the watmm GAS thread

[sheatheman]

I agree about OT. in 2012 it was like some kind of alien relic box to me, but now I have pretty deep understanding of it. Extremely useful box that is still very attractive to me.

just the fact that you can have an entire one voice drum machine on a single track, 3 lfos, pretty great fx, man. Really want one again.

[xox]

15 hours ago, user said:

Bit ridiculous, I know, but I've been gassing so hard for a Juno the last couple weeks. 106's still seem to be going for around 1000,-, some of them even with claims to have been serviced with matching voice chips etc.

is that too expensive? i mean, it's an analog poly synth with midi and if it functions properly....not much comparable on the net for the money afaik, and with such historical significance 

  id rather buy a brand new A4 mk2 for a 1000 or a brand new deepmind 12 for 700 euros but that's me. i just prefer new and modern tech

 

Edited August 29, 2019 by xox

[sheatheman]

If I had $1k I think I would get a oto bim and bam.

And maybe a boum on the master but I’m not convinced on that one

[xox]

42 minutes ago, sheatheman said:

If I had $1k I think I would get a oto bim and bam.

And maybe a boum on the master but I’m not convinced on that one

Vbeen thinking the same thing and i had money for only one unit so ive bought an analog heat a week ago 

[TubularCorporation]

Just got the PDS1550 and gave it a quick test with guitar.  Definitely gets all sorts of 80s teenage garage metal sounds, which is cool, but I can already tell when I run an analog ick into it and use the parametric EQ it's going to be amazing, especially with the dry output in parallel.  This thing is made for blowing subwoofers for sure (even though the EQ sweep bottoms out at 100hz).  Definitely worth the $60, and I haven't even opened it up and messed with the DIP switches and trimmers inside yet.

[TubularCorporation]

They're out of stock now, but xviveaudio has reissued a bunch of BBD chips including the MN2009 used in the Juno choruses, so that means when the chorus inevitably gets too noisy to use (they're pretty much all headed that way AFAIK, my 6 is kind of on the edge) it should be possible to replace the originals and hopefully get another 15-20 good years out of them. When they were ins tock they went for something like $10-$11 USD per chip, so that's about $30 including shipping and some DIP sockets to repair a noisy Juno chorus.

 

Something to keep in mind if you're considering one.  I just emailed Xvive to make sure they'll be doing another run, will post when I get a reply.

 

Hopefully when/if they get more stock I'll have the cash on hand to get enough MN3007s to finally build a Roland Dimension D clone, too. 

 

EDIT: in stock at Cabintech for $10.

Edited August 31, 2019 by TubularCorporation

[chim]

I've been on the lookout for a decent midi keyboard for a while. Ever since I laid eyes on the Studiologic SL series (midi keyboard line by Fatar) they just looked right in the price range, with all the great piano libraries these days I really wanted something heftier than the typical budget controllers. I got the SL73 thinking it seemed to possess the right tradeoff between a great hammer key action and size, the SL 88 grand has full weight partly wooden keys. I was a bit apprehensive about the action being too rigid and sluggish as people reported synth work being difficult even on the 73 , but if you've had any piano experience it's a non-issue. You can easily play drumlines and trills but it's clearly made for a realistic playing experience. The feel is just excellent for a set of plastic keys. With a library like the Ravenscroft 275, it's bliss, the sensitive response follows you all the way from fingers to headphones. 

The thing is really big however, and the metal casing could handle a bomb raid so it's a vastly different world from holding my old edirol PCR 80 in my lap. The controller part is minimal to say the least but you might aswell add another drum pad or dedicated controller. It's around 12 kgs so it's not extremely heavy, it mainly just feels sturdy and professional, albeit a little immobile. 

[user]

On 8/29/2019 at 1:40 PM, xox said:

is that too expensive? i mean, it's an analog poly synth with midi and if it functions properly....not much comparable on the net for the money afaik, and with such historical significance 

  id rather buy a brand new A4 mk2 for a 1000 or a brand new deepmind 12 for 700 euros but that's me. i just prefer new and modern tech

 

No, that's the thing. 1000,-, although a lot of money seems reasonable all things considered and maybe the price has stabilized but maybe the going rate will be 1200,- next year.

