What piece of gear did you buy that you absolutely did not like?

The Lounge Other Gear
#1

The other day I was thinking about the Quasimidi 309 Rave-o-lution. I bought one in the early 2000’s after having an ensemble of machines thinking that it would be the answer to all my issues.

Of course being significantly younger and naiver I thought that German groove box would work well with my Jomox X-base 09 and Korg-ES1.

I opened the package after a work day and hooked it up to my makeshift studio (This was before the years of Youtube, and I didn’t know what it sounded like or even looked like with the power on), turning on the Quasimidi I saw that the sweet plastic blue buttons had a color clashing red LED behind them.

Not a big a deal, you aren’t supposed to judge a rave machine by it’s cover, I told myself, as I went to work on making a pattern while the x-base 09 and es-1 played some sounds. As I switched instrument tracks on the Rave-o-lution the sequencer paused and lost sync! I attempted to AskJeeves/Google to see if this was a common issue. I couldn’t figure it out, and then sold it via e-bay in about 48 hours.

That was probably the quickest equipment turn around that I have ever experienced. I don’t think I’ve ever been as disappointed by a piece of gear as that.

Anyone else have negative experiences with a piece of gear that you had some sort of hope for?

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I was gonna sell it...then I didn't....thankfully
Bad Gear
#2

Alesis Micron and microkorg. Both were a pain to edit, but good sound

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#3

Korg MS2000. Traded my Korg EMX1 for it and I thought the knobs felt cheap. Really the whole thing felt very plasticky and cheap to be honest. Also sounded thin to my ears. It did provide a pretty cool sound in one of my tracks though, but never really gelled with it.

Cyclone Analogic TT-606. Love the sound but I received a defective unit that I have had to invest tons of time into, in order to get it squared away. Actually still working on the RMA situation at the moment.

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#4

Oh man I have many a memory of sitting on the couch with headphones noodling on the microkorg.
I didn’t mind editing that much but it was definitely not the smoothest experience.

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#5

I think if i had the Ion instead of the Micron and MS2000 instead of the microkorg I would be happier. It’s crazy to see how soft synths trample both nowadays. 2019 DSP is much smoother than 2001 DSP

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#6

mpc 500
a pain to edit. crappy pads.

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#7

I had one for a bit that I purchased from a friend who was moving, definitely felt the same. I’m not really too into MPCs overall.

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#8

The Korg Monologue was returned within the week for me… I thought I would be able to squeeze a bit more variety in sounds out of it and the limited envelopes bothered me. I honestly thought the electribe 2 synth version was better as a mono synth, I might be more open to another round with it though now that I have a bigger set up and am more open to less versatile specialized gear.

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#9

Funny, I was the total opposite - I really liked the Monologue and when I think about selling it, I screw around with it and always really enjoy it… But I had a visceral reaction to the synth electribe 2. I thought it was about one of the most user hostile experiences I’ve had with hardware. I loved the idea on paper and was fine with the appearance, and I tried to give it an honest attempt, I really did - but the more I dug into it, the more frustrated I became.

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#11

an intellijel adsr modul…i went better with an LPG by endorphines
!

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#12

Korg Electribe Synth. So disappointing. Maybe I expected too much of it being an all around groovebox. But it never got me inspired

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#13

yeah, I mean honestly they share a lot of similar issues imo… but I was after flexibility at the time, honestly not sure I went to grab the monologue other than it was new and aphex twin was involved :upside_down_face: I already had an electribe 2 so I was used to the work flow and having all the different filter emulations just did a lot for me. When I found I was reaching for the electribe for mono duties more often than my new monosynth I realized maybe I should return it. I ended up landing on a Pro2 as my main mono and it is certainly a versatile bugger.

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#14

Yamaha su 700
Sample recording good and Filter ok, powerful effect but the sequencer part does not have me anymore.I sold it the next month, scammed.
Roland sp 606, disappointed because the hardware interface is ok … It’s the software that fucks
2weeks and go!

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#15

I had the sampler and was thoroughly unimpressed. After about 2 weeks it crashed and when I performed a reboot it had corrupted my SD card which was the last straw.

The MPC Live was another blunder. I hIted the tough screen workflow. It was definitely powerful but couldn’t gel with the workflow. The Force seems more my speed but it is butt ugly and still has the touch screen.

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#16

heh the 500 is a labour of love (on a device that maybe had a few too many corners cut). So many things are annoying to do but I love mine,

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#17

Elektron analogue RYTM mk2. I was never a fan of the new grey box aesthetic, thought it wouldn’t bother me, it did. ( I have an aversion to grey things)
The bugs though, holy crap! That was the reason I returned it. I needed a reliable machine for gigs, ARmk2 was not it. Maybe they fixed the bugs now, but yeah at the time, no thanks!

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#18

Waldorf Blofeld… Not the UI or encoders, but other terrible flaws. Found it unusable!

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#19

A few pedals - I really like thfe Stone Deaf Syncopy, except that both the new ones I had delivered were defective out of the box.

#20

Yamaha QX21. My first MIDI sequencer. This was when it was when it was new, back in, oh, 1987 maybe? I was new to MIDI, having just bought an Alpha Juno 1 as well. Packaged in the same wedge-shaped enclosure Yamaha used for the TX7, this little nightmare offered only a 2-digit LED display and a smattering of buttons with which to program patterns and songs.

It was not fun. However, I couldn’t afford anything better at the time, and I did a full album with it, along with the RX7 drum machine and the Juno. I happily ditched it when I bought an Ensoniq EPS with its lovely 8-track sequencer and big fluorescent display. The EPS may have crashed a lot, but it was much, much easier to use!

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#21

Waldorf Pulse 2. Thought it sounded thin and lifeless no matter what I tried. Probably didn’t give it enough time but in the 2 weeks I had it I didn’t make one sound that I felt like recording. I also couldn’t stand that that large screen was only used for giant lcd-style numbers.

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