At 10:42 AM +0000 8/25/08, Karl wrote:

they all have

their customers. Why ? Answer: They >keep it small.

Yes, but I bet they lose interest. Synthesis technology discontinued
their kits. And is now having a subcontractor build the newer
modules.

I believe a small bit of (gentle) correction is in order here. I have a number of completed MOTM modules, as well as a much larger pile of still unbuilt kits.

Yes, Paul discontinued the kits. However, that's not due to lack of interest. In fact, there is still a decent amount of friendly and good natured protest on the mailing list about that. However, the accurate story about the reason the kits were discontinued is that they were an unbelievably large amount of work to package and stock, especially considering that MOTM is Paul's second job and not his first one. Another factor is that now that there are no more kits to worry about packing (tens of thousand of resistors to be sorted and counted, thousands of knobs, hundreds of front panels to be kept in stock, etc.) Paul can do what he enjoys most and does best, which is designing synth circuits. This means that there will be more, and more varied, modules available in the future and an increasing rate of module production.

As to the subcontractor, that's because all the new modules are surface mount technology rather than through-hole technology. Them new parts is tiny, and they're much better assembled by computerized manufacturing lines. It's still analog, it's just really small. The benefit of this is that modules will now be able to be kept in stock at all times, be quicker to manufacture and possibly cost less over time.

You say that MOTM discontinued the kits like it's a bad thing while in actuality it was a business and life decision made so that Paul wouldn't have to spend the rest of his life sorting resistors into piles. You say subcontractors are building the modules like it's a bad thing while in actuality farming out some of the work means Paul can do the more fun and more interesting work of designing incredibly cool new modules. I mean really, were you mad at Paul when he had a manufacturer etch his circuit boards rather than having him do it himself in his basement?

No more kits = better and stronger MOTM and not that the company is in decline. That there are many modular makers means there's a large demand for "real" synths, even in today's climate of cheap and ubiquitous soft synths. It's a great time to be a modular synth enthusiast.

And besides, there are now more MOTM modules out in the world than there are Moog modules. It's hard to argue with that!


Seth (MOTM fan) Elgart (who also owns an Xpander and two Matrix 6Rs)



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I agree with you in all points, Karl


Karl schrieb:

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Hi Karl !

I?m a keyboardist/arranger, sometimes composer, only, as a pro since I finished studying graphics designs in the 70th and I worked as a musical director several times in the past. But I was interested in tech stuff too and since I got my very 1st keyboard in my life, a Vox organ, in the age of 16. A Fender Rhodes mk I, a Clavinet D6 and a Arp String machine came next as also all FX stomp boxes you can think of. And we modified all ... :-)

With synths, I started relatively late w/ a modular FORMANT, a early PPG 1002, a analog monophonic but w/ "digital" oscillators (Wolfgang Palm lived and lives in my hometown, so PPG was located here too in the pioneer times) and then I got the Minimoog in 1980, then the Prophet5 and so on. Synth programmers were rare in the early days, so I became a specialist at that time and I learned a lot about functionality of synths, synthesis itself and w/ a growing rig, I learned all about midi, wireing, the 1st computers, applications. With a friend, a sevice tech who studied microprocessor technology, my interest also turned to modifications of synths and any keyboard gear, FX ...
I was interested on what?s in my machines ever and how it works, what it can do theoretically and what not. I never buyed gear because of? "who of the big cats plays what". And of course, the sound made the decision all the time, but I never trusted factory sounds from that time where synths came up w/ presets. Factory presets are just a showcase of a product and shows it?s best side, never disadvantages. So the rule was,- delete the presets and programm 1st !

