I guess you and I had the opposite issues with the versions. I’ve had no issues with the 1.6 firmware but the 1.7 and 1.7.1 firmwares would crash without warning on several occasions for me. Particularly sucked when it kept crashing during a rehearsal, since i use it as my band’s drum/string machine
I upgraded to 1.8 a few hours ago. Been playing around with it and I like it. I like the updates to the UI they’ve done.
Edit: spelling.
@schlomo i had basically the same problems with the SD card a few days after i bought the tracker (1.6.). i paid the regular price for the tracker, before the price drop… and stuff like this is just disappointing. makes the whole thing feel more cheap and prototype-y than it should be for the price. alongside that, i also had a few other hardware related problems with the tracker. i felt ripped off, tbh. 400 bucks sounds more adequate to me. would never ever pay the original price again for what it is.
after sorting out most of the problems (that had cost me additional money), i can say that 1.7. is very stable for me so far. basically not one hick up since then. but with all the trouble from before in mind, i’m really hesitant to update to 1.8., because i’m afraid that it could cause new troubles. but well, i also don’t see anything special in 1.8. that makes me want to update, so whatever.
don’t get me wrong though, i love working with the tracker. it’s fun, now it does work as it should. but all the issues, all the headache shouldnt have been there in the first place.
I’m sorry your Tracker experience has been mared. I was fortunate to get a MK3 Tracker for the price drop, so we are talking 1.6 version firmware.
I copied the Trackers OS and folders, I ditched the awful generic samples and I purchased a SanDisk Ultra 256 card as a replacement.
My Tracker works like a charm and my 34,000ish samples load quick as fuck and my machine runs like clockwork.
Not one crash. I use it 8 hours everyday for nearly 6 months now.
I personally think, the generic sd card is the problem for many users.
Get a bigger faster card, they are cheap as chips now. Mine cost me 20 euros.
1.7.1 is very very stable
Yeah I did that too. I couldn’t get all my samples from OpenMPT onto it so I upgraded to a 256 SanDisk Ultra(?) I think. It has really reduced how much it crashes.
Another thing I’ve found will make it crash frequently is how you go about powering the thing. My stock cable broke about 2 or 3 months into owning it. If you use too small of a gauge of cable, the Polyend has like a “white screen of death” I guess. Other cables and supplies I’ve used make it crash when you play a pattern.
Using 1.8 for the last few days. Works fine for me. Haven’t had a single crash yet. Though this is with the larger micro SD and a decent cable.
I was using the stock-SD-card without any problems until I installed 1.8
which ate the card. Went back to 1.7.1 now with a new card.
The decent procedure to handle a problem like this is given by OXI.
They sent out the Coral with a SD-cards which had minor quality. They announced that on their site with the Serial numbers which are concerned and offered a refund for which you could buy a new and better SD-card.
That is transparent and fair.
If your product is relying on SD-cards, sent it out with a quality one, not one that has to be replaced the moment you get the unit. Doesn’t make any sense to have a placebo card in there which is of low quality…
Coral is a polysynth module isn’t it? Couldn’t see much use for SD besides presets. Unless it does wavetable or granular stuff too.
I’m inclined to agree. Although I think it’s not as big of a deal compared to Polyend basically using paying customers as beta testers. With only 16 GB of storage it’s not a huge deal to get a higher quality card and upgrade to a higher capacity, especially with how cheap Micro SDs are lately. Not to say that Polyend should ship out their $600USD machine with a shitty card.
It can play wav-files, so you need the SD for that. Like a sample-player kind of thing…
Yeah, sure, it’s not a big deal. The problem is not so much the money here, but I as a customer would like to be informed, if the product I bought had a mediocre part which (in case of the Tracker) is very essential as it does not function without one. Or deliver it without one from the beginning. If most people replace it with a bigger one anyway. I was happy with 16GB. The sample time on the tracker is so limited anyway…
It’s not so much about the money, it’s just that Polyend has a strange PR policy somehow.
Communication is not their strength. And it already backfired a couple of times.
