Pitch Bend Wheel Dead?

[AndyLoxton1]

Ok, now I'm drooling!!!

[AndyLoxton1]

That thing sounds Awesome!!, but then look at the pricetag, I guess it has to!!!

[Thunderroad75]

Yeap great synth indeed. I remember about 15 years ago people where saying, " oh there will never be anologue synths again cos there too expensive to make, can't get all the old chips etc. Now we are in a very, very exciting time with anologue synths. Companies like Korg, Mg, MFB, Arturia, Novation, Doepfer etc are making really great synths that actually surpass the old greats from the 70s early 80s.

 One major drawback though.............................My pockets aren't deep enough! 

[AndyLoxton1]

Well, I got it back today, & it sounds totally different, a lot thicker, so something must have really been up with it!! Haven't had a chance to play with it properly yet, but in the half hour I had, everything seems more snappy & Pitch bend is now working!!

I know what you mean about the analogue synths & needing deep pockets!!

I had a look at the Volca range by Korg. Analog Drum synth for around £100 is pretty amazing, although, its only audio connection is a minijack, which kind of puts me off as the Montron delay has the same connection and is VERY (White)noisy!!

[Thunderroad75]

Korg are really impressing at the moment. They are putting alot of tiime and effort into their new anologe range of synths and drum machines. I to have looked at the volca range and they seem impressive for the cash. I have a Samsung Galaxy S3 and I downloaded this app,
 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.singlecellsoftware.caustic&feature=search_result#?t=W251bGwsMSwxLDEsImNvbS5zaW5nbGVjZWxsc29mdHdhcmUuY2F1c3RpYyJd

This is open ended so you can load your own samples into the drum machine and the pcmsynth synths. I downloaded the Roland CR-78, TR-808,909. Korg KPR etc samples and loaded them into the drum machine. It is awesome bit of kit and it's free to download. You only pay to unlock it but all that means is you can save your songs. The app is completely usable without paying for the unlock code.

 It has kept me amused for hours, put it through your mixer and speakers................it will blow you away with it's quality and depth. 

[MarctheDarc]

First off; nice that it came back much better than before. When the sound and everything is so much different i would say there's been damage to the print and/or components - atleast by my logic. So you're in for a lot of fun, i'm loving my Brute!

As to the analog discussion, i would actually argue that Korg is far from impressing. So far all their new ventures into analog has been limited, cheaply designed, poor quality and shown a complete lack of creative drive. Not to mention the absense of anything new or even remotely groundbreaking.

The Mono-series are all extremely limited, nigh unplayable (no MIDI, USB or CV/gate without voiding warantee) with only that touchstrip, built in speakers and poor output ruin the signalpath.

Volca-series have improved the interface/control and has MIDI-in (compared to Monos), but with only headphone out and built in speakers, they're looking to be just as ruined in the signalpath as the Monos. More over the cosmetics seem plagiarised from Rolands old machines - so not even there do they show any intent to do something new and exciting.

MS-20 mini is just a cheaply made reissue of their 35 year old synth, with no attempts at improving or refining their original recipe. People have been asking for this for too long for it to even be called timely. Korg have been dragging their feet, arriving late to the party (let's be realistic; they only started planning the MS-20 mini AFTER Arturia announced the MiniBrute), and used absolutely no money or effort to make the new 1 a quality product - it was slapped together in all haste with cheap components to the extent that the sound came near enough the original.

If you want a nice and exciting analog for the 21st century, you need to be looking at companies like Arturia, Doepfer, Vermona (check their Mono Lancet), DSi, MFB (crap build but good sound indeed), Mg and even Waldorf is doing something more inspired than Korg. And that's not even going 'round all the modular and boutique stuff.

Korg doesn't in any way deserve the praise they're getting for making analog, it's just not nearly good enough compared to the competition. Not to mention they are notoriously bad at maintaining software support for their gear - i have returned more than 1 piece of Korg gear to the store because they dropped support of the very necessary software within 1 year of launch.

[Thunderroad75]

  oh boy what have I said now? 

[MarctheDarc]

Nothing in particular, i just respectfully disagreed with your positive position towards Korgs recent analog strategy.

On an update; today i had the chance to compare the MS-20 mini head to head with the MiniBrute, right next to each other. They are worlds apart - and that's not a good thing for MS-20 mini!
It's even more cheaply made in all aspects than i had ever imagined! All plugs and pots felt loose and poor quality. Some of the 1/8" jacks wasn't even the correct size, so the plugs didn't connect properly or stay in place. The main output apparently had a lose connection. The side panels are the cheapest plastic ever, and was already loose and coming off.
Furthermore the VCOs doesn't sound nice, especially the triangle wave was way off, and sounded more like a squashed sawtooth. Tuning was all over the place, with VCOs jumping in octaves at random, and sometimes cutting out individually for no apparent reason. The overall sound was extremely muddy and gritty (not in a warm and/or musical way). Clarity was nowhere to be found, and the scope of possible sounds seemed very limited by this fact.
Only real plus was that the filter sounds very good at high resonance settings.