But there were more synth interested guys in town and so I also got my hands on other synths I didn?t own myself, used ?em in studios or during jam sessions because they were there.
Sometimes it became neccessary to fix occuring issues on the fly, not all gigging in the past was accompanied by (experienced) crew guys, you know, and if, most of the crewguys were able to stack Marshall amps and cabs, setting up wedges, sidefills and the PA, but rarely they had knowledge w/ the new and innovative electronics. Keyboards are the nightmare for them up to now ! :-)
So I teached my crewguys midi and how synths work, how they react to bad current and so on and it was ever a big plus I had spare parts somewhere in my rig and could tell ?em to what these belong and where to find inside the machine, how to remove and how to replace.
There were also a lot of bugs in the 1st midi instruments regarding midi standard and the machines were very sensitive on bad current, weak grounding as also trial and error pushbutton combinations leading into any imaginable situations on stage, loss of all presets during show p.ex.. I had the case a Prophet5 lost all it?s patches because the crew switched on the light-rig 15min before a show and I had to reprogram my patches manually resulting in the audience had to wait at the entrance. Annoying !
It was the 1st show of a long tour and I forgot to record the patches on a cassette after the rehearsals ended and I also didn?t expect such a desaster because it never happened before, in fact, I didn?t believe it?s possible.
Loss of patches was quite common w/ Prophets, Oberheim OB-8 (which also lost data written by the OS in the RAM then) and especially the PPG Wave 2.x ), this caused by spikes p.ex., but we learned that by experience, no one knowed this until it happened several times. It needed weeks to find out a PPG 2.x runs weird if the current runs under 208Volts because of it?s crappy power regulators, a misdesign.

So, all is/was learning by doing and it was also good to dig into basicly reading schematics and circuit diagrams. You cannot count on others all the time and never expect to have quality service techs on a tour unless you tour w/ Santana or Pink Floyd.

The Chroma,- I never had one, so I?m not sure if it generates envelopes by software but I think it isn?t. But I was not talking about CEMs in the Chroma,- it only belongs to the polyphonic analoges for me.

No,- I have no "backup" job since I started to work professional in the music biz.
This circumstance might be a disadvantage nowadays and after all the dramatic changes in the industry,- but this is what I also couldn?t expect ?cause my job worked very well for over 25 years, which is a lot.
I?m pretty sure, for a keyboardist, especially he?s performing live, it?s neccesary to have some technical knowledge and I?m also pretty sure, this knowledge as also the ability to program synths, building my own rig and racks as also cable runs and to create the layout of these runs (audio and midi) without the result of a "spaghetti" design saved me a lot of money, nervous breakdowns and came up w/ well payed jobs for years.
Very often, 2nd keyboardists in a band were happy if I could help ?em if they were lost in their gear. Hired musicians are good players anyway, they all can play,- but most have not too much tech knowledge and they don?t read the manuals at all ... :-)

JoMox,- don?t know. I was never interested in these machines because I don?t like to have desktop models flying around.

I count on keyboard instruments and/or 19" racked stuff.
I don?t trust anything which is lightweight and small and/ or has whacky connections like notebooks and related audio/midi interfaces, mini-phones jacks, FiWi, USB, PCI(express) cardbus and so on. That?s all for the home.
It?s enough to have 5-pin DIN connections for MIDI ! Whacky enough IMO ...

And I don?t trust the crew anymore, they ever find a way to blow your gear !

:-)


Karl schrieb:

Hi PeWe,
Some random Thoughts:

--- In xpantastic@..., PeWe <ha-pewe@...> wrote:

Entirely analog synths are manufactured up today, Moog Voyagers,-
the modulars,- and >these can be configurated to be polyphonic, but
this becomes very expensive then,- for >the user !

I can't count how many times I considered duplicating the M12 with a
modular and came to the conclusion it just wasn't worth it.

--- In xpantastic@..., PeWe <ha-pewe@...> wrote:

But it's not impossible to do it, see Doepfer, Cwejman, Synthesis
Technology and some >more exotic small companies,- and they all have
their customers. Why ? Answer: They >keep it small.

Yes, but I bet they lose interest. Synthesis technology discontinued
their kits. And is now having a subcontractor build the newer
modules. B.T.W. Is it not staggering the number
of modular synth companies seen on matrixsynth?

--- In xpantastic@..., PeWe <ha-pewe@...> wrote:

For pros, the price was never the main factor in buying gear or
not,- but swap the >market w/ tons of cheap gear to make
music/noises, - all start to "produce" and the fee >for work In the
music biz goes down, also for the pros.

Do you remember when the Korg M1 came out. Suddenly many
contemporary musicians
( strings , horns etc…) found themselves out of work. I can remember
this causing a union strike or two.

