Octatrack is a timeless enigma… 
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OT is still the most experimental sampler I’ve used (close second is Iris). At this point I think only Elektron will create something weirder than this that isn’t eurorack or a plugin.
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I wish this will happen again some day. Recent elektron seems less about “timelss enigmas” and more about “fun, fast workflow”. I am still waiting for their next “big box”…
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On that note: using OT with Iris is pretty mind blowing. Infinite possibilities for sound design, there. A timeless pair. I’d only ever sell my Octatrack to fund buying the next Octatrack.
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Yes, stay weird Elektron, stay weird…
Yep, big on power yet maybe not quite the size of the analog mkII’s…
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yeah me too. I fear its like waiting for your favourite band to release an album though. I get the feeling that OT was sort of accidental genius. obviously shit loads of work went into it but i’m not sure they anticipated the flexibility and longevity of what they’d made. really it doesn’t actually need much more to push it over the top, indi outs/modern FX and time stretch, sound engine update etc. I would be hard pushed to find another piece of gear that blows my mind as much as OT and would be very impressed if a whole new thing came about. maybe one day
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Na, I say they’ve grown old and lost their “cohones” …
(maybe, just maybe we can provoke them)
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Mostly inspired by Machinedrum’s RAM machines. Maybe this was the accidental genius?
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The old OTs MkI had a slightly more textured paint job, right? I bought and sold my first OT in 2013. Wished I hadn’t almost immediately. Then in 2015, got another (smoother paint), and will upgrade to the MkII this year, I expect. Might be old hat for some, but the thing continues to bring me much musical joy.
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Mine is like that. I don’t know how old she is. Getting old, need a more textured paint job.
I thought so. Cool! Still wish I had one with that paint job.
Yes they Def did. My first OT had that and I actually preferred it to the newer MK1 paint job. But, I like the Mk2 more than both!
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I agree with the folks in this topic who find the idea of a piece of gear becoming “obsolete” (especially after just eight years) a bit offensive. That’s like asking if we should still be buying Stratocasters and Les Pauls when Gibson robot guitars exist.
But yeah I get it, it was the title of a youtube video to get views–and this guy definitely deserves them so no harm done.
What I thought was interesting was he said the Deluge and one other piece of gear are kind of close in terms of functionality, does anyone have experience with these? Does that idea hold water? I find it hard to believe anything can touch the Octatrack, really…And I don’t even own the thing.
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Yeah the old mk1 paint was textured later when the A4/AR was released they changed the OT to the flat matte black which never looked as nice or seemed as durable.
I have a Deluge, it is a nice machine in its own right but not in the same league as the OT really - although it is a bit like comparing apples to oranges, they are quite different with the only commonality that they both sample and both have sequencers. The Deluge is more like both of the new electribes rolled into one with some +/- IMHO
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Guitars are useless and obsolete anyway. And it hurts fingers. 
Deluge is also obsolete.
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I think the issue is less about obsolescence in the conventional sense and more about being outdated, either due to newer technological developments or simply the age of the machines. A guitar is simple hardware relatively speaking, a complex purpose specific computer can become outdated in many more ways. Wether that’s from newer and better options being available or just simply not being able to repair old broken gear. I agree with the sentiment that you can do what you always could with it still, but I think most people agree with that
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Perhaps it’s nice to know that the arc of history with some technology is longer than we might expect.
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I suppose the way I see it with technology based products such as this is that if they still perform in a useful way then they can’t really go obsolete, and provided that they continue to do so eventually they will become considered “classic” like for example the TR-808 et al.
I guess the exception to this would be gear that for some reason has been superceded, like for example early sampling grooveboxes which due to low sample memory, slow audio processing times and now obscure media like zip, smartmedia, etc. makes them a bit of a pain to use. But even then if they sound good/unique someone will still be using them.
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