Getting started

Groove OS turns your M-VAVE FM-1 into a groovebox: up to eight tracks of FM, virtual-analog and drum sounds, a sampler that records from a phone, a computer or the FM-1 itself, a step sequencer, an arpeggiator, chords, scenes and a performance screen, all running on the FM-1 itself. This chapter gets the beta installed, makes your first sound and builds your first loop. This manual describes Groove OS 2.0, the beta. New to grooveboxes? Learn on your FM-1 teaches you on the FM-1 itself, a step at a time.

What you need

No computer is needed to play or to sample. You need one to install, to update, to load sound banks and to back up projects.

Install it from the browser

1. Open the 2.0 beta page in Chrome or Edge and press Install the 2.0 beta, or open Install, the address with ?to=2.0 on the end. Sign in. The plain Install page is 1.4's: the beta's says at the top that you are installing the 2.0 beta, an optional early look.
2. Connect the FM-1 with the USB cable, switch it on and close other MIDI programs (a DAW, an editor).
3. Press Connect FM-1. The browser asks for MIDI access with SysEx: allow it. Connecting sends only the identity question.
4. The page shows what the FM-1 runs and which build it will install. Tick the list under Before you start (a data cable straight in, a laptop on power, the tab kept open, other MIDI programs closed, and that you understand Groove OS is independent software), then press Install.
5. Leave the cable and the tab alone. The install takes about three minutes: two steps with a restart between them. The FM-1's screen goes dark while it writes. On an FM-1 that still runs M-VAVE's own firmware (V15 or V16), it is one click and two parts, 1.4 first and then 2.0, a little longer (see Coming from M-VAVE's V15 or V16). Then the page adds the six Learn courses to the FM-1 and brings across any samples and kits you had.
6. When the page says Installed, the FM-1 restarts into Groove OS 2.0. If the screen stays dark, switch the FM-1 off and on.
7. The page then shows what to do next. First, one line: Six courses are on your FM-1: SETTINGS > LEARN. Tap GLO (SETTINGS), then LEARN, and the FM-1 teaches you the rest (see Learn on your FM-1); See the courses shows them on the website first. If the line says the courses were not added this time, the FM-1 works as it should in the meantime, and the line says what to do. Start with CORE (See sound packs) opens the sound packs on the Sounds page: play the eleven sound packs there, CORE for a start and ten genres, then add the ones you want into banks A to D. See Loading banks from the website.

Every part is checked as it is written, and the page checks the download against a published checksum before it sends anything. Your samples and kits come with you. Your projects come back on your FM-1, each in its own slot, with a copy in your downloads. See Moving between 1.4 and 2.0 for the details, Install, update and the way back for updating and for what to do if an install is interrupted.

Coming from M-VAVE's V15 or V16

M-VAVE's own app moves an FM-1 to V16, and its download page now offers only V16. The beta installs over V15 and over V16 alike: press Connect FM-1 and the page says what it found, for example FM-1_016 · M-VAVE's V16.

From M-VAVE's firmware it is one click and two parts, one after the other: Groove OS 1.4 goes on first, then 2.0 installs over it. Going through 1.4 keeps your FM-1's own Bluetooth calibration for 2.0. The page shows which part is running and confirms 1.4 before it starts the second. You press nothing in between.

If V16 had been on your FM-1, the page also puts the FM-1's factory sounds back in banks A to D on the way, and says so in one line. See Coming from V15 or V16 for the detail.

Careful: the way back to 1.4 is the same page without ?to=2.0, and the way back to M-VAVE's V15 is on it too, with M-VAVE's own file. There is no backup of the old firmware on the FM-1, and V15 uses the flash where Groove OS keeps its projects, so going back to V15 erases your saved Groove projects. Export them first. See the way back to V15.

First power-on

Switch the FM-1 on. The Groove OS logo plays for a couple of seconds, a column of squares sweeping across the letter G, and then you are on TRACKS.

