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Chapter 19 - Troubleshooting

Most UNA problems are fixable in under two minutes if you know where to look.

This chapter is organised by symptom - pick the one that matches what you're seeing, and the entries below walk through the most likely causes and their fixes in order of probability.

Two gestures worth knowing before you dive in:

  • Panic - if notes are hanging on a synth, hold PLAY / STOP for about half a second (in Performance Mode).

  • UNA stops and sends all-notes-off / all-sound-off on every MIDI channel. Use this any time something has clearly gone sideways - a hold always forces a full stop.

  • Soft Reset - if UNA's settings have got tangled but your patches are fine, hold the CONTROL Knob for 3 seconds to reach BIOS, then SOFT RESET (Chapter 17).

  • Restores all Globals to defaults; patches survive.

Support: for anything not resolved here, midicake.com/contact-us.

No sound

The most common issue. Work through these in order:

1. Is UNA playing? Check the display. In Performance Mode, the position bar should be animating and the note pool should be lit. If nothing's animating, press Play.

2. Are your tracks muted? Enter the Mixer (press the CONTROL Knob from Performance). Check each track's LED. If any of Chord / Melody / Bass is dark, that track is muted. Press it to un-mute.

3. Is the master port enabled? Menu > MIDI > MIDI Output Port Routing. If it's set to a value that excludes the port your synth is on, no MIDI reaches the synth. Set to All to eliminate this as a cause (Chapter 15).

4. Is that port routed to a track that's playing? Menu > MIDI > TRS OUT A Routing (or OUT B). If it's set to "Bass only" and only your Melody track has notes, nothing gets sent. Set to ALL to eliminate as a cause.

5. Are the track and synth on the same MIDI channel? Each track has a Channel parameter (Chapter 15). Your synth listens on a specific channel - usually configurable. If Melody is on UNA's channel 1 and the synth is listening on channel 2, they miss each other.

6. Is the synth's volume up? Obvious, but worth checking. Also check the synth isn't in headphone mode with an unplugged headphone jack (a common cause).

7. Is the cable right? UNA's MIDI Outs use TRS Type-A. If your synth uses 5-pin DIN, use the TRS→DIN cable supplied. If your synth uses TRS Type-A, a normal TRS-to-TRS cable is fine. If your synth uses TRS Type-B, you need a Type-A-to-Type-B crossover cable - a plain TRS cable will not work.

MIDI in not received

You're playing your keyboard, but UNA isn't reacting.

1. Which physical input? UNA has three: USB-C (from a computer), USB Host Type-A (from a USB controller), MIDI In TRS (from 5-pin DIN or TRS gear). Confirm which port your keyboard is connected to and check the cable at both ends.

2. Is the Input Channel filtering out your notes? Menu > MIDI > MIDI Input Channel. If it's set to a specific channel (say, 1) and your keyboard is transmitting on a different channel, UNA won't accept your notes. Set to OMNI to eliminate as a cause (Chapter 15).

3. Is Listen the wrong way round? In Performance Mode, check the LISTEN LED. With Listen off, UNA still receives your notes for solo playing, but chord capture requires Listen on. If you're expecting UNA to detect a chord change from your playing, turn Listen on.

4. Right cable, right way round. UNA's TRS jacks are Type-A. The supplied TRS-to-DIN cables have a TRS Type-A plug on one end (goes into UNA) and a 5-pin DIN plug on the other (goes into your DIN gear). MIDI is unidirectional per cable, so check the signal flow: UNA MIDI Out → cable → your synth's MIDI In; or your controller's MIDI Out → cable → UNA MIDI In. If your gear uses TRS Type-B, a straight cable won't work - see the TRS Type-A note in Chapter 15 for the crossover options.

5. Is your keyboard actually transmitting? Some keyboards can be muted at their local MIDI settings. Try playing a note and check whether your keyboard has an "activity" LED that flashes on note-on.

Notes hanging on a synth

A note started playing and won't stop.

Panic. Double-press Stop in Performance Mode. UNA sends all-notes-off on every channel. Fastest fix. If the hung notes are on the synth's side (a synth voice stuck in its own envelope), Panic clears UNA's contribution but may not clear the synth - check the synth's own transport or turn it off/on if Panic doesn't do it.

Prevent recurrence. Hanging notes usually mean UNA sent a note-on but the corresponding note-off got lost - cable disconnected mid-note, MIDI loop, buffer overflow at the synth. Common causes:

  • MIDI Loop Protection disabled. Turn it on: Menu > MIDI > MIDI Loop Protection (Chapter 15). Prevents feedback in DAW-echoing rigs.
  • Cable disconnected mid-play. Check TRS cables are firmly seated. TRS jacks are less mechanically forgiving than DIN.
  • Synth overwhelmed. If UNA is sending many-note polyphony to a monophonic-only synth, some notes can jam. Check the synth's voice count.

Tempo drift

UNA feels like it's not quite in time with your other gear.

1. Are you actually synced? If UNA is in OFF mode (Chapter 16) and your DAW is running its own timeline, they'll drift because they're running independent clocks - no shared timing reference. Set UNA to IN (following the DAW) or OUT (driving the DAW) so they share a clock.

2. Is the DAW sending clock? Some DAWs don't send MIDI clock by default. In Ableton: Preferences → Link/MIDI → set "Sync" on the output. In Logic: Project Settings → Synchronization → MIDI → Transmit Clock. Confirm from UNA by looking at the Ext indicator on the Performance display when MIDI Clock is IN - if Ext doesn't appear, no clock is arriving.