After the 1.8 Update my SD gave up on me, too. A new SD solved it for me. It feels like the Tracker runs better than ever now. Much faster loading/saving times and zero crashes.
I picked up a no thrills ISY branded 10000 mAh power bank. It’s from Saturn Electronics, Berlin.
Output usb A 5V… 2.4 A.
I use a 1 mtr woven/ braded uab A to C. Cable.
The powerbank I use is deliberately basic, no crazy power management etc.
Also no crashes when using PTs default super long USB C cable inserted into the provided mains power adaptor which then goes directly into a wall socket.
I also spent several months creating my own custom sound directories. I converted all my instruments to mono and I have max 100 files per folder.
The OG PT runs like a charm. I’ve taken full advantage of the increased sampling time.
In one session I recorded 100 x 130 secs takes.
9 hours continuously working, sampling, editing naming, playing. The little monolith does not even get warm.
Yes the SD Card is super, super integral part of the OG PT.
Some Tracker users have unfortunately had various problems with the default 16 micro sd card.
I never used the original sd card because it was too small. I went straight for the kill and got a 256 Gig bad boy. 20 Euros.
I formatted the new card on a Mac and so far all has been tickerty boo.
But, on upgrading to 1.8 firmware, all files disappeared for one time I switched the Tracker on after the nights very late session.
I pulled out the sd card and cleaned it and everything has been solid as a rock since.
Mate, the sampling time before 1.8 was an extremely lack lustre 44 seconds.
Now we have 133 seconds which is dope.
No crashes, I’ve severely spanked the machine with marathon sampling sessions totally exploiting the 133 second sampling time for my Lyra 8 moments.
I hope you get it sorted, have fun.
‘Pattern 0’ bug is still here:-(
After mangling in PERFORM mode and going back to PATTERN mode, the Pattern number blinks in the left down corner as usual, but at the end of the actual pattern it sometimes (rarely) jumps to ‘Pattern 0’.
So leaving PERFORM mode can still cause trouble, which is terrible in a live situation.
Yeah the Polyend is picky when it comes to power I suppose. Custom music directories too huh? I ought to get around to that. I’ve used OpenMPT for the last 6 or 7 years now and have accumulated a good 15-30k individual samples so it’s a bit difficult to motivate myself to get around to that. 
Polyend tracker sounds great with old Amiga Soundtracker samples. Polyend did a great job with the tracker’s resampling engine.
I might upload my Waveworld archive to the samples catagory in scene since the downloads for Waveworld archive are all defunct or too slow to get a good download out of.
The custom directories is me being super anal,
but I think it was worth my extra effort because I think the Trackers file manager/system doesn’t have to convert stereo samples and create loads of sub folders etc.
I have just over 34,000 instruments installed.
I wrote a batch script in Sound forge, to convert, and tidy up my sound palette exclusively for the Tracker.
This was nearly a full months preparation before I wrote a single bar on black beauty.
The PT is my Drumfunk workstation, Its my low tech weapon of choice from now on.
Obviously, the final rendered tracks will go through a full outboard mastering suite before released and fingers crossed a vinyl pressed up later this year.
I don’t know if this is the best place where to ask about new features but i would love to see a small update. When you enable / disable track for recording. would it be possible to show track names so it is easily recognizible what I am arming?
Check here: Draft wishes - Polyend Backstage
Sounds like the process is well worth it for the speed and reliability of your machine. Maybe I’ll try my hand at it for my most frequently used samples.
I know this isn’t the place for it but I’m curious about how you’re going about pressing vinyl. I’m in the States and having vinyl pressed here costs about as much as a used car. I’m hoping there’s a fairly cheap way to do it besides lathe cutting.
I think it’s been a week of using 1.8… Still going strong!
I’m on very small but cool underground labels, they will hopeful fund the small batch of vinyl, the cost isn’t that high anymore for a limited run of 500 units. Here in Berlin we have 4 pressing plants.
But that’s their task to sort out. 
Have fun trying to break 1.8
Hi everyone. My tracker arrived yesterday with firmware 1.7.1 installed. Do you recommend updating to 1.8? I have already made a copy of the SD card and replaced it with a 128 GB one. Thank you