Software vs. Analog in 2025 – Has the Balance Shifted?

[zerocrossing]

If I dropped $3600 on a synth with motors and after 5 years of use those motors are turning the knobs to the wrong places that's an issue even if they are only off by a percent or two that can have a major impact on the sound

You're right that anyone buying a Nina should consider the longterm maintenance. However, they're digital encoders and aren't going to change the sound if they fail or are out of calibration.

Melbourne Instruments has talked about this a lot. Rather than using off-the-shelf motorized pots, they developed their own custom pots using high end drone motors, so the amount of turns they are rated for will probably exceed your life span, even if you programmed sounds on it 8 hours a day, 7 days a week.

[zerocrossing]

I don’t think you realize how truly ridiculous that sounds to people that have real experience with hardware and software.

Let's hear it from someone who has serious experience with both hardware and software:

That entire video is a crock of organic fertilizer. The only thing that it shows is how someone who is very knowledgeable about a subject, can also completely misunderstand the point.

The point? The noise and inaccuracy is the reason why people love analog.

[IvyBirds]

If I dropped $3600 on a synth with motors and after 5 years of use those motors are turning the knobs to the wrong places that's an issue even if they are only off by a percent or two that can have a major impact on the sound

You're right that anyone buying a Nina should consider the longterm maintenance. However, they're digital encoders and aren't going to change the sound if they fail or are out of calibration.

I know exactly what they are and have first hand experience with them when I demoed The Roto Control midi controller they make

https://www.melbourneinstruments.com/rotocontrol

The point of failure with them that concerns me the most is what Melbourne calls their proprietary 'ultra-hires contactless optical sensors" that tell the onboard computer the exact position of the knob. The encoders use these to tell the system if they are moving clockwise or counter clockwise and at what speed

So you have a motor that driver the knob to be at the 12:00 but it's slightly off by a percent or two and is really at 11:59. Not a big deal as it will then use the optical sensors to sense when you turn the knobs but remember it thinks you were starting at 12:00

So you load a new preset only this time you are starting at 11:59 instead of 12:00 and the error continues to compound itself every time you move a control with your fingers and then load a new patch, while the internal sound of the preset might not initially be effected, the user experience and visual feedback most certainly will as the encoders gradually drift out of position

Another issue I worried about which is very common with motorized faders on digital mixers especially ones made by Yamaha is that they get jitters. In this case if the motorized encoders gets the jitters the optical sensors will constantly tweak the parameter, that turns them into an unintended LFO you can't control

Finally I worried about the impact of sweat, skin oils, dirt, dust, and grime making its way into the encoders and how that can impact the optical sensors. If a piece of dust gets in front of the sensor and moves around is that going to cause the unit to think you are moving the knob? Will that throw the knobs out of calibration? Will it block them to the point they no longer work?

[IvyBirds]

If I dropped $3600 on a synth with motors and after 5 years of use those motors are turning the knobs to the wrong places that's an issue even if they are only off by a percent or two that can have a major impact on the sound

You're right that anyone buying a Nina should consider the longterm maintenance. However, they're digital encoders and aren't going to change the sound if they fail or are out of calibration.

Melbourne Instruments has talked about this a lot. Rather than using off-the-shelf motorized pots, they developed their own custom pots using high end drone motors, so the amount of turns they are rated for will probably exceed your life span, even if you programmed sounds on it 8 hours a day, 7 days a week.

a drone motor spins propellers/fan blades, they are not designed for precision and exact positioning. All they need to do is spin the blades where the blades are positioned before and after the spin is not relevant

So sure they can spin 50 million cycles but they are not working the same way in a synth as that track record records. It's not about the amount of times they can spin it's about the accuracy of how they move the knobs around, many times doing so in small increments which is something drones don't use them for

Drone propellers typically spin at a rate of 2,000 to 15,000 RPM, with some high-performance drones reaching speeds exceeding 20,000 RPM.

What's the long term impact to them when you underpower them and ask them to spin at 60 RPM and constantly turn them on and off without making a single rotation, and manually spin them back and forth and use them to produce haptic feedback?

[AdvancedFollower]

If I dropped $3600 on a synth with motors and after 5 years of use those motors are turning the knobs to the wrong places that's an issue even if they are only off by a percent or two that can have a major impact on the sound

You're right that anyone buying a Nina should consider the longterm maintenance. However, they're digital encoders and aren't going to change the sound if they fail or are out of calibration.

This is also true for any synth that uses regular unmotorized analog potentiometers. I've had countless hardware synths with jittery pots or pots that would change their value slightly when you released them, making programming the synth with any kind of precision impossible.

People talk about the constant need to update plugins, but hardware requires maintenance too and will stop functioning properly at some point.

[mxbf]

I use hardware for everything if it is available. Just way more fun and usually adds an element of chaos that is more musical with the recording, etc.