--- In xpantastic@..., PeWe <ha-pewe@...> wrote:

Meanwhile, the biz is down worldwide and there are tons of (bad)
music for free as also >illegal copies all around ...
Now, we have the situation of much more musicians, less jobs, small
fee but also a >request of more knowledge tech wise and a never
ending learning curve.
"Please do everything imaginable w/ your professor like knowledge
and all your gear, >but don't ask for money. Be happy w/ the credits
you eventually get if the stuff will be >released". That seems to be
the rule today.

Yes I agree, I have given up the notion of making any serious money
in the biz.

--- In xpantastic@..., PeWe <ha-pewe@...> wrote:

Kill the pro music biz and you kill the willingness to invest in
high quality gear for a >adequate price which results in a more or
less junk market of electronic noise >generators,- hardware or
software.
90% I see is crap, bad coded or built from cheap parts,- no
reliability at all, no guaranteed >future and all made for the
masses.
On the other side: The crowd is satisfied w/ this, users of gear as
also customers of >music.

Yes we have gone in reverse with these crappy MP3 formats. Which
makes me pause when considering an apple bit box.

I notice the kids would rather spend hours faking it with games like
Guitar Hero than to actually learn to play a real instrument. Being
a musician does not hold the charm it once did. Now the kids want to
be game programmers. A decision most regret when they discover the
long hours, low pay, and the shear tedium of testing a game.

Karl

Hi PeWe,
OK, I should have said entirely analog signal chain. BTW my
schematics show the Chroma, as not using any CEM envelope generators
but rather generating these functions in software. (being a natural
evolution from the multiplexed architecture of a hybrid Analog/
Digital synth).
Thanks for the link. It is a good read, but I am pretty careful about
where my money goes. I have been a little sloppy lately because I
finally have my house paid for. The V-Synth was defiantly an
impulse buy.
You sound too well versed in electronics to be only a musician. Whats
your backup job? Also, what do you think of the JoMox stuff?

Karl

--- In xpantastic@..., PeWe <ha-pewe@...> wrote:

Hmmm,- the Matrix12 and the Xpander aren?t entirely analog

polyphonic

synths.
Entirely analog polyphonic synths were the SEM based Obies, OBX and
OBXa, the Prophets, the Jupiter-8, Memorymoog, ARP/Rhodes Chroma

and

Elka Synthex ...

All synths which generated envelopes, most VCAs, ramps and so on by
software aren?t entirely analogs at all.

Entirely analog synths are manufactured up today, Moog Voyagers,-

the

modulars,- and these can be configurated to be polyphonic, but this
becomes very expensive then,- for the user !

But it?s not impossible to do it, see Doepfer, Cwejman, Synthesis
Technology and some more exotic small companys,- and they all have

their

customers. Why ? Answer: They keep it small.

IMO, the companys like Sequential, Oberheim and Alesis had to give

up

because of some kind of mismanagement in the marketing strategys.

Their

product pallette grew up too fast,- there were a lot of shitty and
unneccessary "small boxes" synths and drumachines been manufactured

by

the big companys in the past.
Products like Sixtrak, Studio400, Jupiter6, Matrix 6 keyboard, OB-

SX

made me laugh in the past as also all these little midi helpers

like

Strummer and so on.
The Prophet10 was a unneccessary product and the T-8 suffered from

the

cheap oscillatorts from the Sixtrack, but Sequential died by the

Prophet

2000 sampler. Sampling was too expensive at that time and a niche

market

already covered by EMU in the professional range and then the

Mirage

came as the killer in price.

For pros, the price was never the main factor in buying gear or

not,-

but swap the market w/ tons of cheap gear to make music/noises,-

all

start to "produce" and the fee for work in the music biz goes down,

also

for the pros.

Meanwhile, the biz is down worldwide and there are tons of (bad)

music

for free as also illegal copys all arount ...
Now, we have the situation of much more musicians, less jobs, small

fee

but also a request of more knowledge tech wise and a never ending
learning curve.
"Please do everything imaginable w/ your professor like knowledge

and

all your gear, but don?t ask for money. Be happy w/ the credits you
eventually get if the stuff will be released". That seems to be the

rule

today.

