Gain knob allows for up to 20dB of boost and an LED Signal Meter indicates clipping and the signal level Records up to 96kHz 24 bit creating stereo or mono wav files on the microSD card Gain knob and LED level meter make it easy to record a wide range of signal levels Plays standard wav files from the card without ren...

Page 2: ...m on 5 Begin with Tutorial Basic Recording on page 4 of this manual Setting up your WAV Recorder 2 Controls Button Knob Switch and Jacks 3 Tutorial Basic Recording 4 Folders and File Organization 5 Playback 5 Browsing Files for Playback 6 Trigger Jack 7 Pausing Recording 7 Example Patch Multi track Recording 8 Using the WAV Recorder as a Pre amp 9 Busy Light 9 Checking for Free Space 9 Hot Swappin...

Page 3: ... left column represents the left audio channel and the right column represents the right audio channel More lights turned on means there s a louder signal The top red lights indicate clipping If the Signal Meter shows that your signal is either too loud clipping or too quiet you can use the the Gain knob to adjust the level Gain knob The volume level of the signal being recorded or played can be a...

Page 4: ... and press the button The button will turn red and the Busy light will start to flash 6 Record as much as you want and then press the button again Wait for the Busy light to turn off 7 Congratulations You just made a high quality recording The WAV Recorder has now created a wav file on the microSD card You can listen to your recording by flipping the switch to Playback and then pressing the button...

Page 5: ...ack mode any file with any name can be accessed You do not need to rename your files to play them Playback Playing wav files with the WAV Recorder is easy Flip the switch to Playback and press the button The most recent recording will play The button will turn green while a recording is playing Turn the Gain knob to adjust the playback volume You can press the button again to stop playback or it w...

Page 6: ...a bit to indicate there s another page of files before or after it The number of flickers indicates the next or previous page number i e one flicker means you can access the 1st page by turning past that light two flickers means the 2nd page is past that light etc Turn the knob to the first or last light and then keep turning it a little bit more to jump to the next or previous page The light will...

Page 7: ...ve Recording timed loops If you have a rhythmic patch you can feed a slow clock into the trigger jack to record a bar or measure of the patch If you just want to capture just one measure plug in the trigger while the clock gate is low When the clock goes high recording will begin on the start of the measure assuming your clock is synced to the start of the measure When the next measure starts the ...

Page 8: ...icroSD cards onto a computer and combine the files into a multi track file using any audio editing software High precision phase alignment For most purposes the files can be combined simply by snapping the beginnings to the same point However if you are doing some specific work that requires the phase differences between tracks to be exact then you may need to line up the tracks manually In our te...

Page 9: ...ird do a disk repair or first aid using Disk Utility on MacOS or fsck or something similar on Linux After repairing the disk copy all your files off format it in ExFAT and copy your files back on Always keep backups of important files Checking for Free Space You can check the amount of free space on the card by holding the button down for 2 seconds while in Record mode An animation of the lights w...

Page 10: ...evel 0 4dBFS 20Vpp The red LEDs turn bright solid clipping 2 6dBFS 16Vpp The red LEDs turn on dimly 8dBFS 8 5Vpp The white LEDs turn on 12dBFS 5Vpp The upper blue LEDs turn on 21dBFS 1 75Vpp The lower blue LEDs turn on The Signal Meter shows the actual signal present on the output jacks whether you are recording or playing By adjusting the Gain knob while watching the Signal Meter you can set your...

Page 11: ...he left side turn the Gain knob The LEDs in the right column will change when you turn fully to the left 0 fully to the right 100 and or to the center 50 The lights on the right column will tell you the value of the parameter you selected as follows A red light in the left column indicates the Sample Frequency menu its options listed in the right column are 96kHz red 48kHz white or 44 1kHz blue A ...

Page 12: ...mazon or any number of electronics retailers Beware of cheap look alikes and only purchase from a reputable seller Avoid cards with a price under USD 20 they are likely to be fakes The following table reports our findings At 44 1kHz 24bit Stereo on the included Class 10 card a 1 hour recording has a 4 chance of dropping samples Using a faster card is recommended At 48kHz 24bit Stereo or 96kHz 24bi...

Page 13: ...be cleaned up or if it isn t a problem This is just a band aid in case you accidentally record at a higher rate than your card can allow and there s no chance of a re take To avoid the possibility of dropped samples when recording at any rate either use a fast microSD card or keep your settings at a lower rate Checking the Firmware Version When you power on the module the LED Signal Meter will bri...

Page 14: ...rome Turn off any EQ or Bass Boost settings The open source licensed source files in C for compiling with gcc arm can be found at https github com 4ms note as of printing of this manual this is not yet posted microSD Card We include a Class 10 card with the WAV Recorder which is sufficient for recording at 44 1kHz If you need to record at a higher rate use a faster card See Recording Rates section...

Page 15: ...maximum before clipping Up to 20dB digital gain can be applied while recording or monitoring using Gain knob Record jack Incoming trigger starts stops recording or starts re starts playback Trigger voltage must be 1 6V rising edge is detected microSD card slot accessible from front panel Class 10 card included 16GB Jumpers The PCB has one jumper labeled JUMP which fits on a 2 pin header located at...

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