Honestly, I don't really ever use VST synths anymore. UVI's sample collections are like 99.999% of any VST plugin for sound generation I use anymore. I have a Virus and Hydrasynth for most stuff, Rev2 sounds better than any VST synth.

UVI's sample collections sound unbelievable though and can access way more tones than the hardware I own. Their Oberheim stuff is A+++. And their Drum Anthology thing is probably one of the best plugs I own.

[DJErmac]

Ah ah... you will never win !...

We will fight until the end !

No, just kidding, nobody cares in the end.

[Uncle E]

I know exactly what they are and have first hand experience with them

Now tell me you've been using hardware synthesizers since before I was born. I'm literally shaking.

[Uncle E]

People talk about the constant need to update plugins, but hardware requires maintenance too and will stop functioning properly at some point.

Seriously, yes. Had to sell my beloved Micromoog for next to nothing because it was so riddled with problems. When my buddy sold his Jupiter-8, it wasn't because it had problems (it was perfect) but because he couldn't bear the thought of getting stuck with a $30,000 paper weight if something went wrong.

[crimsonwarlock]

The only thing that it shows is how someone who is very knowledgeable about a subject, can also completely misunderstand the point.

[zerocrossing]

If I dropped $3600 on a synth with motors and after 5 years of use those motors are turning the knobs to the wrong places that's an issue even if they are only off by a percent or two that can have a major impact on the sound

You're right that anyone buying a Nina should consider the longterm maintenance. However, they're digital encoders and aren't going to change the sound if they fail or are out of calibration.

Melbourne Instruments has talked about this a lot. Rather than using off-the-shelf motorized pots, they developed their own custom pots using high end drone motors, so the amount of turns they are rated for will probably exceed your life span, even if you programmed sounds on it 8 hours a day, 7 days a week.

a drone motor spins propellers/fan blades, they are not designed for precision and exact positioning. All they need to do is spin the blades where the blades are positioned before and after the spin is not relevant

So sure they can spin 50 million cycles but they are not working the same way in a synth as that track record records. It's not about the amount of times they can spin it's about the accuracy of how they move the knobs around, many times doing so in small increments which is something drones don't use them for

Drone propellers typically spin at a rate of 2,000 to 15,000 RPM, with some high-performance drones reaching speeds exceeding 20,000 RPM.

What's the long term impact to them when you underpower them and ask them to spin at 60 RPM and constantly turn them on and off without making a single rotation, and manually spin them back and forth and use them to produce haptic feedback?

Every time you power it up, it does a knob calibration, so you get exact accuracy every time. I don't know how different the technology in the pots are, compared to actual drone motors, but I can tell you that I've owned it for a while and I use it a lot and I've noticed no degradation. I had some issues with it, but they were all fixed with the last firmware update.

[zerocrossing]

I have a Virus and Hydrasynth for most stuff, Rev2 sounds better than any VST synth.

I had both a VIrus C and TI, and while the C was the centerpiece of my studio for years, I found it easy to replace with software as far back as 2005 or so. I gave the TI a chance and found that I much preferred the sound of various software instruments. I had a Hydrasynth Deluxe for a time and found it to be one of the worst sounding synthesizers I've ever played, hardware or software. As for the REV2, I love it, but the internet is full of people who hate it.

But of course, these are all great synths, and that's one man's opinion and I am irrelevant to anyone but myself. My point is, all of this exists because there are people who buy them, and love them. It might seem bizarre to someone that I'd shell out $3,500 for a fairly simple synthesizer, but it fills an important slot in providing a type of sound that I really enjoy. I think people who buy high end cars are crazy, but I don't go to car forums and tell people to buy the Kia instead of their BMW. I'm sure the BMW is awesome. I test drove one, when looking for a new car for my wife, and it was the best feeling EV I'd test drove. It was too small, though, and what's funny was my daughter said the back seat was one of the least comfortable of anything we'd tried, so to her, the BMW was crap. It's all about context.

[zerocrossing]

The only thing that it shows is how someone who is very knowledgeable about a subject, can also completely misunderstand the point.

What? You think I'm wrong? Do you think that a perfect representation of a waveform is why digital is better? It is true for some things, yet tons of people are still using analog processing, even on DAWs, or software that mimics analog processing. Some of it out of nostalgia, for sure, but I do think that humans enjoy noise. It's a natural part of our world. I personally feel like digital emulations do get a lot of that right, but I'm also a fan of using analog when it just makes sense to me. I'm definitely not going to ever buy a tape deck again, that's for sure.

[IvyBirds]

I know exactly what they are and have first hand experience with them

Now tell me you've been using hardware synthesizers since before I was born. I'm literally shaking.

Why? I don't know how old you are, but if you were born after the late 1970s that would be the case

you decided to tell me they were encoders, but I already knew that and explained my first hand experience with them
.
Not sure why you are triggered by that. Those controllers are widely and easily available. Amazon even has them up for sale

https://a.co/d/0Ir1XP2

[El°HYM]

Amish people dont use cars because its no real horsepower - true story.