the watmm GAS thread

Should I get a Volca Sample or yes?

  On 11/23/2019 at 1:41 AM, TubularCorporation said:

Are you building a Dubldeca?

Nah, I'm building my own Teensy based thing to fit in a 1U space, based on a couple of schematics/sketches I found. The Dubledeca looks great though! I might take a look at the code and/or schematics and see how it compares to what I want to build.

  On 11/23/2019 at 1:46 AM, baph said:

Should I get a Volca Sample or yes?

Get the Model:Samples instead imo. I know it's between two and three times the price of the Volca, but it's a lot more capable. I played a very spontaneous set lastnight using it. A friend had to cancel his set and asked me to fill in; I was already on my way and had my M:S with me, but with no patterns programmed into it. I sat at a table for 5 minutes choosing a kit of samples on a blank pattern, then plugged into the PA and played a surprisingly dynamic 25min set, everything generated on the fly, one pattern, 6 samples. It was ridiculous. I've never been able to do that so quickly with any other device.

Also it works very well with an external battery pack; I found a cheap one that holds 4 AA batteries. I'm not sure how long it lasts on those, but I'll do some testing soon.

  On 11/23/2019 at 1:12 AM, modey said:

I'm very surprised by the price, it actually seems pretty cheap for what it's capable of.

 

Yes, when I first saw it I didn't realize they'd filled it with dsp, I thought the EaganMatrix must be a native version of it.  At the initial price I agree, I'd have a harder time justifying it at the list price.  I'm a bit sceptical that they'll ship next summer.  I hope they keep the stripped back look.  

  On 11/23/2019 at 1:46 AM, baph said:

Should I get a Volca Sample or yes?

Yes. Insanely good little thing for the price I think. I just got mine for a "toy" step sequencer and drum machine.

But I figure if you want something more professional, modey's suggestion is the way to go.

  On 11/22/2019 at 4:04 PM, kakapo said:

It looks like people are trouble shooting and working through it, so I don't think it's a write off, but I'm holding off any decision until there are more working diy builds in non expert hands.

Fix went up 3 hours ago, right after my request to join got approved.  Looks pretty simple, leave out 8 components, add two components and two jumper wires (per card).  Apparently the transients on the sawtooth wave weren't triggering the suboscillator properly at some frequencies, so they rerouted the square oscillator to it instead.

My old MPC2000xl has jumper wires hot glued all over the motherboard to fix the problems they didn't catch until after it went into production and it still works great after 20 years or so of being kicked around by multiple owners and having a bunch of expansions added and then taken out and sold and then added again over the years, so I'm not worried about this as long as it's confirmed to work by a few people.  Just glad it got figured out before I started building!

Speaking of GAS, I found out today the second prototype of the Axoloti v2 looks like it's about ready to be approved and they'll be available for preorder soon.

got rid of everything (space, money, usual reasons), and wanna startup with small set up that can be fun for me and my kids once they get a little order. thinking of starting with korg volca bass and korg drum. are there better alternatives in that price range that sound way better or are these as good anything else out there?

  On 11/23/2019 at 1:12 AM, modey said:

modular has been about getting away from super detailed sequencing and just controlling things by chance

Why not both?  My other favorite sequencer is the Eloquencer which is basically an Elektron with more probability options. Combined with a nerdseq which also has chance effects and throw in a confundo to cross fader between the two and you have the best of all world's imo

  On 11/26/2019 at 4:05 AM, acid1 said:

Why not both? 

Well, I have my Elektrons for detailed sequencing

  On 11/25/2019 at 11:47 PM, cooliofranco said:

got rid of everything (space, money, usual reasons), and wanna startup with small set up that can be fun for me and my kids once they get a little order. thinking of starting with korg volca bass and korg drum. are there better alternatives in that price range that sound way better or are these as good anything else out there?

novation has the circuit mono station on sale, which is a pretty dece bass synth/sequencer combo..

https://store.focusrite.com/en-gb/product/circuit-mono-station/NOVSYNTH08~NOVSYNTH08

  On 11/25/2019 at 11:47 PM, cooliofranco said:

got rid of everything (space, money, usual reasons), and wanna startup with small set up that can be fun for me and my kids once they get a little order. thinking of starting with korg volca bass and korg drum. are there better alternatives in that price range that sound way better or are these as good anything else out there?

Get an acoustic drum kit.

Actually I feel that I am about to start the worst addiction. Worser than eurorack - vinyl.

So now I need a turntable and phono pre-amps or something like that? Would be nice to have just a turntable with line out, but that's probably too much to ask.

@thawkins

do it like me; I’ve been buying vinyl without owning a gramophone for yrs now  

all of my records are still originally sealed 

silentio! 

  On 11/26/2019 at 10:13 AM, thawkins said:

Actually I feel that I am about to start the worst addiction. Worser than eurorack - vinyl.