Kill the pro music biz and you kill the willingness to invest in

high

quality gear for a adaquate price which results in a more or less

junk

market of electronic noise generators,- hardware or software.
90% I see is crap, bad coded or built from cheap parts,- no

reliability

at all, no guarateed future and all made for the masses.

On the other side: The crowd is satisfied w/ this, users of gear as

also

customers of music.

As you, Karl, I think it?s good to take care of the vintage

beauties if

you own these,- and as long as you can.
But in some future, it can also become a nitemare which you cannot
afford if you don?t take care on your biz and the music biz itself.

It?s

also important to take care for the machines don?t dominate you and

your

creativity.

No one buys any music because you have one or more vintage synths.

Even

if it sounds better, it can be a crappy song p.ex. and if it?s not,
there?s always someone needed who?s able to recognize the

difference in

sound and this within a mix !

I?ve found this some time ago and it?s worth to read IMO ...






Karl schrieb:

Hi All,

Since we are on the subject, I would like to point out that it

seems to

be a curse for a company to build an entirely analog polyphonic

synth.

Oberheim was sold right after the M12/Xpander and years later,

Alesis

was also sold right after the introduction of the A6. I truly

hope Dave

Smith has better luck.(Although he seems up to the task)
The expense of the hardware / software development seems to

outweigh

the number of units sold. So, if you are lucky enough to have one

of

these vintage beauties, Please take good care of it.

Karl

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Hmmm,- the Matrix12 and the Xpander aren?t entirely analog polyphonic synths.
Entirely analog polyphonic synths were the SEM based Obies, OBX and OBXa, the Prophets, the Jupiter-8, Memorymoog, ARP/Rhodes Chroma and Elka Synthex ...

All synths which generated envelopes, most VCAs, ramps and so on by software aren?t entirely analogs at all.

Entirely analog synths are manufactured up today, Moog Voyagers,- the modulars,- and these can be configurated to be polyphonic, but this becomes very expensive then,- for the user !

But it?s not impossible to do it, see Doepfer, Cwejman, Synthesis Technology and some more exotic small companys,- and they all have their customers. Why ? Answer: They keep it small.

IMO, the companys like Sequential, Oberheim and Alesis had to give up because of some kind of mismanagement in the marketing strategys. Their product pallette grew up too fast,- there were a lot of shitty and unneccessary "small boxes" synths and drumachines been manufactured by the big companys in the past.
Products like Sixtrak, Studio400, Jupiter6, Matrix 6 keyboard, OB-SX made me laugh in the past as also all these little midi helpers like Strummer and so on.
The Prophet10 was a unneccessary product and the T-8 suffered from the cheap oscillatorts from the Sixtrack, but Sequential died by the Prophet 2000 sampler. Sampling was too expensive at that time and a niche market already covered by EMU in the professional range and then the Mirage came as the killer in price.

For pros, the price was never the main factor in buying gear or not,- but swap the market w/ tons of cheap gear to make music/noises,- all start to "produce" and the fee for work in the music biz goes down, also for the pros.

Meanwhile, the biz is down worldwide and there are tons of (bad) music for free as also illegal copys all arount ...
Now, we have the situation of much more musicians, less jobs, small fee but also a request of more knowledge tech wise and a never ending learning curve.
"Please do everything imaginable w/ your professor like knowledge and all your gear, but don?t ask for money. Be happy w/ the credits you eventually get if the stuff will be released". That seems to be the rule today.

Kill the pro music biz and you kill the willingness to invest in high quality gear for a adaquate price which results in a more or less junk market of electronic noise generators,- hardware or software.
90% I see is crap, bad coded or built from cheap parts,- no reliability at all, no guarateed future and all made for the masses.

On the other side: The crowd is satisfied w/ this, users of gear as also customers of music.

As you, Karl, I think it?s good to take care of the vintage beauties if you own these,- and as long as you can.
But in some future, it can also become a nitemare which you cannot afford if you don?t take care on your biz and the music biz itself. It?s also important to take care for the machines don?t dominate you and your creativity.

No one buys any music because you have one or more vintage synths. Even if it sounds better, it can be a crappy song p.ex. and if it?s not, there?s always someone needed who?s able to recognize the difference in sound and this within a mix !