After a couple of years of having zero (semi) vintage synths that all had some issue or other (memory fucked, broken voice, wonky pots) and having zero cash to get anything fixed I also developed a strong preference for new and modern stuff that just works. I dunno, guess it's nice to romanticize.

Had a similar juno lust last year I think and went to try a dm12 because I figured that would scratch the itch at a lower price and less hassle but didn't really gel with it despite quite liking some of the demo's, to be fair it's been ages since I had a go on a juno so my memory of a raw, dry juno is definitely tainted. Have been in a love/hate relationship with a a4 mk1 for a while now

It's all speculation anyway because I haven't really got the cash or space right now anyway and am generally quite happy using diva plus my big synth buy for this year was gonna be a peak. It's just good to be able to vent the gas every now and then.

 

On 8/31/2019 at 1:50 AM, TubularCorporation said:

They're out of stock now, but xviveaudio has reissued a bunch of BBD chips including the MN2009 used in the Juno choruses, so that means when the chorus inevitably gets too noisy to use (they're pretty much all headed that way AFAIK, my 6 is kind of on the edge) it should be possible to replace the originals and hopefully get another 15-20 good years out of them. When they were ins tock they went for something like $10-$11 USD per chip, so that's about $30 including shipping and some DIP sockets to repair a noisy Juno chorus.

 

Something to keep in mind if you're considering one.  I just emailed Xvive to make sure they'll be doing another run, will post when I get a reply.

 

Hopefully when/if they get more stock I'll have the cash on hand to get enough MN3007s to finally build a Roland Dimension D clone, too. 

 

EDIT: in stock at Cabintech for $10.

That's some solid info, cheers. Probably the reason tc came out with that june chorus pedal this year? Was looking for a solid chorus to use on a bassline yesterday and couldn't make anything work but your post made me remember the excellent free tal chorus vst, gonna give that a go, cheers.

https://tal-software.com/products/tal-chorus-lx

[TubularCorporation]

Also, Alpes Machines has released his Juno chorus box as a partial kit for a pretty reasonable price.  If I didn't have a CE-300 (thanks again, THawkins!), Behringer CC-300 and Roland RS-09 and Fender Starcaster Chorus (massively underrated, well made, through-hole Boss CE-5 clone that you could get for $5 on Amazon for a while about 12 years ago - I regret only buying 2)  to cover my Roland style chorus needs I would definitely jump on that and it's tempting anyhow because it's small and covers more ground than any of the real, vintage Roland choruses does.

 

Anyhow, that Alpes unit plus just about any analog or VA polysynth is going to get you some pretty lush, 80s Roland style sounds. I bet a Deepmind plus this would be really close to a real 106, since the biggest difference (in theory - I've never tried a Deepmind because I'm a snob so I spent the money I was saving for one on a Juno 6 instead ) between the Behringer and a real Juno is the digital multiFX instead of analog chorus. You can clone a DCO, you can clone a VCA+ED, you can clone a filter, but IMO you'll never REALLY nail an analog BBD sound in the digital domain. At any rate, I've never eard anything come close - there are plenty of really nice sounding modern and vintage digital delay, choruses and flangers out there but to my ear none of them sound much like their analog counterparts - they're just a different flavor entirely.

Edited September 2, 2019 by TubularCorporation

[kakapo]

15 hours ago, user said:

Probably the reason tc came out with that june chorus pedal this year?

The TC/Behringer doesn't use the MN3009 chips and to my ears doesn't sound anything like the Juno chorus.  I have a Feedback 106 (which does use MN3009) in my modular which pretty much nails the sound.

 

 

[kakapo]

I have a few hardware delays, rack, stompbox and modular, nothing particularly esoteric, but my favourite is still probably the DOD FX90 (uses an MN3005 bbd).  Noisy and dirty and goes into self-oscillation when pushed.   

[TubularCorporation]

2 hours ago, kakapo said:

I have a few hardware delays, rack, stompbox and modular, nothing particularly esoteric, but my favourite is still probably the DOD FX90 (uses an MN3005 bbd).  Noisy and dirty and goes into self-oscillation when pushed.   

