Hey it’s me - yes i know i tend to show up out of the blue when Polyend releases something.
As is tradition with me, i don’t do talkie videos… i just like to do music with the devices.
So here it goes:
Feel free to ask any questions that have not been answered yet and i’ll gladly help you to the best of my abilities (and knowledge).
Regarding the video: all sounds are done with the Polyend Synth, excluding the drums which are done on the Tracker+ via the PERC Engine (Taiko patch is from Synth though) and the rain/thunder and narration samples.
I’m glad it also works the other way (first pads then shift), this is quite important to me.
I’m getting interested in this as a replacement for Microfreak. I would miss spice&dice (and real knobs - encoders just don’t have the same feel), but those pads seem very playable, not to mention multitimbrality. Wavetable, granular and FM seem much more advanced than in MF, and phase distortion and reverb sounds cool. It might even replace MC-707 for a smaller setup (I can use SP-404 for samples). Just lack of EQ concerns me…
I was watching videos on the PS and close to ordering, but the 8 note max polyphony worries me. Especially since you can still get CPU overload warnings. Granted, I just ordered a Hydrasynth Explorer with is also 8 note polyphony. But, it is a single voice and always 8 note. I think I will wait and see how this shakes out, and if maybe they release a + version with more processing power.
Have to say this is more fun and immediate than tracker / tracker+ and play that I’ve had. Don’t get me wrong, those are fun and i’d like to have them back, but this is on totally different level for me.
Got my Synth today, updated the firmware. Came home played around with it for 15 minutes and now the freakin BLUE channel won’t make any sound, no volume. None. I went back to the original firmware, didn’t fix. Updated firmware again, not fixed. Turned off and on, tried multiple scenes, init scenes. No sound from BLUE. What the hell. No mutes on , mixer shows full volume on all 3 synths. Omfg.
I will wait a bit to see if this crops up for anyone before I throw it through the window. So tired of buying gear that has issues.
I’ve just got one of these. Don’t usually get drawn into a product on release but something about this-the sound, interface and price-appealed to me.
Arrived yesterday. Only played with it for about a couple of hours by the Initial reactions are good. I really like this thing. I’m currently on an ambient kick and this thing is a joy for that. It’s so immediate and playable - browsing through the preset scenes I’ve already had a lot of fun just messing around with sounds, and it was really easy to build my own from a initialised patch.
I really like the unique layout and the way it forces you to ‘play’ it. Also the fact that it’s not a groovebox and doesn’t try to be, but is not a synth in the traditional sense because of the interface.
I’ve seen a number of comparisons to the SH4d and the microfreak. I’ve owned both. My initial feeling is that whilst the SH4d has more immediate sound design options, and sounds great, this has the edge because the UX and still has a lot of depth. If you are looking for a sound module to sequence from other things (and like the Roland sound) then I think that is the better box, but if you are looking to play the instrument itself then this seems miles ahead.
Vs the microfreak it’s the same thing really. That is a good sounding, very reasonably priced synth, crazy good for the money-but again it’s not as performative or playable IMO. If you are just looking for sample fodder or to record it then it’s great, but the synth actually allows you to perform and create whole soundscapes on the fly.
For ambient it’s amazing and I think paired with a drum machine it could be a techno monster as well. Going to pair it with the model cycles later on.
Amazing that the OP-XYZ synth thing has got over 2k posts for a synth that costs £2k and still seems to have a bunch of limitation and this thread only has a couple of hundred. Think Polyend deserve a bit more love!!!
This is EXACTLY me, and so far (early days) but this works amazingly for that workflow. I like the fact that whilst you can save ‘scenes’ you can’t save ‘tracks’ if that makes sense so every time you approach the instrument it’s a new performance.
The other synth on my desk at the moment is the Elta Solar42f. The PE Synth is the polar opposite in many ways (price, size, semi modular, analogue etc), but it inspires me in the same way to PLAY it. It doesn’t do anything until you get your hands on it and start pulling out notes. I know that sounds really obvious but I’ve found that groove boxes, samplers etc don’t always feel like I am playing them, more just hitting play on them.
After reading the manual, I fear that the sequencer seems to be more on the weak side. I didn’t read anything about step/grid recording, editing or quantizing. It seems to be more of a sketch pad with realtime recording only. Is that true?
A Scene Init should definitely have gotten you out of any weird state you may have navigated yourself into. But there are some things you can still check before i’d declare it a hardware issue.
There are three things you could try and if none of those work i would send it back for repair/replacement, because that is definitely not normal behaviour
Go to Main Menu → Synths → Check if Local is OFF by accident on the Blue Synth or if the voice count is 0 by accident. This might persist even if you reset a scene.
Try a different power source - just in case the device isn’t getting the right amount of power. This can lead to completely unexpected behaviours (not just this device of course, but in general)
Try an emergency firmware flash - This can be done by holding the recessed reset button with something thin/sharp, while the device is off.
If none of that helps, depending on where you got the device from, contact your reseller or Polyend directly.
Or if you feel up to it, you can write me a private message and we could jump on a google meets call / zoom and we could have a look together.
That is true’ish. You can record steps (and add rests), but there is no editing after the fact.
The added steps are automatically quantized so to speak but you can add humanization and/or swing to it and there are different playback modes and rates.
You can play one engine at a time like any other non multi-timbral synth aka hydrasynth etc.