I?ve found this some time ago and it?s worth to read IMO ...






Karl schrieb:

Hi All,

Since we are on the subject, I would like to point out that it seems to
be a curse for a company to build an entirely analog polyphonic synth.
Oberheim was sold right after the M12/Xpander and years later, Alesis
was also sold right after the introduction of the A6. I truly hope Dave
Smith has better luck.(Although he seems up to the task)
The expense of the hardware / software development seems to outweigh
the number of units sold. So, if you are lucky enough to have one of
these vintage beauties, Please take good care of it.

Karl

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Hi !

Yep,- 20K pieces is right, That?s what I?ve read too.
The prob is: 20K pieces per type of chip.

There are a lot of CEMs in the early synths,- OBXa, OB8, Memorymoog, Prophet 5 rev 2+3,? Jupiter 8 and Elka Synthex.

Roland started to get rid of the CEMs w/ MKS80 rev.2 and Oberheim started to reduce CEMs in their machines w/ the Xpander, Matrix12 and Matrix-1000.

How many of the synths mentioned above do exist up today, how many are trashed meanwhile, how many have been sold in the past as new ?
How many of all these chips are still existing in the stock of some small refurbishing companys but not freely available on the market ?
Isn?t it, if you can afford it, you?ll get your old dynos serviced and restaurated up today ? It?s just a question of money.

Example Xpander:
Max. of existing units maybe 2000, maybe less because some are lost meanwhile.
I?ve never seen a CEM 3374 oscillator failure up to now,- I?ve seen one died CEM 3372 signal processor/filter in 25 years in my machine and these ones are relatively easy to find and not very expensive,- I have 6 in stock for the future.

If we find 1000 people who are interested in 6 CEM 3374 each,- that?s 6000 chips. Who wants the other 14000 pieces.
What?s the flop rate in production of integrated circuits like CEMs ?
Will there be any selection of working chips out of a new production series ?
Do we have to pay the flop rate also ?

It seems, all the synths which have cohorts of CEM 3310 /3320 / 3340 and 3360 chips inside need more replacement parts compared to the Oberheims (except the SSM types). But how many fo these synths were built in the past and how many do exist today ?
But nothing failed in my MKS80 except one CEM 3360 chip in over 20 years,- and there are only 4 inside.

There are more parts in all these machines, not only CEMs ! What happens to these parts ?
What happens to the switching PSUs no one want?s to repair ?

Are there image files of the OSes for all of these synths,- how long will the eprom-chips be available (are they?) and the machines to burn these 8-Bit chips ? Who will do that ? Who will do the service for the refurbished machines in the future then ?
Don?t ask me how many techs here at my place have the knowledge to service vintage gear and these few people( I know 2) are tired of it because it?s a occasional job, not a job to make their life.

As long, we don?t get displays and the rotarys, it makes no sense to re-produce CEM 3374 for the Matrix12 and Xpander I fear.

I?m not sure, but I have the impression, there?s a trend change in the market anyway,- the people look for hardware again because of all the complexity and the never ending bugs as also update strategys regarding software.
There will be new high quality products in the hardware market in next future by well known synth designers which will not be cheap mass products at all and one of these examples seems to be the John Bowen Solaris and Kurzweil is back too and I?m sure they have some pretty good ideas and concepts in the pipeline for 2009/ 2010.

But start the poll,- I?m interested in the result anyway.


attila publik schrieb:

attila publik wrote:

IIRC, I read somewhere that some company wanted a minimum order of
20.000 chips
to start making them again...

There?s a lot of great analog synths out there getting older...

Should we start a poll for how many chips we could consider buying?

/Attila

If so, not only on this group, because there's lots of Curtis-based synths.

Maybe MatrixSynth blog?

Jeremy.

PeWe wrote:

Jeremy Smith schrieb:

Hi,

I was wondering why the Xpander, made from 'crummy' Curtis chips, can
out-sound any of the VST soft synths I've heard.

I don?t know what makes you believe Curtis chips are "crummy".
These are nothing else than miniaturized analog circuits and without
these you would have never seen any polyphonic analog synth in a
compact design.

Or have I just not
heard the best soft synths?

