MakeNoise 0-Coast (Portable Analog Semi-modular Synth) for $499

[Wormhelmet]

Buckle up, Dorothy...

Ahhh. I love Fugue Machine. Nice pairing.

[foosnark]

Not really fan of their graphics style though.

I wish Magpie or Grayscale made alternate panels for 0-Coast, but I suppose it'd be harder to swap out than Eurorack modules tend to be.

[justin3am]

Not really fan of their graphics style though.

I wish Magpie or Grayscale made alternate panels for 0-Coast, but I suppose it'd be harder to swap out than Eurorack modules tend to be.

I wouldn't think it would be any more difficult than it was to make the panels for MI's Elements. Grayscale made panels for Tempi and the Richter Woggle Bug, I figure he could use the same kind of LED pipes for a 0-Coast panel.

...but I love Make Noise panels. Their panel designs have always been controversial, with the original Maths panel causing the most commotion. For whatever reason, they are appealing to me. I think they look compelling and they go well with other modules which are stylistically adventurous (if that isn't too pretentious to say ). It's all good though, everyone has different tastes. I'm glad that the market is growing large enough to support companies with all sorts of design aesthetics and different approaches to sound/modulation.

[.jon]

Yeah I can easily understand the appeal of their design, and it's certainly original and fits their ethos, just doesn't do it for me personally. It's also not that bad to prevent me from buying their products, they're way too good for that level of nitpickery

[spektralisk]

Another cool demo. This will be my first hardware synth!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FW8QYt6bio

[sprnva]

Tried my hand at making a sorta self-running patch by sending the clock out and random voltage into the Math section and out to the gate and 1v/oct respectively. The Math attenuverter can then affect both. Then I just tweaked random knobs along the way. Spacey bleeps and bloops ensued.

As I don't have any other modular gear this is pure 0-Coast with effects from Live.

https://soundcloud.com/localtechnique/0-coast-doodle

[foosnark]

After checking my PayPal balance from selling a few things, I've got a 0-Coast on the way now.

[sprnva]

Awesome! I think you're gonna love it. It's so much fun and for someone like me who doesn't have any modular gear it's a powerful and affordable way to get a taste of that world.

I just had another doodle which I've put up on SC (I set up that account mainly so I could easily share my 0-Coast ramblings). It's just random noises but it was a lot of fun making them.

[foosnark]

As predicted, I do love it

I was a bit concerned at first though -- it shipped with a bad MIDI DIN cable, and sustained notes would cut out before I released them. I thought it was a driver or Maschine issue (since I've had some weird stuff with MIDI in the past when I had too many ports active) so I wasted some time trying to figure that out. Thankfully I had a spare cable from the Thingamagoop 3000, and that sorted things out.

Also the Dynamics light doesn't light up. No big deal since everything else works, and it's easily the least important blinkenlight on the instrument. But it's a minor disappointment as far as quality goes.

I think it's a bit weird that there is no way to tap the MIDI A gate or pitch input directly to use them for other purposes, and that it's not normalled to Slope Trigger by default. You can use the Contour section's EON output for that though. It'd also be nice to be able to use the Overtone/Multiply sections with external signals or tap their output separately from Dynamics. I guess it's semi-modular for a reason though.

Otherwise... very cool. I had it playing a generative patch for a while, just blissfully chilling for about an hour and occasionally making a knob tweak or two. And I still have another module to unpack and set up in my rack

[foosnark]

Oh, and for the most part I actually don't hate the panel design or font in person as much as I thought I would. I do think some things could have been slightly clearer with different graphical choices, colors etc. but it's not bad overall.

[sprnva]

I would have returned it if there had been anything wrong with mine. Maybe these kind of things are more usual in the modular world where a lot of stuff is handmade. I do like having the Dynamics light working. I also like the graphics. Maybe it's just something you get used to as you get more familiar with the panel, as some of the MN modules do look hard on the eyes at first sight.

Here's a quick attempt at putting together a multitrack 0-Coast piece. It's pretty janky but it'll do for a start.

I sequenced each track and recorded it to audio before repatching and doing the next. I recorded the pad sequence twice and played back both tracks with some panning. As there's slight variations I got a nice phasing effect.

https://soundcloud.com/localtechnique/techn0-coast

[foosnark]

I did write to Make Noise tech support. I'm kind of divided about returning it for the dynamics light, and going without for a few days. OTOH that sort of thing would affect the resale value and slightly affect my happiness with it, so in the long run I suppose it'd be better.

[sprnva]

I assume you have up to a year to return it under warranty. So you could leave it for a bit until the "new toy" period passes and you could better handle the time without it.

[foosnark]

They've sent me a form to get an RMA, so I'm going to go ahead and deal with it

[Trevor Refix]

Here's a short little synth jam I recorded last night - the first piece I've recorded with my brand new 0-Coast! I love this thing. The 0-Coast is doing the plucky lead arp that starts right away and slowly evolves through the track. It's being played - and summed - via my Pro 2. These things are going to be BFFs. Bleep bleep, bloop bloop! Such a fun little synth.

https://soundcloud.com/textureandlight/infinite-push