Disappointment in hardware synths
-
- GRRRRRRR!
- 15959 posts since 14 Jun, 2001 from Somewhere else, on principle
Maybe but neither would have had a fraction of the flexibility of the CS1x. It was the firs synth I'd ever seen with that matrix-style editing and I took to it like a duck to water after more than a decade of deep menu diving in things like the M1, O1/W, Trinity and ASR-10.
NOVAkILL : Asus RoG Flow Z13, Core i9, 16GB RAM, Win11 | EVO 16 | Studio One | bx_oberhausen, GR-8, JP6K, Union, Hexeract, Olga, TRK-01, SEM, BA-1, Thorn, Prestige, Spire, Legend-HZ, ANA-2, VG Iron 2 | Uno Pro, Rocket.
-
- KVRian
- 822 posts since 25 Nov, 2005
CS2x - I love that sound (maybe I'm too old for the new stuff - I just happen to love 1980s and 1990s):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKvUuSxUjkg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKvUuSxUjkg
-
- GRRRRRRR!
- 15959 posts since 14 Jun, 2001 from Somewhere else, on principle
I also love stuff from the 80s and 90s but that doesn't make me want to live in the past.
NOVAkILL : Asus RoG Flow Z13, Core i9, 16GB RAM, Win11 | EVO 16 | Studio One | bx_oberhausen, GR-8, JP6K, Union, Hexeract, Olga, TRK-01, SEM, BA-1, Thorn, Prestige, Spire, Legend-HZ, ANA-2, VG Iron 2 | Uno Pro, Rocket.
-
- KVRist
- 425 posts since 23 Aug, 2012 from Way Out West
Can't say I've ever encountered that problem. I find the 'sound' in store is no different than the sound @ home.BONES wrote: ↑Thu Feb 13, 2020 4:48 am I don't see how you can know how something you don't own will fit in with your set-up until you get it home and plug it in with everything else. The Minilogue was a bit like that - it sounded great in the shop but when I got it home and played it alongside my Ultranova, it didn't really cut the mustard.
-
- GRRRRRRR!
- 15959 posts since 14 Jun, 2001 from Somewhere else, on principle
The thing is, in store you can only compare it to other synths in store. Minilogue sounded great on it's own and in comparison to a couple of other synths in the store. I thought it might be a good, tinier replacement for the Ultranova but, in the end, it just wasn't. But that realisation didn't come the day I bought it home, it took me a lot of time and effort to get to a point where I felt I was making a fair comparison. That's because how it sounds on its own isn't really what's important, it's how it fits into our songs and you can't get a good idea of that until you spend some serious time with it.
When it's software, I don't worry much about it because it's a lot less expensive and doesn't take up any space but with hardware I have to be a lot more ruthless so each instrument has to justify it's place in my set up. Ultimately, the Monologue was a better fit so I kept that longer but I was more than happy to have spent the time and money I did on Minilogue.
Anyone who thinks they can make the perfect decision about a synth just by trying it out in a shop is kidding themselves or, more likely, just deluding themselves about the shit they buy. Even something like the Waldorf Pulse 2 I had, which was/is a really good synth. In the end it came down to the fact that I just didn't like using it as much as I do some of my other hardware. A lot of that was down to it being a module, which meant hooking it up to a sequencer or controller just to get a sound out of it, where even the Rocket had a button I could press to preview a sound. MicroMonsta suffers from that, too, but it was cheap and I like having it around so I've kept it. But it probably gets around 10% as much use as Uno or Skulpt.
When it's software, I don't worry much about it because it's a lot less expensive and doesn't take up any space but with hardware I have to be a lot more ruthless so each instrument has to justify it's place in my set up. Ultimately, the Monologue was a better fit so I kept that longer but I was more than happy to have spent the time and money I did on Minilogue.
Anyone who thinks they can make the perfect decision about a synth just by trying it out in a shop is kidding themselves or, more likely, just deluding themselves about the shit they buy. Even something like the Waldorf Pulse 2 I had, which was/is a really good synth. In the end it came down to the fact that I just didn't like using it as much as I do some of my other hardware. A lot of that was down to it being a module, which meant hooking it up to a sequencer or controller just to get a sound out of it, where even the Rocket had a button I could press to preview a sound. MicroMonsta suffers from that, too, but it was cheap and I like having it around so I've kept it. But it probably gets around 10% as much use as Uno or Skulpt.
NOVAkILL : Asus RoG Flow Z13, Core i9, 16GB RAM, Win11 | EVO 16 | Studio One | bx_oberhausen, GR-8, JP6K, Union, Hexeract, Olga, TRK-01, SEM, BA-1, Thorn, Prestige, Spire, Legend-HZ, ANA-2, VG Iron 2 | Uno Pro, Rocket.
-
- KVRist
- 413 posts since 29 Apr, 2019
I bought a Mininova, some volcas, and a Minilogue XD
-_- Well...
Mininova just feels like a VST with offboard processing though the voicing is strange in how it works at times.
Volcas I thought would be soooo neat, they kind of are but the FM is a real big headache.
MinilogueXD I just fight with my PC to use the darn thing right but the drivers are kinda borked on windows. Kinda a let down though as I now mainly use it as a midi keyboard.
in fact I actually came on here looking for a thread like this. Thinking about selling my mininova and minilogueXD to a better home.
More or less just finding out my comfort zone in programming is in the box, not outside it.
now is Novation would have created a keyless ultranova desktop module I would probably have loved that.
Now if anyone is wondering why I was looking into hardware would be JayB's trance videos and Giuseppe Otaviani with all their hardware making some amazing tracks.
-_- Well...
Mininova just feels like a VST with offboard processing though the voicing is strange in how it works at times.
Volcas I thought would be soooo neat, they kind of are but the FM is a real big headache.
MinilogueXD I just fight with my PC to use the darn thing right but the drivers are kinda borked on windows. Kinda a let down though as I now mainly use it as a midi keyboard.
in fact I actually came on here looking for a thread like this. Thinking about selling my mininova and minilogueXD to a better home.
More or less just finding out my comfort zone in programming is in the box, not outside it.
now is Novation would have created a keyless ultranova desktop module I would probably have loved that.
Now if anyone is wondering why I was looking into hardware would be JayB's trance videos and Giuseppe Otaviani with all their hardware making some amazing tracks.
-
- KVRAF
- 2269 posts since 10 Jul, 2008 from Orbit NE US
I had no problem determining i would find plenty of use for my Korg Kronos just by reading the user manual and then trying it out for a few hours at the house where i bought it.
gadgets an gizmos..make noise https://soundcloud.com/crystalawareness Restocked: 3/24
old stuff http://ww.dancingbearaudioresearch.com/
if this post is edited -it was for punctuation, grammar, or to make it coherent (or make me seem coherent).
old stuff http://ww.dancingbearaudioresearch.com/
if this post is edited -it was for punctuation, grammar, or to make it coherent (or make me seem coherent).
-
- KVRian
- 595 posts since 14 Apr, 2019
I have to try to fit a synth into a mix to know whether or not it's going to work for me. Maybe it depends on how busy your music is. If it's generally just one synth line at a time maybe it's easier to tell before buying that it's definitely what you want.
I have owned a cz101, esq1 and microbrute. I wasn't impressed with any of them. I probably would love a korg triton but I'm not going to spend that kind of money. I'm happy with u-he etc.
I have owned a cz101, esq1 and microbrute. I wasn't impressed with any of them. I probably would love a korg triton but I'm not going to spend that kind of money. I'm happy with u-he etc.
