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Digital synth love

jmbf44

By jmbf44
in EKT General Discussion

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DerWaschbar Veteran

DerWaschbar

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It seems pretty straight forward to create and upload panels for Ctrlr, but I haven't gotten too far into it yet. The community seems pretty supportive though.

I think the gripe with MQ is that loads of the synth editors don't work or at least some work and some don't on other systems and there doesn't seem to really be any support or anyone troubleshooting the editors and updating them. So you end up paying for something that very likely won't work, or won't work well and may never work.

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Grain Bastard Proficient

Grain Bastard

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I have an OP-1 which is very digital (unashamedly so!!!) and I absolutely love it. The individual 'synths' in it on their own aren't the most complex (single ADSR, single LFO for example) but once you see the device as a whole and take into account the tape and the sampler you can get some superb sounds from it.

 

I also find inspiration from the fact that the 'DNA' synth on the device is unique to each OP-1 as it uses the unique CPU identifier number as part of its algorithm for sound generation!! Bit of a gimmick maybe but still sort of cool imo :)

 

I have a few analog synths too (Mopho, Microbrute, TT-303, Monotron) which I also really like and a lot of VSTi's - All of them have a place.

 

To dismiss digital synthesis as some kind of inferior method is so narrow-minded it gives me liquid shit!!!

 

I was hoping that the A4 would have lowered the price and increased availability of the MonoMachine as I quite fancy one of those - in fact much more than the A4.

 

Just mho.

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awepittance Grand Master

awepittance

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Mesh Gear Fox, what you're describing is essentially what the new device by the Monome creators have come up with co-created by Ezra Buchla, Don Buchla's son. It's an open source, very small Oled screen thing that even kinda looks like the Op-1, but smaller and more boxy. It's supposed to be in theory even more open ended than the Nord modular. Unfortunately the price is somewhere around $1200

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awepittance Grand Master

awepittance

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interested to know what your main beef with MQ is? is it the pricing structure?

 

i've been using it since i wiped my treasured dx21 patches accidentally with jsynthlib. so far i haven't lost any sounds, but it works ok. i tend to avoid using it because it's a bit convoluted (i seem to always have to set up my midi ins/outs again and again). plus it seems too heavily based around the idea of "sets", or at least the idea confuses me a little.

 

the fact that this ctrlr program works as a vst is a delightful convenience

my beef with MQ is it's a company that has flooded google search results with the #1 or #2 result anytime you type in _______ (synth name) + software editor, when it just takes you to the same template page showing a screenshot of the individual panel/patch for that synth with no details on how it functions with said synth. It's just really frustrating the way they've done this. On top of this, they don't really explain that the MAc version of it is broken as fuck, from Snow Leopard all the way to Mountain Lion, MQ was never able to let me real-time edit a panel

 

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jeyemusik Community Regular

jeyemusik

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Mesh Gear Fox, what you're describing is essentially what the new device by the Monome creators have come up with co-created by Ezra Buchla, Don Buchla's son. It's an open source, very small Oled screen thing that even kinda looks like the Op-1, but smaller and more boxy. It's supposed to be in theory even more open ended than the Nord modular. Unfortunately the price is somewhere around $1200

 

I've seen that one, think there's a new video doing the rounds now and whilst in theory it looks interesting it looks pretty slow and tedious to do anything non-trivial with. I'm struggling to see what it is about the device that will justify it's eye watering price tag at this time. Perhaps once it's a bit more evolved and some of the CV functionality is explained it'll make more sense..... To be truthful, it'd way down my list of things to investigate....

 

At the other end of the spectrum are the Patchblocks that are just about to be released and were funded by a Kickstarter campaign. I ordered a couple and think they could be really useful wee things.

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Audioblysk Grand Master

Audioblysk

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these patchblocks look great! that would offer certain advantages over what i'm thinking of. any word if it's polyphonic? had a look through the site but maybe i missed something.

I have heard no polyphony, but I assume with enough patchblocks one could rig up each voice on a different osc.

 

Those things are way too far from being useful for me to put money on now IMO. GIve it 5 years, fuck yeah.

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ryancolecreate Veteran

ryancolecreate

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MQ is just a horrible horrible piece of software. In it's entirety. The UI is amongst the worst I have ever encountered. It's core functionality is not reliable. It's extremely overpriced.

 

I have the feeling that there is one guy behind it who has not seriously worked on it in the past 10 years. He updates only enough so that it will run on new platforms but without any testing for feature completeness. He needs to retire.

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Guest The Bro

Guest The Bro

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Almost got a Korg Wavestation SR yesterday that someone was selling on Gumtree for £50!!! Alas by the time I called it had been snapped up.

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Guest The Bro

Guest The Bro

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Ha ha you dissed me not that long ago for owning a JV1080 and now you're buying a JV yourself lol!!

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Guest The Bro

Guest The Bro

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Does anyone have Roland D50? It's kinda on my shopping list and I really like what I've heard of it so far.

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BCM Grand Master

BCM

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I never dissed you for owning one I don't think... Might have dissed you for not using it though maybe...anyway, I take it back whatever it was...

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gmanyo Grand Master

gmanyo

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I just offered someone a pretty low-ball price for their CZ-5000 on craigslist. Hoping he'll at least make a counter offer because the thing sounds great from the previews and reviews I've seen/read.

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LimpyLoo Grand Master

LimpyLoo

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I just offered someone a pretty low-ball price for their CZ-5000 on craigslist. Hoping he'll at least make a counter offer because the thing sounds great from the previews and reviews I've seen/read.

 

Casio CZ's are the coolest. Good luck, hope you get it!

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LimpyLoo Grand Master

LimpyLoo

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How much are they worth? I looked it up and it seems like they go for around 250 USD.

 

Yeah in that ballpark.

 

The CZ-1000's go for like 100-150usd.

 

If you don't win the CZ-5000 and decide you want a simple synth, I'd recommend the CZ-1000 (or the CZ-101, which is a tinier version of the CZ-1000, but it tends to fetch more money 'cause it's so damned cute).

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BCM Grand Master

BCM

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I used to have a CZ1000, was alright, bit of a bitch to program though...still, managed to get some cool leads and pads out of it and found the sound very useable...I always wanted the 5000 though, looks much easier to program.

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ryancolecreate Veteran

ryancolecreate

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I've got a 101 and it's pretty nice. It makes some really warm fat horn type sounds. It really is much fatter in timbre than many digital synths i've heard in person.

 

One thing that sucks though is that there is no internal battery and all patch memory (all 16 slots of it :D ) is volatile meaning when you disconnect it from power your patches get lost after a while. This kept me from really digging into it, until I got my hands on Unisyn to build and store patches. You also can't do a manual patch dump from the synth itself. It has to be initiated from another connected machine. :p Otherwise it's be a cinch to use sysex librarian or something to store patches.

 

That put me off using it as you'd either have to reprogram the patches every time you use it, or stick with the presets which is boring. :)

 

It was just a really early midi device before they had ironed out the behavior.

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