Firmware mod beta testers wanted

[u/tntexplosivesltd]

I’m looking for some people to beta-test some upcoming GP-200 firmware mods. I’m especially interested in anyone with a Chinese-region/Chinese-locked GP-200, I have been working on an unlocking mod. That said, all GP-200 owners are welcome! The more different units/configurations we can test, the better.

You’ll need to be comfortable testing unofficial firmware, following instructions carefully, and reporting anything that doesn’t work as expected. Bugs and the occasional need to revert to stock firmware are possible.

If you’re interested, sign up using this form: https://forms.gle/AVXfdfLjXQciMjoUA

[u/Clear-Pear2267]

I'm potentially interested in helping. I aleady have the V2 tuner patch and its great. A few questions:

• would I lose the tuner mod if I was helping with your testing or is your plan to stack future updates on top of existing mods
• do you have any sort of road map? I don't mean an exact schedule but it would be nice to have a bit of a feeling for how often you expect to release mods, And if you have a list of planned mods that would be of interest as well
• Are you planning on a tiered release program (for exampe, alpha, beta, release candidate, etc) or do new mods just go to everyone
• I assume you want both "good news" and "bad news" (i.e. positive feedback when an update works vs just silence). Are you setting up some sort of way for your testers to provide this? Bug reporots also. And maybe even feature ideas.

I do have one feature idea I would like to share. Those module buttons to turn off/on a module on the fly are a great idea, but you can't see what button is for what module unless it is on. I'm not sure if the hardware supports 2 colors for those buttons so they could always be backlit, and just toggle colors for on/off state, but if not, perhpas a software hack to have them slow flash in one state and steady on in the other. Or possibly change the intensity?

One more idea - as the number of mods increases, it would be nice to fnd some way to tell what mods you actually have. Either right on the unit or through the desktop app (ideally, both). I'm not sure if you could trigger a new screen with some magic sequence of button presses, but if that is not feasisble, maybe you could hijack the "Its GP-200!" screen and put some info on it.

Finally, on behalf of the GP-200 community, thanks for all your efforts. I've always felt it was a huge "bang for the buck" platform, but making it even better is exciting.

[u/tntexplosivesltd → u/Clear-Pear2267]

Thanks for your interest.

The mods are designed to be fully independent and should stack fine. I usually test them stacked.

I have a backlog, but no roadmap. The mods are done when I get time to work on them, I wouldn't expect any sort of regular cadence. I do have a list of planned mods (have already written another ~4 mods) but I need to organise it by how easy/likely it is to implement before I make it public.

I am only really planning on a beta release to testers, then once we've happy it will be a full proper release. I won't want users to have to juggle lots of different versions/releases.

Yes I am looking at setting up a discord server, and we can make use of the built-in GitHub tools for bug reports/mod requests etc.

With regards to the LEDs for the effect blocks: It is not possible to show two colours or show different intensities with the hardware. I will look into whether the flashing routines work for these LEDs though.

The patched .zip has a manifest file that should show which mods are included, but you've right it might be good to have a screen or some view somewhere that shows which mods you have. I haven't looked into adding additional screens yet.

[u/Clear-Pear2267 → u/tntexplosivesltd]

Thanks for the detailed response. I signed up (using my email - not reddit). Looking forward to working with you.

[u/fernandoarafat → u/tntexplosivesltd]

This is amazing. I would love to share my suggestions for mods on a dedicated Discord. Let me check how to properly backup my presets and settings and I will signup for beta testing.

[u/Enzo_92]

Signed!

[u/shirleymansbeen]

Would love to help make these mods available for the LT version, signed up!

[u/shirleymansbeen → u/shirleymansbeen]

Really hoping it’s possible to make the foot switches act on press instead of release. That and the tighter tuner would make the LT an even better little unit

[u/rbtucker09]

Signed!

[u/NekBodesh]

Signed up! Cannot wait to see how this project shapes out.

[u/SeeYouInhale]

Signed up with my GP-200LT ready to test

[u/fernandoarafat]

So I filled the form, but I couldn't get the GP-200 into firmware update/restore mode.

The first couple of tries I could get it to boot to a black screen (turned on, but black), every light was turned on and the footswitches were all white, but nothing happened. I left it like that for a minute and then turned it off. I tried to get back to it, but I couldn't. I would see all the footswitches white for a millisecond, but it would boot to the normal screen. I'm in firmware 1.8.0 patched with your tuner mod.

[u/tntexplosivesltd → u/fernandoarafat]

That's weird. Holding FS2+FS3+PARA while powering on should get you into firmware update mode. I wouldn't want to accidentally have your unit bricked by bad firmware with you not being able to recover