And let’s avoid side discussions, especially about what should or shouldn’t: there has been too many flags already.
Was a bit confused by Elektron’s new platforms.
So the DT2 and the Tonverk are both new platforms, but different new platforms?
What does Elektron mean when it says platform?
Found some information in some posts and thought it might be useful to have it all in the same place.
Info from other posts:
Digitakt 2
From the initial post on the DT2 launch thread by Elektron (Introducing Digitakt II)
From the DT2 feature request thread
From the DN2 speculations thread
Digitone 2
Presumed to be the same new platform as the DT2?
Tonverk
From the initial post on the Tonverk launch thread by Elektron
Tonverk heralds the arrival of another Elektron platform, the first device and certainly not the last. It joins our family of platforms, each offering hugely exciting opportunities that we can’t wait to explore and bring to life.
The Cirrus Logic chip supports 2 ins and 6 outs, which is what the Tonverk has. It also has plenty of ram, 8GB total, along with another 8GB of flash, presumably for OS, factory samples, etc.
NXP iMX 8M Plus Quadlite (MIMX8ML4DVNLZAB) SoC (hidden under heatsink)
AzureWave AW-CM276NF Wifi+Bluetooth Module
Cirrus Logic CS42526 2ch ADC + 6ch DAC ()
Sandisk SDINBDG4-8G NAND Flash Memory (hidden under heatsink)
Micron D8CJN MT53E2G32D4DE-046 8GB LPDDR4 SDRAM (hidden under heatsink)
What I understood is that on the first Digi, there is one chip that does both sequencing and audio, while on DNII/DTII there are two, so it’s more powerful. Some code most likely could be reused.
TV is an entirely different architecture with an OS that needed to restart coding from scratch but offer a lot more hardware ressources to develop the instrument.
From my understanding, on generation 2 of Digitakt and Digitone, small select parts of the new platform is supercharging the old platform. Like connecting a new motherbrain on top of the old platform. Not entirely sure how the chips are synced and what is running on what chip, and what kind of headroom there is for future updates.
But they did say in one interview video, I think it was Sonicstate at Machina Bristronica 2024(?), that they renamed the FX page to FX to leave the door open for other effects.
I wonder how the Syntakt fits into this? Is it similar to the I or IIs? I would love for it to be possible to add the FX and bus superpowers from the tonverk to make a Syntakt II.
I love the Tonverk but do prefer to design my own sounds in a synth and being able to do that in one box with the tone sculpting power of the new FXs and buses would be incredible! A man can dream.
This reads as more ‘vibes’ than ‘technical details’. We can see what chips are used from the teardowns. Where are the “small select parts of the new platform” used in the DT2 and the DN2 that is also used in the TV?
So far from the technical details it looks like they doubled up the CPU in the case of the DN2 and added a DSP chip in the case of the DT2 neither of these feature (from what I can see) in the TV so the notion that it was a ‘soft launch’ of a new platform (if that new platform was the TV) is incorrect.
Remember a company is incentivized to not correct speculation and rumor even if it’s not true when that speculation/rumor casts their products in a better light.
Not necessarily. Managing expectations is as important as building brand equity. But I digress.
Imo “platform” also means form factor. Both of the II-s have a more or less unified size and usage logic (minus device-specific stuff). As such, the TV might be similar — once we get a “*verk” it might have a familiar shape and feel + same guts + a couple of device-specific features.
No, I think this is a misinterpretation.
“Platform” in the sense of what was introduced in the original post is the hardware architecture.
E.g. DNII has the same form factor than DN OG but the hardware is different, even if they have some code in common.
TV has a whole different architecture, that required the whole code to be rewritten, but offers way more power.
As my previous post was removed I’ll just say this.
If information about what constitutes a new platform had been clearly messaged by official means, rather than games of telephone (which everyone relied on because there is a vacuum of official information) there would be no need for this thread to exist.
I noticed it too, there was a brand new platform, and now a brand-brand new-new etc. Must be some kind of Accelerationism me thinks? Accelerationism - Wikipedia
On a serious point, this fragmentation has to be a problem for them now.
I lead reasonably sized software engineering team (about 50 devs), but due to years of tech debt and various unorthodox choices accumulating, you get a system with many, many areas that can only be worked on by 1 or 2 people, which severely limits how quickly you can implement fixes and features.
Even if we discount all the legacy gear (OT mk2, Rytm etc), that means the (presumably tiny) Elektron dev team is trying to juggle and split between: Syntakt, Analog Heat etc (old platform), DT2 and DN2 (new platform) and TV (new-new platform)
I wish them the best of luck but releasing this new-new platform for the TV only a year after their last new platform, smacks of some poor engineering & product direction choices
I wonder if the new and new-new are perhaps the same. The tonverk being the same ‘new’ platform technically but in a different form factor ? (Sorry, I haven’t kept up with any teardowns that might have happened, so I might be proven wrong).
