Oberheim TVS-PRO (2-voice SEM)

Thanks I’ll follow that thread. Probably the OB-6 is still worth getting.

I am not sure about the Sequential OB-X, they registered the trade mark but that could have just been to block Behringer.

Theres also the Abstrak Instruments VS-1, which is an 8 voice OB-X clone. It’s not shipping yet but its probably getting close.

You could be waiting a while for a desktop Sequential OB-X I feel.

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Right, that’s what I’m thinking and desktop it has to be.

I think so. And in relation to this thread, they have stated that for the OB-6, they basically dropped in the SEM oscillators and filters. And knowing that the TVS is two SEM’s with some extras, this is good to know. At one point I had an OB-6 and an SEM Pro, and in the end, I kept the OB-6. It being polyphonic, and having that X-Mod really opened things up.

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@SoundRider I succumbed (again…) :face_with_hand_over_mouth::roll_eyes:

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J3PO unboxes and plays the 2021 Special Edition

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKeA8aBELk0

Tom Oberheim announced today that he again has worldwide rights with his trademark.

Read this from Tom Oberheim’s web-site:
https://www.oberheim.com/media/music-tribe-oberheim-press-release

This may just be a thing in itself, but we can always hope that the Oberheim company will be manufacturing and selling products again. There is demand worldwide for Oberheim synthesizers.

I looked around and decided this thread, with the most recently made Oberheim product is the best place for this announcement. Making more TVS-Pros would be a good option.

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I’d be a little surprised — it’s pretty clear they haven’t really designed that production line to scale, and it’s a lot of work to redo it. We might see some more limited runs, but I don’t see it suddenly turning into a mass market product. I think it would be as likely that we see something new in collaboration with DSI, either another re-issue, or ideally something actually new — although that might be a bit hard if Tom is actually going to be at the core of the design team, at this point.

Having worked for an “Emeritus Engineer” myself, it’s surprising what is possible ! Tom’s surely got notebooks full of ideas, and a few of those are very good ideas. Spin one or two of those off to a small team of competent employees, and two years later you’re shipping a brand new Oberheim synth. What’s needed is the money and organization invested to make that happen.

So you’re right it’s perhaps a long shot. Certainly another round of the TVS Pro is possible though, you could probably fund it on pre-orders.

I remember Sequential filed for the OB-X name earlier this year. Wonder if they’ll give that up.

I guess we’ll just have to wait and see if Oberheim has a deal in the works for manufacturing, or if he’s perfectly content remaining a small scale producer.

“Tom Oberheim is a pioneer of analog synthesizers, and our whole industry owes him a debt of gratitude for his innovations,” said Uli Behringer, Founder of Music Tribe. “When we learned that Tom was still interested in making his own products with his original name, we knew the right thing to do was to transfer all of our Oberheim registrations back to him.”

wow. imagine that: doing the right thing and Behringer in the same sentence.

(waiting to find out there’s more to the story and the rights to the name expired or something anyway…)

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??? Meaning, back from Behringer??

On the other hand, let’s not go there, please. :wink:

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according to the link from @Jukka yes. Music Tribe had the rights to Oberheim’s own name.

I’m not trying to go too off-topic and start a B war. indeed, kudos to Uli if that’s all there is to the story. it is strange they had rights to the name and then just “gave” it back…? maybe there’s an agreement to allow B to make some of their Oberheim clones without suing, or something. who knows?

anyway I’m glad the man can use his own name again. hope we see more from him soon!

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… to the press release on Oberheim’s web-site. Music-Tribe had acquired trademark rights in some countries but not the USA. US law is different, i won’t detail here. Now all worldwide rights again belong to Oberheim exclusively.

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They had rights in a couple of countries, but got smacked pretty hard by the USPTO when they tried to register in the US. If they hadn’t, I’m sure they wouldn’t have given the non-US rights they’d acquired back, but it was probably a combination of “this will be too complicated for a globally-unified supply chain” and “the press on this has already been awful”.

Anyway, yes, off topic — there are plenty of other places to read the details.

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Right, that’s why I didn’t know the entire situation - only remembered the news that the Behringer Oberheim trademark bid had been rejected (in the USA).

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Oh yeah, I’m betting we will see more small rounds — just saying that it’s not going to change in price or production rate. And yeah, exactly that kind of emeritus work is what I expect we’ll see — but that’s still a bit different vs. Tom being fully involved, which is my impression, at least, of how he’s wanted to work to date, including on the TVS Pro.

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Maybe Oberheim will go design some stuff with Uli. (and thats okay) maybe Uli will help Oberheim with some manufacturing stuff (and thats okay too.)

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Reading between the lines, I would be stratospherically surprised.

They could always sell more TVS-PROs if they can iron out the parts and manufacturing challenges, along with launching whatever this new product is :