Pocket Operator PO-32 Tonic
PO-PatchStudio
A free app for designing drum sounds and patterns for the PO-32 Tonic, and moving them to and from the hardware over its own acoustic transfer. Built on the open-source libpo32 engine.
Download PO-PatchStudio
- macOSUniversal (Intel + Apple Silicon)
- Windows64-bit installer
- LinuxAppImage
- LinuxDebian package
- AndroidSideloadable APK
Free, no account needed. See theinstall guidefor system requirements and per-platform steps.
The Studio: transport, four-lane sequencer, device map and voice editor in one workspace.
What it does
Design the sound
Pick a voice from the kit and shape it with the full 21-parameter Tonic drum synth, plus an A/B morph you drag to blend two sounds. Everything previews locally.
Sequence the beat
A 16-step, four-lane sequencer that mirrors the PO-32’s four monophonic voices, with per-step accent, fill and morph, plus tempo, swing and pattern chains.
Move it to the hardware
Send kits, voices and patterns to the PO-32 over its acoustic link, or import Sonic Charge Microtonic .mtdrum and .mtpreset patches to edit and transfer.
Keep your work
Save kits, voices, patterns and full device backups to a local library. Search, tag, favourite, audition and load them back into the Studio.
The full Tonic voice, on screen
Every one of the PO-32’s 21 drum-voice parameters gets a real control: envelope faders, waveform and filter switches, and the mix. Drag the A/B morph fader to pick which side of a sound you are editing, and hear each change as the pattern plays.
Previews are rendered by the open-source libpo32 synth, so they are close but not bit-identical. Anything you transfer plays through the PO-32’s own engine and sounds correct on the hardware.
A sequencer that plays like the hardware
The grid models the PO-32’s four monophonic voices as four lanes. Set steps with accent and fill, add per-step morph, then chain patterns into a longer arrangement and bounce the result down.
Transfer over audio, not USB
The PO-32 has no USB data connection. It moves patches as sound. PO-PatchStudio builds the transfer, plays it into the PO-32’s microphone, and can record the device’s data dump back and decode it into your kit. Backup and restore work the same acoustic way.
Put the PO-32 into receive mode, play the transfer, and it lands on the device. Prefer to do it later? Export a WAV instead. Full steps are in thetransfer guide.
One place for your kits
Save a kit, a single voice, a pattern, or a full device backup as a library item. Search and tag them, mark favourites, audition them, and load any of them back into the Studio.
On the roadmap
Today PO-PatchStudio supports the PO-32 Tonic. The PO-33 K.O! and PO-35 Speak samplers are on the roadmap, but I am not promising a date. Their transfer format is not solved yet, so their realistic path is line-in sampling rather than the PO-32’s acoustic patch transfer.
Free, and built on open source
PO-PatchStudio is free, with no licence, trial or in-app purchase. It builds on the community’s reverse-engineering work, in particularlibpo32(MIT) by Eric Lewis, which provides the PO-32 transfer stack and drum synth. Thanks also to Sonic Charge Microtonic (the sound model it imports from), schollz/supertonic and the wider Pocket Operator reverse-engineering community.
Developed independently for interoperability. Not affiliated with or endorsed by Teenage Engineering AB or Sonic Charge / NuEdge Development AB. Pocket Operator, PO-32 and Tonic are trademarks of Teenage Engineering AB, used nominatively.