Just to clarify, the review I said stated that the same Curtis chips sound better in one synth (Xpander) than another made by another (poorer talented) company.

Jeremy.
--
Jeremy Smith BSc (Hons)
Managing Director, San Fran Systems LTD.

PeWe wrote:

Jeremy Smith schrieb:

Hi,

I was wondering why the Xpander, made from 'crummy' Curtis chips, can
out-sound any of the VST soft synths I've heard.

I don?t know what makes you believe Curtis chips are "crummy".
These are nothing else than miniaturized analog circuits and without
these you would have never seen any polyphonic analog synth in a
compact design.

Hi,

I didn't mean they were bad. But there's a review of the Xpander which
says they "Screwed the t**s off crummy Curtis chips" to get the best sound.

I was just going on 2nd-hand opinion, but I personally think they sound
great.

Jeremy.

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AFAIK, Dave Smith is using CEM filters only and these are available.
In addition he has NOS chips in stock from the past.
It also can be, there are the chips he needs in production for his company, - depends on count of pieces in the end.
The schematics and tech specs for nearly all CEM chips are available in the web.

Karl schrieb:

Hey PeWe,

I think I know why Curtis chips have his rep. There is a reveiw of the
M12/expander on a large retailers site. It trys hard to convince you
that buying an old synth is a bad Idea, and what you should do is buy
one of their new digital wiz-bangs. Yha Whatever man!
Sadly, Doug Curtis has passed away so I don't think there will be
anymore of these chips available. I keep wondering how Dave Smith is
dealing with this. Anybody Know?

Karl

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>>>

Jeremy Smith schrieb:

Hi,

I was wondering why the Xpander, made from 'crummy' Curtis chips, can
out-sound any of the VST soft synths I've heard.

I don?t know what makes you believe Curtis chips are "crummy".
These are nothing else than miniaturized analog circuits and without these you would have never seen any polyphonic analog synth in a compact design.

Or have I just not
heard the best soft synths?

This is possible.
The best analog modelling soft synths technology is replicating analog circuits digitally (algorythms) and combining these "modules" that way, it was done in the originals.

It?s a fact, some anaolog circuits are harder to clone and some easier, depending on the limits of modelling analog behaviour in binary code and in respect of this, the designers all follow different strategys combined w/ their own innovations and experience.
A result of binary code will never be a true analog waveform compared w/ a real analog circuit and it?s well known, the heart of a analog synth, the filter, is one of the hardest to clone modules, this depending on the complexity of the original filter.
So, it?s possible to get a result which is very close and it get?s better in future, no question,- but it?s a different technology w/ different results, disadvantages but also advantages.

Eventually some of the designers follow the right strategy by deciding not to clone technology from the past, but creating totally new synthesizers in software because digital technology can also do things, analog technology couldn?t.
This is sometimes also the case w/ todays hardware synthesizers, which are very often a software controlled DSP based design in a enclosure w/ a hardware user interface.

Depending on the ears of designers or users:
The human ear is more or less easy to fool.
Create a halfway good sounding machine, give it a good looking design and a great innovative name, and the ears of most users believe what they see.
Create a clone which has all the functionality of the original and add some extras, make it sound reletively close to the original but give it a perfect GUI, - the ears will believe what the eyes see,- in most cases.

Another example:
Use a recording software w/ a great GUI and record in 16Bit/44.1K, don?t use the best converters and not the best speakers. The producer won?t care in most cases because his eyes are fixed to the tracks waveforms running in the GUI of the recording softwareand to all the animations,- today the people watch the music unfortunately.

If you listen to the purists, a "chip"-synth is crap and a discrete analog modular is the king,- so don?t ask what these say about software clones.

And yes, there are great sounding clones/synths to find in the market by Sonic Projects, U-HE, Disco DSP, NI, GForce, Way Out Ware and Arturia p.ex.,- I don?t mention the sampling technology based synths/clones here.

But all these suffer from bugs here and there which is quite common w/ software at all and from the fact you?ll have to control these w/ more or less uncomfortable controllers, beginning w/ a standard mouse up to complex USB midi-controller keyboards which all don?t have their knobs and sliders located where you expect ?em for a specific machine as also you need computers and growing calculation power w/ each update of these virtual machines.

