Hello,
For those of you who have an MK1, does it play nicely when synchronized to an external MIDI clock? Does everything work as expected in this scenario, in your experience?
I’m thinking of getting an MK2 since I discovered it, but the unreliability of its OS made me think that maybe the MK1 is still a “better” machine in certain regards, especially since I play live from time to time and really value stability.
Cheers
Hi,
No midi Sync issue with mk1 
That’s great, thank you
Got a MK2 on the way. Was a bit scared of all the talk about bugs, but been looking at this synth for a long time. Hopefully i wont regret it. 
I know you can P-lock/automate the regular parameters pr step. But can you also do that with the x-mod and x-env?
Well, I just got one (MK2) and it certainly sounds phenomenal; one of the best synths I’ve ever heard. But mine crashes a bit, I’m on the latest firmware 1.2.3r. Is there likely to ever be an upgrade for stability etc?
It’s actually not the most intuitive thing to drive though, and I’m not really a fan of the pseudo MPE buttons, it doesn’t add much imho and would be better off with clicky (good feedback) buttons like the mk1.
Not a deal breaker.
And neither are the crashes … not yet.
Quite an achievement, really. And a future classic I would say, if enough of them can stay alive for long enough.
But I think I’m done with boutique small synth companies on the other side of the world.
similar experiences to yours. sounds great when it’s working, but knowing whether or not it’s going to work makes it essentially useless to me. holding on to it in the hopes that they can sort out the firmware bugs which must be extensive, but i’m guessing at this point there’s gotta be some hardware problem underlying that aren’t being discussed in the open.
the forum’s been dead (as in down/not available) for a few weeks now too which is not a great sign either…especially after going to the trouble of making a ‘we’re not dead!’ post there a couple months ago.
hoping for the best but who knows. Mk2’s been out for what…2 years? 3 years? there’s really no excuse for issues continuing for so long for so many users.
Yeh, the crashing is annoying but it’s not unusable as long as you’re not on stage, live, I guess.
Such a brilliant toy otherwise.
So the verdict on the mk2? Unstable and prone to crashes? Not worth the investment at this point?
Depends on your patience. I havent had that many crashes. But there is some inconsistensies in how “p-locks” works. So some parameters works as described in the manual. But some i dont get to work at all.
It sounds good. And is really flexible. But its like a big collection of great ideas, but poorly/strangely implemented.
Thanks. I don’t play live or anything like that, I mostly want it as an idea generator, making sounds and loops to sample.
I just spent 30 min on mine now. And got 3-4 pretty cool loops. So it usable even if it is some bugs and oddities. hehe.
Its really awesome for hard gritty techno melodies.
How do I check what firmware my mk2 is on?
OK, so I’m returning the Mono mk2. It’s very buggy and some features just don’t work in my hands. I have a mk1 and I’ll be sticking with that. I will add that the mk2 seems very well built and feels more solid than my mk1. I have a feeling Norand as a company might be coming to an end.
i’m hoping they’ll be able to offer me a fix or there might be another update later, idk…i love love love the sound, and really into ideas being implemented. i’m willing to hold on trying to get it fixed, but it’s very frustrating too.
i hope they’re not coming to an end, i’d love to see where they go and take things. but reliability is so huge as they’re obviously learning the hard way.
I wish there was more evidence that they are learning.
As someone who is very curious about these, what bugs are you experiencing exactly? I keep going back and forth about whether to snag a mk1 or mk2 as my only hardware mono synth.
My mk1 is fine, I don’t see many bugs or crashes at all. The mk2 just didn’t seem to work correctly. For example, I was trying to p-lock a parameter and it just didn’t work as expected. My mk1 does. It could be user error of course. The mk2 also locked up a couple times within the first 30 mins.
My own personal take on this is that they tried to pack in too many features and it has just overwhelmed the QC.
When it locked up first 30 min, did you use the stock presets, because they seem to be corrupted as mentioned upthread
No. I was using a new project.