3. Is UNA the master when it shouldn't be? If MIDI Clock is OUT and your DAW is set to receive external clock, the DAW is following UNA and any tempo change on UNA transports the DAW. If you meant the DAW to lead, swap the roles (Chapter 16).

Encoders feel wrong

A knob is skipping steps, or the CONTROL Knob rotates unevenly.

1. Is the parameter locked? Track parameters can be locked (Chapter 8) - a locked parameter won't change no matter how you rotate. Check whether the parameter icon shows a lock indicator.

2. Is the display showing what you expect? If you're rotating a PARAMETER Knob and no on-screen change happens, the knob may be on a parameter that has a very narrow range (e.g. 0–2). Try turning further before assuming a fault.

3. Encoder hardware. UNA's encoders are mechanical parts and can wear over years of hard use. If a specific encoder consistently misfires (skips steps in one direction, or triggers phantom rotations), that's likely a hardware issue - contact support.

Display artifacts

The display shows garbage pixels, a stuck screen, or flickering.

1. Power cycle. Unplug UNA from USB-C, wait 5 seconds, plug back in. Solves most transient display glitches.

2. Firmware crash. Though rare, it's possible for UNA's firmware to hits a issue that leaves the display corrupted. If a power cycle doesn't fix it, note what you were doing when the display went bad and report it - Midicake actively fixes these.

3. Hard fault recovery. UNA can crash and reboot on its own if something in the code goes wrong. On the next boot, UNA prints crash information to serial. If you have technical support open, they may ask you to capture this via Connect's diagnostic tool.

Controls not responding

You press a control and nothing happens.

1. Are you in the right mode? UNA's six labeled controls are context-sensitive - one that opens a sub-mode in one context might be disabled in another. Check the labels on-screen; a control with an empty label is deliberately inactive.

2. Are you in the middle of a confirm prompt? Some actions (patch load, patch copy, reset) put UNA into a "confirm" state where only YES and NO respond. Look for a confirmation message and hit NO to back out.

3. Physical fault. If a specific control never responds regardless of mode, it's likely a hardware issue. Contact support.

Patches not saving

You made an edit but it didn't persist.

1. Autosave is silent. UNA autosaves without a visible cue. If you're on the patch you edited, everything is saved. Power-cycle UNA and load that patch again to verify.

2. Copy-to-slot mistake. Patch copy replaces the destination patch's contents. If you copied a source patch and don't see it, you may have copied it into the wrong destination. Check what's in each slot.

3. Storage layout mismatch. If UNA just came out of a firmware update that changed the storage layout, a factory reset happened automatically at boot - your old patches were wiped. Restore from a Connect backup (Chapters 15, 19).

UNA won't power on

The display is dark and the unit is unresponsive.

1. USB-C cable. Some USB-C cables are power-only and don't pass USB data - UNA needs both. Try a known-good data-capable USB-C cable.

2. Power source. UNA draws from USB-C. Confirm the source is delivering power. A laptop that's asleep won't power UNA reliably; a computer that's fully off definitely won't. USB hubs sometimes don't deliver enough power - try connecting directly to a wall adapter or a powered hub.

3. Unplug anything on the USB Host port. UNA supplies power to whatever you connect there. A hungry controller can take enough that UNA won't boot. Disconnect it and try again; if UNA now starts, power the controller from its own supply (Chapter 15).

4. Recovery from a failed firmware update. If a firmware update was interrupted, UNA can end up in a state where it doesn't boot. Recovery: hold the rear-panel Firmware Update button while connecting USB-C. UNA enters Program mode; flash the current firmware via Teensy Loader (Chapter 18).

5. Hardware fault. If none of the above work, the unit likely has a hardware issue. Contact support.

UNA restarts by itself

The screen freezes for a moment and UNA reboots, as though it had been power-cycled.

1. Check the USB Host port first. This is the most likely cause. UNA powers whatever you plug into the Host jack, and a controller drawing more than UNA can supply will pull the voltage down until UNA resets - often just as you play a busy passage, because that's when the controller lights up. Unplug it. If the resets stop, power the controller from its own supply or a powered hub (Chapter 15).

2. Try a different USB-C supply. A marginal power source produces the same symptom. A wall adapter is a better test than a laptop port or an unpowered hub.

3. If it keeps happening with nothing on the Host port, note what you were doing - which mode, which action, whether the sequencer was running - and contact support. UNA records the details of an unexpected restart internally, and support can walk you through retrieving them. A restart you can reproduce on demand is the most useful thing you can bring us.

Nothing here matches - using the diagnostic tools

For everything else, UNA's BIOS Mode (Chapter 17) has two diagnostic screens that help pinpoint problems:

  • MIDI LOG - live view of every MIDI event flowing through UNA. If you're wondering "is my keyboard even reaching UNA," open MIDI LOG and play a note. If nothing scrolls, the problem is upstream of UNA. If notes appear, the problem is downstream (routing, channel, synth-side).
  • MEMORY DUMP - a snapshot of all UNA's Global values. Useful when reporting bugs to support - they may ask you to note specific values.

Hold the CONTROL Knob for 3 seconds from any mode to reach BIOS. Rotate to select the diagnostic you want, press ENTER. EXIT returns to your previous mode.

Contacting support

For anything unresolved: midicake.com/contact-us.

When you write, include:

  • UNA's firmware version (Chapter 18 - check via BIOS).
  • What you were doing when the problem started. As specific as possible.
  • What you've already tried.
  • A Connect diagnostic report if you can - Midicake CONNECT has a "Send diagnostics" action that captures logs, MIDI activity, and firmware state in one file. Attach it to your message.

Midicake's team is small and responsive. Most tickets get a first response within a day.