In the end, everyone has to decide what?s neccessary for his work w/ synths and to take care on who?s consuming this work.

I don?t believe, the consumers of music will recognize all the differences in a musical context which they like anyway,- they don?t do direct comparisons. They like the music or they don?t like it, they don?t ask how it?s been made.
They listen to mp3 and meanwhile, too much mp3s found their way to CDs, even w/ major company releases ! :-)

Jeremy.

Hey There Jeremy,
First off, I agree that Tom's accumulated experience with synth
design created an incredibly sounding synth.

I have spent a great deal of time trying to figure this out myself.
Bottom line: The Oscillators are always slightly out of tune and out
of sync with each other. As PeWe has pointed out in other posts you
can pile up digital emulations and all you get is a louder version of
the tone. Doing this with the M12/expander creates a sound which
seems to be almost alive, as the waves drift with each other and
never lock up in a synchronous way. BTW Every once in awhile they
will go 180 degrees out of phase with each other which will almost
mute the tone. Re-tuning or Layering two voices together will fix
this most of the time

Experiment:
Set up a drone patch by turning the VCA2 all the way up. Go to master
page turn all but one of the voices off. Trigger a tone in the lower
octave. Run an autotune and listen carefully. As time goes on the
oscillators will slowly drift in tuning creating a wonderful
chorusing sound. The rate at which this happens is not a constant
thing. Depending on warm up time and ambient temperature the rate at
which this happens will be different. This will cause each note
played on an analog synth to be slightly different. So your ear does
not get bored with sound. The digital emulations try to model this
but I suspect other feature in the design take first chair.

This motion of the sound gives all analog synths their distinct
sound. Back in the 80's there was a lot of complaining about this,
because guys who were trying to synthesize an orchestra could not
pile up more than a few voices before the sound became muddy.
Demanding more precision in their instrument's tuning, pushed
designers to the DCO and finally complete digital emulation.

Karl



--- In xpantastic@..., Jeremy Smith <jeremy@...> wrote:

Hi,

I was wondering why the Xpander, made from 'crummy' Curtis chips,

can

out-sound any of the VST soft synths I've heard.

The conclusion I came to is this: The right pair of ears, but not

just

that - enough technological knowledge to influence prototyping.

As an example, Stevie Wonder was instrumental in some synth

creations.

Kraftwerk were too. And Thomas Dolby. And I guess Tom Oberheim has

great

ears.

Are the soft synth creators not using the best producer's or

artist's

ears? Or is analogue circuitry just better-sounding? Or have I just

not

heard the best soft synths?

Jeremy.

.. and original is original, no matter if it sounds "better or worse", which is somewhat
subjective ofcourse.

I think the answer hides in physics in that sense that the chips are not only designed for
music, but they happen to produce harmonics and noise that comes naturally, i.e., non-
intended from the electron movements in the analog chips. All software synths are digital
and thus discontinuous, on the contrary. And, forgetting the analog amplifiers and
loadspeakers, they can only reproduce what has been programmed, without variation and
individuality. Best software synths are quite near approximations of what can be measured
and thus imitated. I don't think the sound of analog synths are a result of just a good pair of
ears and continuous analog circuitry, but their sound is also a result of some lucky natural
phenomenons, which all we may still not be able to measure and reproduce exactly with a
software. This is how I see it.

Hi,

I was wondering why the Xpander, made from 'crummy' Curtis chips, can out-sound any of the VST soft synths I've heard.

The conclusion I came to is this: The right pair of ears, but not just that - enough technological knowledge to influence prototyping.

As an example, Stevie Wonder was instrumental in some synth creations. Kraftwerk were too. And Thomas Dolby. And I guess Tom Oberheim has great ears.

Are the soft synth creators not using the best producer's or artist's ears? Or is analogue circuitry just better-sounding? Or have I just not heard the best soft synths?

Jeremy.

Hi,

Yes, please, scan!

I did just a few days ago scan the Owner's Manual. The file did not fit in the Documents
directory, so I did make a link to it. See:



Tiitu

PS: There is a new picture of M12 with the name OBM12_specs.jpg in