A freshly installed FM-1 has nothing saved, so it starts on EMPTY, a clean page with sounds ready: four tracks, a drum kit (DRUMS), a bass (FAT), keys (SOFT) and a lead (VIBES), no notes yet, 120 BPM with the click on. Play the keys and the selected track sounds; turn ALGORITHM to pick another track. Nothing is wrong, nothing is locked: every part can be changed.

The SELECT wheel (the left-hand encoder) has six stops. Turn it and the screen changes; tap HOME to come back to TRACKS (on PERFORM, turn SELECT).

The buttons open tools from anywhere: SEQ, ARP, FX, ENV, LFO, EDIT, and GLO, which opens SETTINGS. Hold GLO for a second and the page's own help card shows. See The controls.

Songs to start from come with every sound pack on the Sounds page. CORE, the first pack, has songs in different styles: on its page, /sounds/core, Add song to FM-1 puts one into an empty slot. When the music is stopped and nothing is unsaved, the FM-1 opens it right away; otherwise load it from PROJECT (the slot, LOAD). See Songs inside the sound packs.

From then on, power-on picks up where you left off. The session is saved automatically while the music is stopped (every two minutes, once you have left the controls alone for a moment, and when you leave the PROJECT view), so the next power-on, or the restart after a power cut, brings it back. SETTINGS > STARTUP can be switched to NEW if you would rather start from a blank session (Settings).

First five minutes

Pro tip: to be walked through your first groove step by step, on the FM-1 itself, start First Groove: tap GLO (SETTINGS), then LEARN, pick FIRST GROOVE and START. It starts from silence and checks each step as you play it. See Learn on your FM-1.

To make a beat of your own, these are the things to know first. (To look around a finished song first, load a song from a sound pack and try your first ten minutes, then come back.)

1. Start fresh. A new FM-1 is on EMPTY already. Later, to start again: turn SELECT to PROJECT, turn ALGORITHM down to NEW and press SEL, then put the cursor on EMPTY and press SEL. EMPTY is a clean page: four sounds, no notes, two bars long, with the click on. If the session has unsaved changes, or the music is playing, it asks first (EMPTY? UNSAVED CHANGES ARE LOST). CANCEL is chosen first, so turn ALGORITHM to START and press SEL. If you would rather play along with something, add a song from a sound pack (CORE's are a good start) and load it instead. To clear one track and keep the rest, put the cursor on its lane on TRACKS and hold HOME+REC: it asks, and undo brings the track back. See A clean page.

2. Write a beat. Tap HOME for TRACKS, turn ALGORITHM to the DRUMS lane and press SEQ: the step grid, the drums down the side and the 16 steps of a bar across. The tag at the right of the hint line says STEPS: the white keys are the 16 steps, the first white key is step 1, the second step 2, the last step 16. The black keys pick the drum: pads 1 to 8 of the page shown (a kit has 16 pads on two pages, and HOME+OCT flips between them). Tap a key to place the selected drum's hit on that step, and tap it again to remove it. You don't need to move the cursor to write: a tap always writes on its own step, wherever the cursor is, and takes the cursor there. Or work the other way round: walk the cursor to a step with ALGORITHM, hold SEL and press black keys, and each drum's hit lands on that step. The cursor is for editing a hit you have placed: walk to it with ALGORITHM and press SEL for its velocity, chance, ratchet, flam and nudge. Hold a step's key and turn K1 to K4 to give that one hit its own tune, decay, level and velocity. See The step grid and Parameter locks.

   Careful: a white key is a step, not "write at the cursor". If you put a hit on step 1, move the cursor to step 2 and press the first white key again, you have pressed step 1 again, and the hit goes. Press the second white key for step 2.