My local gearstore where this transpired told me that the unit had only been there a few days, had not suffered any damage during that time, and was in the same condition as when it arrived. Said store is high quality with pro staff, so this is really out of place.
Personally i think it's a bold move to put a unit as dodgy as that 1 on display; they must really rely on the MS-20 name to sell it for them.

For me, it killed whatever little doubt that the MS-20 might've been a eligible choice.

[Thunderroad75]

I respect your point of view, as we all have one, but I don't think you can really aim so much negative critiscim towards them. After all they are doing something in the right direction even if you feel the quality is not there. I don't see Roland or Yamaha doing the same thing. Roland bought out the Sh-01 Gaia, nice idea, retro style, crap plastic look and dull sound! Still they did try 

Korg are a business after all and need to make a profit on products that sell. From what I see the Korg MS20 mini is doing just that.

So I still stand by my original comments. Korg are doing good things especially with the volca range.

Come on Roland I want to see the SH-2 updated to 2013.

[MarctheDarc]

Fair enough, i will agree that Roland and Yamaha should wake up and revisit/reinvent some of their classic stuff. There's plenty of great stuff to build on. Though i dont think the Gaia SH-01 counts, because it really wasn't that good (even for a digital). Then i actually prefer the SH-201 that came before, it wasn't competing with real analog, but it had some nice tricks up its sleeve.
But so far, i'm not so sure Korg is any better from a consumer standpoint. To turn a quick profit, they're doing well enough, but i doubt people will stand for their complete lack of dedication, innovation and quality in the long run...
No doubt my negative stance is born from a couple of rude awakenings - luckily for me, each time Korg have been so far out of bounds, they've violated danish law, and i've been entitled to a full refund. Otherwise i would've been seriously angry. Atm i'm just at mildly annoyed... Just seems silly to me, to come up with such great ideas, and then fumble them in the actual execution.

I am actually quite interested in seeing how the Volca series turns out, but i dread that it's yet another place where their incessant built in speakers are promising to ruin the signal path, and leave a great idea utterly destroyed. Also i think it's a cheap trick to dress them up like Rolands classics. Beyond that i have my fingers crossed that they turn out better then i'm expecting.

At the top of my "dream come true wish list" is a Roland VP-330 remade, properly.

[Thunderroad75]

Still waiting for the Novation Bass station 2 to finally hit the stores. I have an idea it will be awesome!

[beefinator]

All the demos I've heard have been terrible, but I'll give novation the benefit of the doubt, because it seemed that the guys they had showcasing it knew nothing about how to use it, how to show off its features without making just a mess of everything distorted.

But the part that really makes it a no for me are the multi-function knobs.  Sure the bassstation (awkward name...    3 s's if you write it out, and you can't really abbreviate it...)  has presets, but I love the minibrute for its totally knob-per-function interface.
The bassstation has at least twice the number of parameters accessible via the front panel than it has actual physical knobs.  Just my preference, I wouldn't want to deal with that.

[MarctheDarc]

I'm very curious about the BassStation as well. Hereby suggesting abbreviating it BaSta ;-)
Actually Thomann.de has it on short deliverytime (2-5 days). Sadly can't afford to try it out for a while.
Just used my budget for the coming months on a Steinberg UR28M soundcard.

Must say that i'm no big fan of shift/function buttons etc. but i prefer it to computer editors. Since, be it 6 months (korg) or 10 years (or anything inbetween), eventually the manufacturer will cut support for the editor. And at some point an update to your OS will render your editor software useless, cutting you off from editing these things in your hardware, unless you maintain an old computer to do these edits.

That said, i still feel the MiniBrute is the more interesting design of the 2. So personally i'll probably be saving for a poly of sorts.

[Thunderroad75]

I am looking forward to the Bass Station 2. Got my deposit down and I'm ready to go when it hits the shops. I personally don't mind a bit of menu diving as long as the main parameters are to hand. To be honest the amount of features the Bass Station 2 offers far out weighs anything that old analogue synths could offer. I think these days with so much on offer we expect so much from synth manufacturers.
 I loved my old Mg Prodigy. It was one of the later models with filter in and s-trigger. Very basic but what it did do, it did it very, very well. I have never heard any other synth that has oscillator sync sound as raw and exciting as the Prodigy.

 I hope the basic sound of the BS 2 will have that?