ESQ-1!!

Just put half down on this baby down at Switched On.

They also have an SQ-80 being repaired that'll be ready sometime next month. It'd cost another $200 or so, but has polyphonic aftertouch and more waveforms. Hmm.

Murky polysynth with lots of vibe!

It's my fav. SQ8L is on like 60% of my tracks, so I feel like it's about time I snag the actual synth.

It's a great synth. I kind of miss mine but it was a little too 80s-cheesy for my taste and mine was very flaky and crashed often. On good days, though, the workflow was AWESOME. Easiest to use piece of gear I've ever owned after the SK-1.

  On 2/24/2012 at 6:26 PM, sweepstakes said:

It's a great synth. I kind of miss mine but it was a little too 80s-cheesy for my taste and mine was very flaky and crashed often. On good days, though, the workflow was AWESOME. Easiest to use piece of gear I've ever owned after the SK-1.

Ha ha. My friend has an SK-1. He loves that thing. It's pretty fun.

But yeah, I'm kinda leaning toward to SQ-80 as it's got the extra features and is supposedly more reliable. I'll call to find out the price difference later.

Oh DURP. I forgot to specify I actually had an SQ80, not an ESQ-1. So they're definitely not immune to the flakiness...

  On 2/24/2012 at 11:03 PM, sweepstakes said:

Oh DURP. I forgot to specify I actually had an SQ80, not an ESQ-1. So they're definitely not immune to the flakiness...

Ah, word. Well, unfortunately...

THEY ACCIDENTALLY SOLD MY ESQ-1!!!

Soooo they gave me store credit and they're gonna let me know when and if they're able to get an ESQ-1 and an SQ-80 up and running that they are repairing. If I can, I'm probably gonna snag the SQ-80 for the polyphonic aftertouch if nothing else.

The polyphonic aftertouch on mine was incredibly flaky. It didn't work on all keys and was uneven and intermittent on the ones it did work on. Minor feature IMHO. Biggest selling point for me is the great interface and sequencer, just super intuitive.

  On 2/24/2012 at 11:49 PM, sweepstakes said:

The polyphonic aftertouch on mine was incredibly flaky. It didn't work on all keys and was uneven and intermittent on the ones it did work on. Minor feature IMHO. Biggest selling point for me is the great interface and sequencer, just super intuitive.

Hmm. Alrighty.

Well I just ran into someone selling an SQ-80 locally for $175, so I might just snag that instead. We shall see.

  On 2/25/2012 at 12:10 AM, wahrk said:

  On 2/24/2012 at 11:49 PM, sweepstakes said:

The polyphonic aftertouch on mine was incredibly flaky. It didn't work on all keys and was uneven and intermittent on the ones it did work on. Minor feature IMHO. Biggest selling point for me is the great interface and sequencer, just super intuitive.

 

Hmm. Alrighty.

 

Well I just ran into someone selling an SQ-80 locally for $175, so I might just snag that instead. We shall see.

Good price! Definitely worth it IMHO, especially if you have other gear to sequence it with. If you have the chance to play with it for a good hour or so to see whether it crashes, that would be ideal. Plus you can get a feel for whether that hazy 8-bit sound bothers you.

  On 2/25/2012 at 12:12 AM, sweepstakes said:

  On 2/25/2012 at 12:10 AM, wahrk said:

  On 2/24/2012 at 11:49 PM, sweepstakes said:

The polyphonic aftertouch on mine was incredibly flaky. It didn't work on all keys and was uneven and intermittent on the ones it did work on. Minor feature IMHO. Biggest selling point for me is the great interface and sequencer, just super intuitive.

 

Hmm. Alrighty.

 

Well I just ran into someone selling an SQ-80 locally for $175, so I might just snag that instead. We shall see.

 

Good price! Definitely worth it IMHO, especially if you have other gear to sequence it with. If you have the chance to play with it for a good hour or so to see whether it crashes, that would be ideal. Plus you can get a feel for whether that hazy 8-bit sound bothers you.

Whelp, never mind on that deal. Sold already. But yeah, still holding out for the one(s) in the shop. And I love the sound of the ESQ-1/SQ-80.

If you just like that sound, though, you can get a Shruthi-1 for about the same price. It has a similar sound but where I would describe the SQ80/ESQ-1 filter as "squidgy", the Shruthi's filter can get downright mean. Plus it has much more advanced synthesis and MIDI features like an arpeggiator. Monophonic, though.

This is, I'm kind of a Bob Yannes fanboy. Some of my favorite sounds have come out of the SQ-80 and the SID chip, so those are two things I must eventually own.

good synth! where's chris moss acid...he's got one that he bought off EDMX..well he used to anyway

I got one of these babies in a waterlogged tweaker basement. Cool analog filters... Old Skinny Puppy used them a shitton live back in the mid 80's.

the ESQ-1 is great fun

Well, they won't have the other units ready for another month, and that's iffy at best.

Anyone know a place where I could find one of these babies online other than ebay or craigslist?

There's one on ebay that's in need of repair, so I asked the seller what was wrong with it. If it's not too big a deal, I might just get it and get the Switched On guys to fix it up for me.

Dunno, I sold mine on Craigslist. I sold it for cheaper and told the guy I sold it to about the flakiness and he said he had electrician friends that knew how to fix stuff like this. I got the impression that he was extremely busy with his day job and it would probably sit in the corner and collect dust until he sold it to the next guy.

i got an sq80 and its real cool, easy to make sounds on it and the polyphonic aftertouch is sweeeet

theres an internal battery that might need replaced, i got mine fomr the states for about 14 bux and it needs soldering, it'll tell you when you power up

you can also get another wave chip for it that has like an extra 70 waveforms or something, mostly unuseable but supposed to be good for glitchy stuff

http://m.matrixsynth.com/2011/05/accessing-hidden-waves-on-ensoniq-sq-80.html

loads of cool info here if you've not checked it out

http://www.buchty.net/ensoniq/

looks like they can burn custom roms for you too...

very cool synths

ESQ-1 was my first synth; I later sold it at a profit and nabbed an SQ-80 (named him "Skew-Whiff" ).

In terms of onboard synthesis these can't be beat imo (not an expert) and the sequencer is dead simple (though I do often wish I could get multiple tracks with different time signatures going simultaneously without breaking out my multiplication tables).

A cool feature is that the VCAs go up to the proverbial "11"—in effect you can get analog amplification/overdrive from the unit itself!

Ensoniq.