Baby Audio Tekno - Drum Synth

[kraster]

I have to say I really like this. I don't think it's super immediate in that there's a lot of interaction and some unpredictability involved.

It feels more like an emulation of an analog drum machine (Vermona, Jomox, Analog Rytm) as opposed to something like Microtonic which is a very digital (and very great) drum machine.

It excels at sounding imperfect with random timing and sonic deviations and the filters, clippers and limiter sound great. It can sound very analog with the right settings. I love Microtonic because it's super pure where Tekno is more about character. It has a huge amount of heft.

I don't really see it as something that is super open ended. I find it very purposeful but with plenty of depth.

I'd love to see Ah_Dziz's points implemented. Choke groups and linked pads. I'd also like to have a way of locking certain engines from randomisation like they have in Atlas.

[c_voltage]

Hm i really liked variations range for kick here (and kick character in general).
(And cpu wise yes seems very little eating)
But builtin seq would be nice indeed.
Will think.
*for 50 would grab with no hesitate

[m-ac]

Can we choose which pads are humanised? I might want some wild pitch variation playing on a cowbell, but I don't want those same parameters to affect my kick, for example?

[toitoi]

ridiculous interface design does not make you want to use the plugin:
-completely unnecessary and non-functional visualization from the right takes up a third of the plugin screen, while to get to the really important calibration settings you need to mouse click and scroll(!) what the heck? make the knobs smaller don't steal my time on scrolling, you want me clicking and scrolling for all 18 drums, (it would be faster to open Microtonic or freeware Geonkick do everything in one page interface)
-drum machine without a Sequencer look incomplete
-no choking
-price 129$ for this is wrong
What I liked is the sound and clever randomisation system plus sample export is a nice touch

half good half made product, maybe from ver2 it will be complete

[billinder33]

Looks like BA prioritized simplicity over features.

I like and use Baby Audio's stuff (Transit2, Spaced Out) and if I was into this kind of device I'd definitely give it a try. Until recently, I primarily used dedicated plugins for kick & snare (Kick2, DC Snares). But I've recently gotten into Triaz as a fully-featured drum machine w sequencer to create patterns

Triaz is a sample based drum machine. I don't see the point of comparing them. In Tekno you can generate, for instance, a kick from scratch and it has a decent amount of shaping controls for that. And that's its primary point, I guess. All the rest can be made in Bitwig for me. It has sequencer and modulation system. Look, Unfiltered Audio has all those sequencers, patterns (?) and LFOs, but its kick engine has only 5 controls. In tekno its 10. Other modules has even more.

I understand this, and wasn't comparing them on that merit. I used to do a lot of native sound design of drums with PhasePlant and Kick 2. But with tools like Triaz and DC Snares, I decided layering and tweaking samples was a fine solution for how I operate. YMMV.

The greater issue for me as a potential buyer is that Tekno is more of a 'tweener' device. Not quite a fully-featured sound generator like Kick2 or PhasePlant (admittedly Tekno's sound design abstraction layer looks nice), and not quite a fully-featured drum machine like Triaz. Mixing Triaz with Kick and PP is the best of both worlds... groove design in Triaz but when you want to throw real sound design horsepower at a specific instrument, you can. FWiW you could even front Triaz's MIDI with Techno's sound design. Again, YMMV.

[oobesan]

This is a product in a crowded market place. The UI and UX are extremely meh. $79 is high for this. $129 is crazy. Transit 2 was a home run, but this... sorry.

[miloszz]

Some nice sounding kicks, snares I haven't found a great sound yet but largely it's making me realize what's so appealing about the the Jomox Alpha Base - synthesizing kicks and snares is valuable to me but I'm completely happy with samples for hats, clap, cymbals and rarely use toms anyway. For synthesizing sounds aside from the kick and snare I'm more into glitchy weirdness.

[m-ac]

-completely unnecessary and non-functional visualization from the right takes up a third of the plugin screen

I was confused by this too as it looked like it might have had some function in the demo video. I get it, it looks pretty, but maybe offer users the option to have something else, synth settings for example, as the default layout.

[aMUSEd]

So is this like Heartbeat - synth drums but no sequencer?

[shonky]

From a quick demo yesterday, it sounded pretty good, but the demo limitations made me not want to persevere. I’d sooner a 20 minute, no interruptions, demo than these irritating dropouts.

Looks like a better workflow than Stix though, high spec but thoroughly unintuitive UI with some unnecessarily oblique design choices.

[Ah_Dziz]

So is this like Heartbeat - synth drums but no sequencer?

It's better than heartbeat. No sequencer though.

[Igro]

I think it would be better, if by clicking the module, the settings on the right would show up instantly, instead of making another click on a setting button. I don't see the point of those cell images on the right (a la Audio Damage synths).

[SirkusPi]

ridiculous interface design does not make you want to use the plugin:
-completely unnecessary and non-functional visualization from the right takes up a third of the plugin screen, while to get to the really important calibration settings you need to mouse click and scroll(!) what the heck? make the knobs smaller don't steal my time on scrolling, you want me clicking and scrolling for all 18 drums, (it would be faster to open Microtonic or freeware Geonkick do everything in one page interface)
...

On the subject of UI, I do not get that hex drum visual pad layout at all. It doesn't match either a keyboard or any standard pad controller arrangement. All it does is confuse me when I'm trying to play.

And yeah, that logo filling the right third is a bit silly too.

I have great respect for Baby Audio, own and like several of their plugins, and understand that sound should be more important than UI. Moreover, I've seen comments from people on other forums who like the hex layout imagery, and I recognize there's no pleasing everyone. I wash Baby Audio every success with this plugin. But personally, I just can't get past the interface issues, and in a croweded plugin market (where I already have plenty of drum plugins, and am always looking for any excuse not to add even more suplusage to my collection), it's enough to get me to pass.

[seangm]

So is this like Heartbeat - synth drums but no sequencer?

Exactly, I just picked up Hearbeat last week for $29 so I'm not that tempted by this one. If it had a sequencer I would probably bite though.

[dj ray]

Its funky, but has the same problem that most synthesized drum machines (Microtonic, Drum Computer etc) have: it sounds a bit too metallic and plinky plonky. Great for industrial, experimental, special fx et al, but not quite the drum sampler replacement it's being marketed as. At least not for more commercial styles. I think Punchbox got it almost right.