Same here, my favorite analog delays are the DOD FX 90 and a modded Unicord Stage DE-1 (which is a big amp-top BBD delay that some previous owner put the wrong value delay time pot in, and I recently added some switchable caps in the filter path, so you can go from really clean, lush shorter delays out to ridiculously underclocked stuff where the delay time is 5-6 seconds (I forget what chip is in there but it's meant to top out at maybe 300ms or so) that degrade into aliased noise.

 

That's one of the really cool things about BBDs, they're kind of in a grey area between analog and digital audio, and if you push them out of spec you get digital aliasing in the analog domain, which sounds great.  The FX90 will do that too if you set the internal delay time trimpot all the way clockwise, but that thing is dirty enough as it is, so I ended up setting it to the longest time I could get before audible aliasing starts.

It's interesting that your FX90 will self-oscillate.  One of the things that initially disappointed me but ended up being one of the reasons it's my favorite analog delay these days is that it doesn't self-oscillate at high feedback settings like every other BBD delay I've ever used.  I've gone through and got it as close to factory calibrated as I can, so it's working like it's supposed to.  With the feedback all the way up, I get almost endless repeats, more like what a digital delay would do than what BBD delays typically do, but it never turns into howling feedback from the self noise or anything like that, it'll just repeat at more or less unity gain and slowly degrade from every trip through the delay line.  Only BBD echo I've used in my life that can do that. So no spaceship noises, but you can do some basic, tape style sound on sound with it.

 

EDIT: a lot of people hate on the sound of the bypass buffer in old DOD pedals and it definitely does color the sound pretty noticeably in bypass but I actually really like what it does and think of it as "the DOD sound" now. I've got a couple vintage/DIY fuzz pedals that usually sound bad with any kind of buffer in the effects chain with them, that I actually think sound as good or even better through a bypassed 80s DOD.  It's a bit like the tone of an old Space Echo preamp, but not quite the same.

Anyway, yeah, get an FX-90 while they still cost 1/3 of what the comparable Boss pedals go for.

Edited September 2, 2019 by TubularCorporation

[kakapo]

I've seen the analogy of bbds being analogue sampling, I think because each stage in the bbd is effectively a sample and hold circuit and they have filter stages like a DAC/ADC, but never thought of 'digital aliasing in the analog domain'.  I'm going to read up on it and try to get my head round it.

There was a useful guide to the trim pots on the FX90 , I'm not sure this is the same one I used, but it's useful and gives an example of the self oscillation.  I think I've read that even with adjustment not all FX90s will self oscillate.  It was actually set up to self oscillate when I first got it but I have it fairly tame at the moment.

https://www.doktorsewage.com/hot-rod-dod-mod-fx90-analog-delay/

I know what you mean with the slowly degrading quality, I often use it with my modular and then drive it back through a resonant filter. 

 

   

[thawkins]

I cannot fuckin believe it - I open the lid of my laptop yesterday and out of nowhere there is a fan making noise. It has literally been a month since I had to replace the screen a second time in 2 years because the backlight broke out of the blue. My last macbook pro was and still is a tank and lasted for 10 years with no issue, not sure what the fuck is wrong with the modern ones, and I took that one out to DJ and mess around more than I took this one anywhere.

I don't like being the one mac dude who keeps talking about his repairs but this is getting ridiculous now.

[Nil]

https://www.plogue.com/products/chipsynth-md.html

This thing is beyond incredible and can sound lush as fuck if set accordingly. In minutes I've dialed super complex bell-ish pads à la Egyptrixx (I'm over the moon really, I've been wanting to nail such sounds for years now).

It of course does the Sega MegaDrive / Genesis bread and butter super convincingly, but it can really do so much more. Basically, the FM engine itself can be quite pristine, and depending on the (virtual) DAC you pick (to my surprise there's been tons of revisions of the console) and similar options you can dirt it up in a tasteful, grungy, characterful way.

I can already tell I'm going to use it A LOT.

