FX Chains in Expanded, only 6 knobs?

I was exited about making my own interfaces for effects with those gaudy interfaces like vintage channel, or combinations of multiple effects,  in addition to being able to create a clean interface that stays consistent across plugins instead of every plugin different and ending up with something that looks like an xmass tree. 

But 6 knobs and buttons is just way to limited if you want to build something using more than one plugin, for many plugins it's not even enough for 1 plugin.

ACT has 8 rotaries, 8 sliders and 8 buttons + 4 banks, to be perfect FX Chains should line up with that so you could build something with FX Chains that perfectly mimicked the layout of ACT.

That's just missing a huge opportunity for something that could be amazing.

Hoping they saved that for X2

Mentioned this back when Fx chains first came out,quite a daft number, that just confuses the hell out of controller assignments/organisation, I was only  just debating putting out  a thread myself, so good to see i aint the only one this bugs.

+1
8 faders, 8 buttons, 8 Rotary and say 4 banks.

With 4 banks we'd have 4x8 rotaries, sliders and buttons in the FX Chains, that would be amazing.

One thing that would be genius was to have a "special" state for the FX chain buttons that reacted to the bank state of ACT, that way you could add 4 buttons and set each one to light up according to the state of the ACT banks.

I can never remember what bank I selected when switching to different ACT targets so I end up with a lot of trial and error controlling say the Prochannel EQ

Just sad they missed such an opportunity to have ACT and new FX Chain interface line up, don't know why they did, because it was the first thing I thought of when I read about fx chains in expanded, it should have been obvious.

I'm pretty sure I saw a shortcut somewhere to flip through the tabs in the multidock, can't remember what it was, it was mentioned in one of the Cakewalk U videos. If you're lucky there may even be a midi keyboard command you can bind.

Linear Phase


I think the best thing would be; for FX Chains to automatically analyze the plugin gui, and recreate it.  Other than that, I find I just like to put my FX into Chains, and then click to access the original GUI.  I don't really have a need to create a GUI to access something that is not, "clear and succinct with all the options in my face."

I usually throw my things into the Multi-Dock..  My only grip is that you have to click those tiny arrows to scroll along the bottom.

use ctrl+shift+arrow(left or right) to scroll through  the tabs

Isn't the whole point of the FX chain controls to keep the front-end simple?

To me the FX2 Chains represents an opportunity for creativity. (If we had more than 6 knobs/buttons)

There's thousands of combinations of different effects that could be thrown together with an easy clean interface, spend time and make the effect once, and then slap it on a track every time you need that again, and if it could mimic number of ACT controllers, total intuitive control.l

Or.. how about those hideous GUIs many effects have where they try to mimic some real hardware with gaudy graphics (And fail miserably, only to break every interface standard because their custom made GUI doesn't follow any conventional standard, no tab order, common UI element shortcuts are broken etc..), just wrap a FX2 chain around that and forget the GUI abomination ever existed.

And lastly, an opportunity to wrap every plugin you use into a FX2 chain, place things in the order you want, not what the plugin creator wants, and have everything look the same, clean and efficient.

Yeah I understand that, also that it has to fit into the prochannel.

Multiple banks would be great, i just had an image in my head of being able to throw together crazy effects using FX2 and creating a custom setup out of them with FX chain knobs and buttons as a front end.

Thanks for replying though, it's nice to be with a company that communicates with its users.

Fx chains 2.0 are layouted with 6 knobs and buttons in a row each.
The x2 pro channel fx chains are layouted with 2x3 knobs and 2x3 buttons in 2 rows each.

What does that mean for custom graphics? Are the two chain types not interchangeable?

TabSel


Fx chains 2.0 are layouted with 6 knobs and buttons in a row each.
The x2 pro channel fx chains are layouted with 2x3 knobs and 2x3 buttons in 2 rows each.

What does that mean for custom graphics? Are the two chain types not interchangeable?

They are interchangeable.  The custom graphics in the PC will be limited to the background images and label colors.  The custom knobs and buttons will continue to load in the FX Chains when they're in the bin... but will be ignored in the ProChannel, and replaced with standard controls.