HAWK-800 and AtomaHawk Feature Enhancements for the Poly-800

The HAWK-800 and AtomaHawk bring a large number of new features and functions to the Poly-800. Below is a summary of the features. You can download and read the owners manual to understand the specifics of each of the new features. Below is a summary list of features.

HAWK-800 Features

Sound Generation and Control

• Arpeggiator with various modes.
• Tremolo - LFO1/LFO2 modulate DCO1/2 volume.
• Two LFO's (LFO1 and LFO2) and two super LFO's (SLFO3 and SLFO4). All four LFO's have triangle, sawtooth, sine, square PWM, random sample and hold waveforms. All waveforms can also be inverted. EG3 routing too.
• LFO free running modes.
• LFO1 and LFO2 delay type select - cycle on note onset until delay or no cycle until delay expires.
• LFO2 sync to MIDI clock.
• EG3 retriggering sync by MIDI clock.
• Note triggered sequencer transpose and MIDI sequencer transpose too.
• Resonance modulation by LFO's and the envelope generator.
• LFO1 frequency modulated by SLFO3. LFO2 frequency modulated by SLFO4.
• LFO1 modulation depth modulated by SLFO3 (or EG3).
• Random sample and hold waveform clocked by the on board seq. or MIDI clock.
• Random sample and hold waveform clocked by sequencer repeat.
• DCO harmonics can now be modulated by any of the four LFO's.
• Portamento mono mode with slide rate parameter stored per patch.
• Portamento unison mode.

MIDI Controls, Modulations and Utilities

• MIDI controllers (special and NRPN) for all original and extended parameters.
• MIDI standard controllers implemented for LFO1 rate, VCF cutoff and resonance depth.
• MIDI controllers for setting Poly, Hold, Chord and Portamento modes.
• MIDI sustain controller send and receive.
• MIDI SYSEX single patch dump send and receive.
• MIDI SYSEX bulk patch send and receive.
• MIDI EX-800 SYSEX dump receive (sequencer and patches).
• MIDI Poly-800 MK2 SYSEX patch dump receive (patches only).
• MIDI user initiated SYSEX HAWK-800 bulk dump all patches.
• MIDI SYSEX save running patch into current selected patch.
• Selectable Omni On, Off or Auto on power up.
• Keyboard MIDI TX channel selection (1-16 or no MIDI TX).
• Joystick MIDI TX channel selection (1-16 or no MIDI TX).
• MIDI soft thru of all messages.
• Sequencer MIDI time code send on/off.
• Chord mode synchronization SYSEX send - if cascade sync mode is selected then pressing the chord key will send a SYSEX message to set up the chord progression table. This allows a slave unit such as an EX-800 to operate in chord mode with the same chord structure as the master unit.
• MIDI patch bank selection (1 of 4).
• MIDI note on velocity sensitivity where VCF and envelope generator parameters can be influenced by incoming MIDI note velocity data.
• Portamento unison mode.

User Controls, Settings and Functions

• Local keyboard control on/off.
• Local joystick control on/off.
• Extended playing range on/off (increases the playing range by two octaves while ignoring the parameters 11 and 21).
• Cascade mode (for when you have two Poly's or a Poly and an EX800. One unit plays odd notes and the other plays evens).
• Cascade sync mode (the master unit sends SYSEX patch dumps to the slave as well as setting the Poly mode and patch number. This ensures that your slave unit plays exactly the same sounds as the master).
• Poly mode is stored and recalled with patches.
• Bend depth stored per patch.
• You can send the global parameters from the Poly 800 to another Poly-800 or EX800.
• A global parameter is now available that allows setting the keyboard MIDI note velocity.
• Local sequencer control on/off so that you can send the Poly 800 sequence to another synth via MIDI.
• A global parameter now allows keyboard MIDI transmit octave shift up or down 3 octaves.
• You can cancel out of a patch write by pressing the write button (instead of reaching around the back and fiddling around for the write enable switch).
• All user patches, globals and sequencer data are stored directly in flash memory so that you no longer need ANY backup battery.
• Sustain pedal operation. The original "step up" jack now also operates as a sustain pedal with patch control over decay and release times as well as sustain hold point.
• Joystick parameter editing and patch section. You can now change the operation of the joystick to edit patches and select patches.
• The Up/Down data keys also operate as patch up/down selectors when in Program mode.
• Four banks of 64 patches (for all kits shipped from June 2009 onward) giving the HAWK-800 256 patch storage in flash memory (no backup batteries are required).
• All notes off panic button (with MIDI TX too).
• Portamento unison mode.

HAWK-800 Features

• Extreme Resonance (also known as the Moog Slayer mod).
• Quasi frequency modulation (also known as the FM-800 mod).
• Both of the above features are controlled and modulated by the envelope generators and LFO's which is something that the original mod's just cannot do since they rely on potentiometers for control.
• 24/12 db per octave selectable filter slope. Original mod details HERE
• All three features are controlled by parameters that are stored in patch memory. This is a critical feature because all of the original mod's don't use any kind of patch storage and the original mod's require that you drill holes in your Poly-800 and then install potentiometers and switches. The AtomaHawk places all of the mod's under full digital control. No drilling or hardware required.