[TubularCorporation]

I got a DAFM a while ago and it sounds great, although the firmware still needs a few more tweaks (last version I got the pitch bend range was only a half step but there's a promised update that will make it user-adjustable over at least +//- 1 octave).  YM2612 sounds so good. On paper it's almost the same chip as an FB-01 or a DX-100 but in practice it really does its own thing.

[sheatheman]

Ruismaker noir is an iOS version of DFAM.

it’s amazing. Highly recommended.

http://ruismaker.com/noir/

ive done an a - b and it’s freaking close, but a lot more features.  

[TubularCorporation]

Seems cool, I'm talking about DAFM not DFAM tho

 

DFAM seems cool but out of my price range, if I had an iOs device I'd try that out.

Edited September 5, 2019 by TubularCorporation

[sheatheman]

Hahaha wow 

the human brain is amazing!

it deonst mtater waht odrer the lerttes in a wrod ar as lnog as the frsit and last lteters are crocret!

Edited September 5, 2019 by sheatheman

[Nil]

re : Chipsynth MD. It includes a VGM player, so I had to listen to Sonic 1's OST through it and through my monitors. As a kid, I would have never ever dreamed of listening to it with such accuracy/definition. You can even mute / solo tracks, change speed and tuning... that was so awesome.

Nostalgia aside, I'm floored by the sheer tonal qualities of that synth.  I've been trying (hard) to get the sort of FM sounds you'd hear in Egyptrixx / Barker / Gabor Lazar / Mark Bell... tunes for quite some time now, and it's surprisingly easy and convincing with that one. And it sounds gorgeous right away.
The soundprint it self has an aura to it, like the finest hardware FM synths recordings I've heard really. It's sounds alive, period. I don't know how they do, PortaFM was already quite impressive in that regard (much of a simpler beast though). It oozes personality and attitude, can go so much further / deeper than video-game like synths.
Blasphemy incoming : I'd have kept the Digitone if it had had a similarly strong sonic personality.

[d-a-m-o]

3 hours ago, Nil said:

re : Chipsynth MD. It includes a VGM player, so I had to listen to Sonic 1's OST through it and through my monitors. As a kid, I would have never ever dreamed of listening to it with such accuracy/definition. You can even mute / solo tracks, change speed and tuning... that was so awesome.

Nostalgia aside, I'm floored by the sheer tonal qualities of that synth.  I've been trying (hard) to get the sort of FM sounds you'd hear in Egyptrixx / Barker / Gabor Lazar / Mark Bell... tunes for quite some time now, and it's surprisingly easy and convincing with that one. And it sounds gorgeous right away.
The soundprint it self has an aura to it, like the finest hardware FM synths recordings I've heard really. It's sounds alive, period. I don't know how they do, PortaFM was already quite impressive in that regard (much of a simpler beast though). It oozes personality and attitude, can go so much further / deeper than video-game like synths.
Blasphemy incoming : I'd have kept the Digitone if it had had a similarly strong sonic personality.

Love the sound of the sega genesis, pretty sure the first time I’ve heard FM was on this machine 

 

[sheatheman]

wow you got rid of digitone

[Nil]

Yup. Not regretting it at all.

[thawkins]

Current GAS status:

• laptop in for repairs - using my trusty 2009 mbp
• messed up and broke the left driver on my Beyerdynamic DT-770s; need to order a replacement now but why bother fixing the part when it's probably worth it to just get a new pair?
• been without speakers/monitors for 2 months now, hopefully UPS guy will not leave me hanging tomorrow

[Taupe Beats]

15 hours ago, sheatheman said:

Ruismaker noir is an iOS version of DFAM.

it’s amazing. Highly recommended.

http://ruismaker.com/noir/

ive done an a - b and it’s freaking close, but a lot more features.  

Had no idea they were so close in comparison. Thanks for sharing! I love Noir, and admittedly I hadn't heard any similarities in any DFAM videos I've seen (I haven't heard one in-person). The combo of modulation and the sequencer in Noir makes it really easy to get usable phrases quickly. A lot of the sounds I get out of Noir sound like Randomer to me.