3. More bars. Hold HOME and press F3, G3, A3 or B3, the first four white keys: on a drum or sound track the loop becomes 1, 2, 4 or 8 bars (the toast says 2 BARS), and what you wrote repeats into the new bars, so you only change what should differ. If you did not want the copies, a tap of HOME+REC takes them and the length back. On the drum grid, OCT- and OCT go to the previous or next bar (BAR 2 OF 4), and the white keys are then the steps of that bar; ALGORITHM also walks on into the next bar past step 16. A one-bar track has no next bar, so lengthen it first. The melodic sequencer works the same way: OCT- and OCT move the bar (ONE BAR if there is only one), HOME+OCT- and HOME+OCT set the track's octave, and HOME with F3, G3 or A3 sets the pattern to 1, 2 or 4 bars (LENGTH 2 BARS; the 8 key says TOO LONG there). See Length and loops and SEQ.

4. Get more sounds. The Sounds page has 11 sound packs, free: CORE, a good first one that fits any style, plus 10 genres from LO-FI to AFRO. Each is a drum kit and 24 sounds, FM and VA. Play them in the browser, then load one into any of the FM-1's banks A to D (see Loading banks from the website). Each sound pack also has two or three songs inside you can put into a slot and take apart.

5. Sample your own. Turn SELECT to SAMPLER, the stop after KEYS, and press SEL on + NEW KIT to open the editor. Plug your phone or computer into the FM-1's USB-C port, pick FM-1 Audio as its sound output, turn K1 (INPUT) to USB, play something, and press REC as the sound you want starts. It lands on a key, ready to play. See Your first sample.

Your first ten minutes

Try these in order, on a song from a sound pack (CORE's are a good start): press Add song to FM-1 on the pack's page, for example /sounds/core. If the FM-1 does not open it right away, turn SELECT to PROJECT, put the cursor on that slot, press SEL and pick LOAD. Each is one idea, and none can lose work without asking you first.

1. Hear it. Press PLAY. Watch the playhead cross the lanes on TRACKS.
2. Pick a track. Turn ALGORITHM (the right-hand encoder). The white frame moves from lane to lane and the selected track's name appears in a toast. Under the screen, K1 to K4 are that track's four macros, each named for the sound (a bass might read TONE WIDTH GROWL PUNCH). Turn them while it plays.
3. Change the sound. Turn the PRESETS encoder. The browser opens, and each detent plays the next sound on a spare voice; the track keeps its own sound until you press SEL to take one. HOME leaves with nothing changed. See SOUND.
4. Play the keys. The 27 keys play the selected track. With IN KEY on, a key outside the project's scale slides to the nearest note that fits. See KEYS.
5. Roll a new idea. Hold HOME and press SEQ: DICE writes a new line for the selected track, in key, with the same rhythm feel. On a drum track it writes a new beat. If you do not like it, hold HOME and tap REC: undo. See SEQ.
6. Drop a part out. Turn SELECT (the left-hand encoder) to the right: MIX, then PERFORM, the third view. On PERFORM the white keys 1 to 8 mute and unmute the tracks. See PERFORM.
7. Record yourself. Turn SELECT back to TRACKS, select a track and press REC. A one-bar count-in, then play: your notes and your knob moves are written onto the track's loop. See Recording and undo.
8. Sample a sound. Turn SELECT to SAMPLER, press SEL on + NEW KIT, plug your phone or computer into the USB-C port, set K1 (INPUT) to USB and press REC on the sound you want. Press the key it landed on to play it. See SAMPLER.
9. Keep it. Press SAVE. A song that has never been saved asks for its name first: it offers PROJECT 1, the first key you press starts a new name, and SAVE again saves it (HOME says NOT SAVED and leaves it). While the music plays, SAVE waits for the stop (SAVES WHEN YOU STOP, the SAVE light blinks) and saves the moment you press PLAY; SAVE again before then calls it off (SAVE CALLED OFF). The project goes into a slot on the FM-1. See PROJECT.

Pro tip: the bottom line of most views is a hint that says the next useful move (PLAY: HEAR IT · SEL: TRACK MENU). It is on by default; SETTINGS > HINTS switches it off.

Where things are

Troubleshooting