Ooof, been there. For me records were my addiction before synths. I still have a collection of maybe 200 or so. I never listen to them anymore. I tried putting a bunch up on discogs, which worked for a while, but then a few people flaked out on me in a row, so it kinda put me off. 

  On 11/26/2019 at 10:13 AM, thawkins said:

Actually I feel that I am about to start the worst addiction. Worser than eurorack - vinyl.

So now I need a turntable and phono pre-amps or something like that? Would be nice to have just a turntable with line out, but that's probably too much to ask.

Don't do this. It's a waste of money AND time.

And storage space.

Last time I checked (which was about five years ago) good quality turntables didn't come with built-in phono pre-amps. If they had one, that was a sure sign they were bad.

In fact, most turntables / record players are bad. Below 200 euro or so they're all pretty much the same basic Chinese model that is notorious for carving up your records.

  On 11/26/2019 at 1:24 PM, rhmilo said:

Don't do this. It's a waste of money AND time.

And storage space.

Last time I checked (which was about five years ago) good quality turntables didn't come with built-in phono pre-amps. If they had one, that was a sure sign they were bad.

In fact, most turntables / record players are bad. Below 200 euro or so they're all pretty much the same basic Chinese model that is notorious for carving up your records.

Expand  

I'm already addicted to vinyl  and I second this: spend money on turntable / amp / speakers or don't do it at all. There is a huge difference between second rate and good sounding stuff. Actually 200 euro sounds about right, i would have said $250-$300. 

Vinyl is tremendous. it will take your music listening out of headphones, make it something you share, make you dance more, and supports artists. 

it probably doesn't really "sound better", especially if you're getting used stuff (crate digging is really fun and doesn't have to be expensive). pitches get weird, scratches, imperfections, etc. but as i said, the more important points are the other stuff.

Yeah my main motivation is supporting the artists by paying for the music. I figured yeah I can buy a digital download, but being a software guy as a day job I know this shit will not last and I want something tangible and more or less durable for my money, so I have slowly started buying vinyl from the artists that I like. Usually this means I get the mp3s as a download too.

Plus I like the album art.

As for the amp/speakers, I already got the Neumann KH120A which are super nice and probably I will end up getting the subwoofer as well some day. So on gear side, I think I only need a proper turntable and a phono pre-amp. Thinking about a used Technics MK2 SL1200 which seems to be 500€ these days, and https://www.thomann.de/intl/ld_systems_ppa_2.htm

Let's see if this feeling goes away after a couple of weeks and I get off by just writing about my urges here.

While the Technics SL 1200 is undoubtedly a classic, that is not because it sounds good. It’s great to DJ with and very durable, but a record player meant for listening will sound much better (and be a lot nicer to your records). 

FWIW My own record player is a Denon DP 300F. Its successor, the DP 400, comes with a built in phono pre-amp. Dunno how good it is, but it’s Denon so it won’t be shit, I’d assume.

  On 11/26/2019 at 4:05 AM, acid1 said:

Why not both?  My other favorite sequencer is the Eloquencer which is basically an Elektron with more probability options. Combined with a nerdseq which also has chance effects and throw in a confundo to cross fader between the two and you have the best of all world's imo

Depending on your needs, an old TR-505 is about the same price as a new Volca Drum.  You won't be tweaking the sounds at all like you could with a Volca, but it has a great sequencer.

  On 11/26/2019 at 5:45 PM, rhmilo said:

While the Technics SL 1200 is undoubtedly a classic, that is not because it sounds good. It’s great to DJ with and very durable, but a record player meant for listening will sound much better (and be a lot nicer to your records). 

FWIW My own record player is a Denon DP 300F. Its successor, the DP 400, comes with a built in phono pre-amp. Dunno how good it is, but it’s Denon so it won’t be shit, I’d assume.

Hmm you got a point there. I only pick the Technics because it's easier for me to pick a known good thing instead of doing a research.

I found a really clean original Presenting Celestial Vibration with Edward Larry Gordon in the trash yesterday.  It's like if you pay attention to records long enough they start to find you.  I stopped actively collecting records back in the early '10s years ago but they still keep finding me.

THwakins I hope you never have to move again...

  On 11/26/2019 at 6:51 PM, d-a-m-o said:

 

Expand  

Am i the only one GASing over this one ? 

It seems pretty cool but for me it would have made more sense to either have a 5 octave or more keyboard or a desktop version of this. Seeing how it has 8 voices and 4 oscs per voice you're really gonna want to play this thing. Good to see they added 3 FX engines including lush reverbs, in my experience a dry wt hardly ever sounds good.

I've mostly been exploring wavetable synthesis with ableton's wavetable synth, the blofeld and the ericasynths black wavetable osc and it's gonna be a while before I'm ready to drop any serious money on an additional wt thing. 

  On 11/27/2019 at 6:26 PM, d-a-m-o said:

Am i the only one GASing over this one ? 

Was but there's no microtuning is there?