Internal monologue of a chronic synth undecider

The Lounge General Discussion
1

Oh fuck it I’ll buy the Minilogue XD.

Hmm, just the one LFO, mind. The Gaia 2 has two.

Yeah but we’ve been through that. The Gaia 2, despite looking like a flight deck, still contrives to find a way to require you to menu-dive. A lot.

Minilogue XD it is, then.

Didn’t MusicRadar say it lacks a HPF?

Well what about the Digitone 2?

OK that’s a very sideways move - it couldn’t really be more different from the MXD or Gaia 2.

Yeah but it’s Elektron. We like them.

Nah - FM’s not for me. But I tell you what, how about the Hydrasynth?

OK, at this point are you just offering up any and every synth you can think of?

Well, no, I’m sticking within a sort of niche, I’m not suggesting any synth.

That niche being? The DN2 is an FM, multi-timbral; the MXD and Gaia 2 are analogue/VA and mono-timbral. The Hydra is something else all together.

I suppose I meant they’re all in a similar price range. It’s not like I’m considering a Grandmother or a 3rd Wave.

The DN2 is £900 and the MXD is half that.

Well fine. What about the SH-4D?

Oh god spare us, not again. We looked at that, remember? Like, repeatedly. It has that dumb “pick it up and shake it” feature no one asked for.

Well yeah, but it packs a lot of synth in a small, affordable box.

Then why did you reject it before?

Well, Bad Gear hated it.

You’re not Florian from Bad Gear; you’re a part-time synth hobbyist, not an Austrian synth genius.

Still don’t fancy it. There’s never been a substantial update to it, the PCM range is lacking, and the save mechanism is ridiculous.

FFS. What are you actually looking for? Apart from the moon on a stick.

You know, a good all-rounder. Multi-timbral. Not FM. Minimal menu-diving. Doesn’t have backlit Skittles (© Bad Gear) for keys.

Congratulations - literally none of the options you’re considering meet those criteria.

Hey, what about the Minifreak?

(Continues forever.)

8 Likes
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This could be a summary of 90% of the external dialogues on this form. Good job internalizing them!

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I’ve been GASing my arse off recently, and this is accurate.

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There’s already so much discussion on forums about ‘what machine will pair with xxxxx’ but many don’t think it’s relevant to them so yet another thread is made.

No one seems able to make their own decision anymore … even with all the info already on the web

Luckily there is a mute function - I’d love one driven by ai , ‘ another one of ‘those’ threads - auto mute

Need a mono synth - there are already 1000’s of threads

Need a machine to pair with digitakt - already thousands of threads

Need a machine for digitakt / Syntakt / akai / blah blah blah ….

Need a poly synth

Need a sampler

Need fx

Need …yawn …

Mute

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Do you have the possibility to try one of these device? If not buy one used, so you can resell at no loss.
Or get an analog four :sweat_smile:

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That’s pretty accurate. It helps to know what features you really need (not just want). This comes with experience and depends on other parts of your setup. If it’s missing such feature, I simply eliminate it (and sometimes write it down why I did it, so I can remind myself).

For example I don’t buy anything without S&H. I also don’t buy anything that would cause me to expand my setup. Only option is to further consolidate it or at least keep it same size while improving it in some way. So I haven’t bough a synth in a year (even though I gassed over many) and even got rid of a few.