Using Two Controllers with Axe FX II XL+

J

Juan Loco

Member
Hi Folks,

Is it possible to connect two MFC 101s or controllers to the Axe FX II XL+?

I am teching for someone using the Axe unit and I need to do some patch changes from side of stage. Doing it via the onscreen menu is a bit of a faff, so I was thinking of either getting a second MFC that I assume I could connect to the Faslink (the onstage MFC is via Ethercon) or a MIDI pad controller I could connect via MIDI.

Anyone else done this and have any advice?

Thanks in advance
 
Connect the MFC via network cable, the midi port on the Axe-Fx is still free than, so you can connect any other midi controller there.
I have my MFC and my RAC12 always connected that way and when gigging I add a Morningstar MC6 to that setup (midi input on the RAC12). I never had any hickups that way.
 
Great.

It looks like I will probably be getting another MFC 101, so I assume the one onstage can run on the Cat 5 and the one by me can connect via Faslink (or MIDI) and they all talk to each other?
 
Both MFCs would talk (and listen) to the axe-fx, but only one at a time.
I doubt they both get updated on changes coming from the other footcontroller.
 
Right then, I now have the other unit and have connected it via MIDI to the XL+. The stage MFC is connected via Cat5.

Everything seems fine and the 3 devices all talk to each other and update but I am getting MIDI conflicts. If different presets are selected quickly one after the other it goes into a preset change meltdown and starts scrolling through randomly until I disconnect/unplug the 2nd MFC. I sometimes have to power cycle the XL+ to get things back to normal. This happens if changing presets on either MFC and also when using the wheel on the XL+ to quickly scroll through the presets. This probably wouldn't happen under normal gig conditions as presets aren't selected like that, however I would obviously like to know if there is a way to stop it doing it. Also tonight I had a patch change to a preset with a whammy in and when the act moved the pedal (connected to the stage board) at the same time as the preset change (from my board) the whammy was all over the place, had to come out of the preset and back in to get it to right itself!!

BTW, It shows this behaviour if the 2nd MFC (mine) is set to 'Axe FX Mode - None' or 'Axe FX Mode - XL+'
 
As an update to this, after several phone calls with Tech Support and then to one of Metallica's techs I have it working, just about...

Steps taken were:
1, First of all I persevered with both MFC's connected to the Axe as Fractal said this would work with a few adjustments. Example being, first of all go into both MFC's and disable all MIDI channels for each preset apart from channel one as apparently the default setting is to transmit on all 16 channels on each preset change. This then worked until I hit a patch change on my MFC while the turn was stepping an the expression pedal, this didn't work out so well......probably due to a mass of MIDI information hitting the Axe from the two sources.
Unfortunately with it set up this way, fast patch changes to test the stability also still resulted in some odd behaviour.

2, After speaking with Metallica's tech he said they had exactly the same nightmare with this and eventually ended up connecting one controller (they don't use MFCs) to the other via MIDI so one controls the other. So, I now have the stage MFC set to 'AXE FX XL+ mode' (and talking to the Axe on MIDI channel 1) and mine set to 'none'. This involves manually inputting the patch names on my MFC but no biggy. I then set my board to talk to the stage board on MIDI channel 2. This seems much more stable but unfortunately still not totally 100% with still the odd quirk showing up when testing.

Anyway, I hope Fractal look into maybe ironing out the MIDI implementation quirks on a future update!
 
Still havent' really figure out what you're trying to do here. But on first glance, you're doing things that have never been imagined in MIDILand. Which is fine, but wild implementations of '1000' different MIDI applications are doable if you map out what you want to do. We can help, but 'it's not stable' based off another MIDI controller is outside of FAS purview. IMO.
 
It's quite straight forward, I'm trying to do patch changes using a 2nd MFC offstage while there is one onstage as well. Kind of the same as running a show to timecode where everything is automated, lights, video and patch changes etc but I'm doing it manually without the timecode.

I was using the front panel of the Axe FX scrolling the directory and hitting 'enter' but I wanted it to be more straight forward, hence using a 2nd MFC. This is exactly what Metallica and many other big acts do with the techs doing the changes rather than the act but there still being a board onstage. Have a chat with Matt in Tech Support, he gets it.
 
It so happens I had just posted a wishlist about this. What would be really useful is a Master/Slave functionality implemented in MFC. It's found in many MIDI controllers like the CAE RSTs, old Axess FX1s, LiquidFoots, etc. It lets you do things like using multiple controllers as remotes and/or connecting multiple controllers to form one aggregate controller unit.
 
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